Larry left out - again

I got the word a while ago that Ward 1 City Councillor Larry McCavitt is not on the CEB interview schedule I was sent last evening.

Awww, shucks. And he did such a good job, too.

No, I'm not endorsing him - I'm just saying he did a good job.

This is obviously a little omission that I hope will be cleared up rather quickly.

In the meantime, enjoy the candidates for mayor, won't you?

PSA from Port Media

(click on image to enlarge)

CEB interviews on air

Interviews with candidates who chose to participate will be airing on PortMedia (Comcast channel 9) as follows:

Mayoral: Wednesday, October 7, 14, 21, 28 at 8am & 7pm – Holaday & Shanley

City Council:

Thursday, October 8, 15, 22, 29 at 8am & 7pm – Cameron (Ward 4), Connell (At-Large), Cronin (Ward 3), Derrivan (Ward 5)

Friday, October 9, 16, 23, 30 at 8am & 7pm - Heartquist (Ward 1), Herzog (At-Large), Hutcheson (At-Large)

Saturday, October 10, 17, 24, 31 at 8am & 4pm - Jones (At-Large), O'Conner-Ives (At-Large), Shand (Ward 3), Sullivan (At-Large)

Sunday, October 11, 18, 25, & November 1 at 1pm - All candidates

All interviews will be available on line after each has aired on PortMedia for the first time.

Interviews will be available at www.portmedia.org, www.portreporterunlimited.blogspot.com, & www.cebport.org

"Citizens for Environmental Balance undertook the creation of the questions & filmed the interviews. Part of CEB’s mission statement is “To present factual information so that informed decisions can be made regarding the future of the community.” CEB reached out to local freelance journalist Gillian Swart to be the interviewer. CEB wholeheartedly thanks Gillian for her time, dedication, & effort to making this possible. CEB also thanks PortMedia for their help in making this happen."

Me: Thanks, CEB.

Holding the Red Sox hostage

Yesterday I was clicking through the few remaining TV channels I actually get now that I have scaled back my Comcast service.

I noticed that while I still get Home Shopping Network, I still have no access to baseball games in this crucial point in the season.

Highly significant games are being broadcast on stations such as TBS (31 on Comcast), ESPN, etc.

I was told when I reduced my service for economic reasons that I would get channels up to, I think, channel 25. The Red Sox, of course, are broadcast on NESN, which is channel 51. I choked down acceptance that I had lost regular baseball viewing from my life until the ALCS and/or World Series.

If I can't afford an expensive Comcast cable package, I certainly can't afford to go to an actual game - even if they weren't all sold out.

I pointed out the fact that Comcast was holding the Red Sox hostage when the Comcast woman described the package to me. She said it wasn't Comcast's fault that NESN is channel 51.

For those of you who don't remember - or never knew - the Red Sox games used to be broadcast on channel 38, which was actually viewed on channel 6 (I have no idea why).

I object to having access to the Home Shopping Network, which mysteriously moved from some high-numbered channel to channel 3 during this whole transaction, and not the Red Sox games.

The only good thing that came out of this is that I no longer watch TNT all day. In fact, I rarely turn on the TV at all anymore.

Being poor sucks for more reasons than one would think.

A new twist to the nourishment project

The Daily News is reporting a new twist on the easements and eminent domain.

The town has begun proceedings to obtain the easements by a forcible eminent domain taking, and [state Sen. Bruce] Tarr said the objective of yesterday's talks was to get the Army Corps to accept the taking as the equivalent of the easements if necessary.

I have to run off for the day, but I wish Sen. Tarr and all good luck with that and the negotiations with the property owner who is holding out.

The reasons, oh the reasons

I have at least two examples of extremely personal examples of how people choose whom to vote for. Not personal to me - personal to the people.

There in the comments on the Daily News website we see someone who feels that (in part) because Donna Holaday sent her a campaign contribution letter with her last name spelled incorrectly, Holaday cannot possibly understand her concerns.

As I was told a couple of weeks ago by someone I ran into on Liberty St., she isn't voting for James Shanley because when he came to her door campaigning, he not only allowed the cat to run out (after she asked him to come in quickly so the cat would not do so) - but he did not help her retrieve the cat when it did run out.

As she tells it, "He ran away."

It only goes to show that, while campaigning, you have to watch every little thing you do (or don't do).

Because in this instance, every little thing you do is not magic.

No egg on their faces

So I was talking last week to someone who is in the news business.

I was expressing my hardline position that the "fourth estate" should report the news in an unbiased manner, damn the consequences.

The discussion was about (Newbury's) state Sen. Bruce Tarr, in the last 2 meetings of the MR Beach Alliance, kind of slamming me/the Current for printing what actually happens at the meetings. I mean, he actually said that some of the media was reporting "too much of what happens" at the meetings.

I was told by the first someone that my position was "naive and old-fashioned."

HUH?

I have come to realize that people don't trust - or even expect - news sources to be accurate or unbiased.

It's the 'expect' part that gets me.

What I don't expect is to be shunned and basically made fun of by a public official (or officials) in a public meeting because I'm reporting the facts.

I have an idea why Gary Davis, the counsel for DCR who attends the meetings, slighted me at the last meeting (not my imagination). I slammed his public information officer in one of my stories because she gave me what turned out to be totally wrong information.

No wonder people don't trust the government, either.

Although ... all I hear privately is that it's Davis' fault that this whole thing is falling apart. He was the one talking with the property owners about the easements.

(I call this, in my head, "Blaming The Black Guy." He seems perfectly competent to me; but I could be wrong.)

Just keep in mind that at the first meeting I attended of this beach alliance group, there were reps from Tierney's local office, I believe Kennedy's local office, someone from (Newburyport's) state Sen. Baddour's office ... and (Newbury's) state Rep. Harriett Stanley was there.

Somehow, somewhere along the line, these people all dropped out. I believe they saw right from the start that this was likely a failed effort and didn't want to be associated with it, politically.

Tarr is the co-chair of the group so he was obligated to stick it through. Fred Lucey from (Newburyport's) state Rep. Mike Costello's office, bless his heart, is also always there.

But I think Fred and Mike might also be a tad miffed at me.

Sorry, guys. I believe in the public's right to know.

The scoop on the beach project

This is all in my story in the Current, but I'll repeat it here anyway.

The sand for the beach nourishment project is coming from the dredging project.

The dredging project is partially funded with stimulus funds ($1 mil).

ARRA deadlines require "shovel in the ground" by Feb. 17, the one-year anniversary of the signing of the bill.

If the dredging is not done this winter/spring, the Army Corps will likely lose the stimulus funds for this project (I believe they could divert the funds to another project that will be ready by the deadline).

Plus, the other portion of the money was an earmark on a federal bill, which I assume also has a deadline for use, but which is probably not as imminent.

So basically if they lose the $1 mil, the money would have to be replaced out of the next federal budget.

As Mark Habel of the Army Corps said at the last meeting, the have plans in place for three contingencies: 2 beaches, one beach, no beach.

Since apparently all the people in Salisbury signed the easements, Salisbury will still get its share of the sand, no matter what.

I have heard from multiple sources, including Habel at last week's meeting, that boats - including Coast Guard vessels - are scraping bottom in the mouth of the river, under certain tidal conditions.

What do you think will happen, given all these circumstances?

Beach nourishment drowns

I just heard on the news that 2 people held out against signing the easements.

Wow.

Guest post: a squirrel story

By Steve Hutcheson

This past week my stepson found a baby squirrel in the middle of the street with one eye closed and favoring a hurt arm.

It was sitting on a sewer cover and people were driving over it.

He took her home in a shoe box that a lady was kind enough to give him. Once home, we had to figure out what to do with it so he called the city for advice. They told him to throw it back in the woods where he found it.

Although that is standard answer for things like this (see link below), you really need to care enough to dig further to see if it makes sense in that particular case. In this case, the wildlife rehabilitator said the baby would not have survived the night due to cold or predators.

The best thing to do if you find a baby animal that is definitely orphaned (see mass.gov link details: http://www.mass.gov/dfwele/dfw/wildlife/living/young_wildlife.htm ) is to call one of the wildlife rehabilators on the state internet link ( http://www.mass.gov/dfwele/dfw/wildlife/rehab/wildlife_rehab_nd.htm ) and not the city for advice.

In addition, there are also websites that tell people how to temporarily help them until you can drop them off to a professional. For instance, even taking it home would not have helped if we had left the baby outside that night in the box without bedding, she would have died from the cold anyway. So the Internet was real important for this baby squirrel from immediate care to knowing where to bring her....without the internet we would not have known what to do....

Don't call the city first. I need to work on improving that.

Per the wildilfe rehabilitator, the baby squirrel turned out to be 4-5 weeks old and had either fell or been pushed out of the nest. That is what most likely caused the arm injury. One eye was closed because it was so young her eyes were just starting to open. Her eyes just starting to open was significant since the first thing she saw was a person. So it thought people were her family and not another squirrel.

My wife and daughter tried to let her go in the same area she was found but it ran back to them for that reason (which we didn't know at the time). My wife and daughter both thought she just liked people not knowing it actually thought we were it's family.

So we took her home for the night and brought her to the animal hospital in the morning. We would have liked to keep her as part of the family but we didn't know how to feed and care for the baby squirrel and it's illegal to keep them as pets.

Here is a photo of the baby squirrel warming up in its new bed. Happy ending to this story thanks to my family and the internet!