Back to Cottone

[oldetowne]

There is a rumor circulating that the town is seeking to acquire some property from the neighbors on Westway and/or Church Street to build a new parking lot for Cottone Field.

This is probably in response to the "recent discovery" that the current access to the field is not ADA compliant, as well as the "enlightenment" that it would probably cost tens of thousands of dollars to install lights all along the existing paths to get to the parking lots.

Wonder if this issue is going to be this year's immediate pre-election surprise.

[cruzrt]

The Board of Education has a topic on their agenda for May 9th that is titled approximately "Cottone Field Lights". What's this all about?

[oldetowne]

Bonnie Therrien, Dan O'Connor and others are coming in to get the board's approval of a schematic lighting plan so that they can go next to P&Z. Lights at Cottone by Labor Day. You heard it here first.

[cruzrt]

Does anyone know what the Board of Education meeting said last night about the Cottone lights? The Cable TV transmission was not working last night for Channel 16 (again), and I was unable to get over there to the meeting.

[Dr.Ken Sokolowski]

The BOE, the Town, and Cox Cable should be ashamed about the state of the signal and low reliability of the broadcasting of these important meetings. I was sufficiently annoyed that I drove to the SDMS to see what was going on.

Apparently there was some accident which damaged the cable (outside) that prevented it from being transmitted, I was told. I was also informed that the video tape fo the entire meeting would be broadcasted at the usual times, though I added "if the taping" is successful this time.

I got there to hear the last half of a "presentation" by Bonnie, Suppicich, Cottone, O'Connor and some contractor (?for the lights) and their responding to questions from the minority side of the BOE table (in particular Penny and Matt).

NO action was intended to be taken last nite; this was only the hearing from the public and the presentation by the proponents and a quizzing by the members of the BOE. There was no significant deliberation among members of the BOE in regard to what they heard; there was no debate among them. This was just a "information/opinion" gathering session.

[ Action will be taken on the proposal - to grant permission for the lights to be installed, etc., at the NEXT BOE meeting on May 23, same time, same location. At that meeting there will be one more opportunity for members of the public to address the BOE about this issue. When will the public hear members of the BOE discuss the issues raised by the non-BOE speakers? It should come in the discussion period following the formal motion/second of the proposal. Members of the public could always attempt to pry from each member of the BOE their ideas and inclinations about this proposal before then. ]

Following the presentation, most of the proponents left, before the final public comments section. This meant that none was available to wait till the last moment in order to make the usual derogatory comments about the essentially inactive WTXA or any of its members. Three, maybe four, people spoke at this time, myself, a Mrs. Griffin, and a Robert Young. I learned later that no one spoke about the lights issue in the first comments opportunity that evening. I look forward to viewing the tape of the meeting in its entirety on Mo/Fr 2:30PM & Tu/Th/Sa 7:00PM.

I will post an elaboration of my comments another time, except to report now that I said that the lights on Cottone Field will indeed be installed and used; I urged the BOE to assure that the process for raising all the needed funds (for installation, use, and maintenance) be squeaky clean and ongoing, so that no costs will default to the taxpayers if and when "privately raised" funds fall short as the politicians have promised.

[RGarrey]

Foot Doc, you are right, the signal quality that we have been getting from COX Cable for our Public and Government access channels has been horrendous lately. We have been getting promises for years that it will improve the quality, but it continues to only get worse. Cox has stated that it is working on the issue and now hopes that when we move to the new studio in June that they will be able to correct the problem. If the signal is not better then we will be asking the entire community for help in forcing COX to fix the problem.

As far as the meeting on Tuesday the problem was a broken connector on the cable in the auditorium that feeds the signal to Cox. Hopefully they will have the cable fixed in time for the next meeting.

[cruzrt]

The BOE meeting of last night (May 23) was supposed to complete the topic of Cottone Field lights. Does anyone know what actions they took?

[SyZyGy]

With hardly a clause
despite its flaws
in knee-jerk fashion
the Board said okay
to plans for lights
with hardly a pause

[cruzrt]

I got a look at the videotape of that BOE meeting; why is it that only 2 or 3 of our elected BOE members even commented on the topic? And, it was admitted that the number of events to be held under the lights is open ended. That's a big red flag that we all need to pusure (as long as the elected BOE doesn't seem to care).

[cruzrt]

The Lights were on the agenda for last night's Council meeting, but there was no television signal on cable. Does anyone know what happened with the field last night?

[cruzrt]

I've gotten an answer, albeit 2nd hand, to what happened at the June 5th Council meeting re: Cottone lights. The issue did get passed along to P&Z for review. But, there is new and interesting info. Seems that 1 of the Councillors (don't know which one) raised questions about the overall funding. And, Mayor Morin responded that recurring maintenance and related costs would not be handled by the private boosters group, but instead should be taken care of by the town. I trust the person that told me this. I'm also not surprised that this new turn of events would mean more bucks out of our local taxes.

[oldetowne]

I've heard essentially the same thing. The issue was sent to P&Z for an 8-24 referral, but not yet for a site plan approval or special permit or whatever it is. They will just be asked whether it's a good use of town property and won't get into the specifics at that point. That will have to be done after a formal application by somebody.

As for the payments, I think thousands of people in Wethersfield will be saying "I told you so" in unison when the town starts paying the bills.

[cruzrt]

The Council, BOE, P&Z is out of control. The "public-be-d**ned"; they're going to get those lights put up no matter what. They have succeeded in driving the neighbors out of their homes. In the last 3 years, more than 1/3rd of the neighbors on Westway St. there have sold their homes. That's not normal turnover.

[cruzrt]

The Town Council has the lights on the agenda for July 17th. The Town Manager Weekly report that came out on July 14 says that there is additional information included that is not in the Council Agenda packet. But, that additional information did not get into the Web version of her Weekly report. I wonder what the Councillors get to see while the public does not get to see.

[cruzrt]

So, now it's official. The Town Budget (that means us taxpayers) will pay for the maintenance of the new Cottone lights. Morin and the Boosters swore up and down that the town would not be responsible for ANY costs for the lights. They tricked us. Is anyone surprised? When the Mayor appears on the voting machine this November for State Legislature, remember that.