CATCHING YOU UP ON SOME THiNGS YOU MAy HAVE MISSED
By DAN VALENTI
PLANET VALENTI News and Commentary
(FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, TUESDAY, APRIL 28, 2015) — While you were out, THE PLANET thought you would like to know:
— Keeping the Fat on the Land: For a little while, somehow some way The Pittsfield Public Schools managed to survive a dreaded personnel crisis. After deputy superintendent N. Tracy Crowe left Pittsfield for sunnier climes (and what clime is not sunnier than Pittsfield at the moment?), the PSD ran without the position being filled. Gasp!! THE PLANET wonders if anyone noticed. Could it be that this position, and the other assistant, deputy, associate, junior-grade, second-in-command, auxiliary, and subordinate superintendents, each making 100 grand or so, are actually not needed for the administration of a school district? You will breathe a sigh of relief to know that Supt. Jason “Jake” “JIV” McCandless got on it right away. So get this. JIV made the case for Morningside Community School principal Joe Curtis to take Rowe’s job. “He’s a very politically connected person,” a school department source told us. As principal of Morninside, Curtis made about $90,000. His new gig will give him a $25,000 raise. Curtis will make $115,000 plus bennies, which include five weeks of vacation, travel reimbursements, and a “mobile communications allowance.” Total compensation? North of $150,000. This sacrificial salary prompted JIV to boast that the salary represented a “substantial savings” for taxpayers. War is peace. Love is Hate.
— Everything Is Coming Up Roses: THE PLANET will give you the Reader’s Digest version of this financial whopper. Not long ago, the Profiles in Courage on your city council gave a presentation of the annual “7 O’Clock Follies,” also known as the financial review as demanded by the !New and Improved! city charter. Part of the “Follies” is the yearly exercise in Good Cheer led by the city’s “independent” auditor, Tom Scanlon. The “independent” Mr. Scanlon pronounced these words about Pittsfield financial condition: “Everything looks good.” Yes, that is a quote. “Everything looks good.” Several choruses of “Happy Days Are Here Again” were followed by champagne toasts and a line of dancing girls. See, taxpayers, there’s nothing to worry about. Your “independent” auditor told your councilors: “Everything looks good.”
— ‘Not for the Feint of Heart’: That was a quote spoken by Supt. JIV back in March, referring to his grim, dire, foreboding, forbidding, dour, harsh, churlish, surly, sour, threatening, and menacing school budget prognosis for the upcoming fiscal year — FY16 — that begins on July 1. What could all this mean? Will the schools have to get rid of the fatty tissue at the top? Will the assistant’s assistant’s assistants be sent packing? Will schools close, ceilings collapse, and a Nepal avalance barrel through Mercer? Thankfully, nothing THAT serious. What McCandless means is that all $4 million in pay raises will remain in place and the school will be getting millions more than it did in FY15 (a budget hike of nearly 4% when the dust settles). You see, for JIV, only getting a couple million more represents a fiscal emergency. He didn’t come right out and call Mary Jane and Joe Kapanski “them lousy cheap bastards,” but he might as well have done it. To hear JIV speak, the taxpayers have been shirking in their duty to “support The Children” lo these many years. Anyone see a disconnect here?
— Two, Two Mints in One: Though every impartial analysis suggests that Pittsfield’s declining overall population and school population cannot support two high schools, The Suits approved $120.8 million in new borrowing to build a new Taconic High School. Nothing new or surprising there, but big plan$ for PH$ may have slipped through the crack$ unnoticed. They’re not letting figures out at this point, but THE PLANET got a look at a secret document that is eyeballing a renovation in the $60 million range. Officials won’t publicly comment much less admit the estimate is even out there. As Bill Hines Jr. told councilors before their vote on THS, Taconic and “other schools are in deplorable condition. … We cannot let the next generation down.” Hines, of course, is a young adult born on third base, but he thinks he hit a triple. One might point out the reason for the “deplorable condition” of schools is that the city has not done its job with routine, regular care and maintenance, despite having not one but two maintenance staffs, with one reserved exclusively for the schools.
— Pothole Payoff: The city recently accepted $207,177 from the state for emergency pothole repairs. It’s part of Gov. Baker‘s Winter Recovery Assistance Program. Public services commissioner said the money could be used for pavement patching, buying rounds of drinks at Lach’s Lounge, sign repairs, greasing palms, sign repairs, and curbing. He mentioned nothing about fixing potholes.OIP, or “Only In Pittsfield.”
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“So I said to my bartender, I says ‘Hey, lookie here. Set me up with one bourbon, one scotch, and one beer.” — Johnny Lee Hooker, (1972).
“OPEN THE WINDOW, AUNT MILLIE.
LOVE TO ALL.
The Deputy Superintendent hire… Joe Curtis.was unecessary. The Fat at the top is overkill, and should be cut ahead of any School Services.
This mayor and the last one were so focused on building new parks and schools that they forgot that roads need to be kept up with. It is too bad that if the mayors were not aware of the deteriorating roads that there was no one knowledgeable enough to point it out to them. So sad.
Looks like they are putting in the finishing touches on the 4 million plus dollar Common park system and there are plenty of new walkways there if people would like to see what flat paved surfaces actually look like. And another little beauty of a park near the bus station which seems like it was just done over a couple of years ago. These for some reason are the priorities.
Money for roads?? Not so much. Just not that important to the mayor. What an absolutely abysmal failure as a leader of a city. It totally blows my mind that he would run again with the prospect of probably being totally humiliated by the vote totals. Unless of course, he knows something we do not. Has he got more rabbits he can pull from his hat? Does he have a stash of votes somewhere that only he knows about? does he believe that all those pay raises will translate into votes?? For him?? If I am a teacher and I now have my pay raise in the bag, what incentive do I have to vote for him? None.
You are so right Dusty. He is an abysmal failure.
That racket really starts at the state level, generous grants for “improvements” that are money-makers, while basic services and maintenance are considered an encumbrance. It’s “money laundering” when you shield the money you earned in your bank account from tax, but funneling tax money into bank accounts is called “public service”.
Wilson is correct. The Feds began the grant game in the 60s part of LBJ “Great Society.” Pittsfield accepted Fed grant money and tore down all of downtown West Street.
Then the State got in on it. All these state grants usually are for work that didn’t need to happen or at least happen in such a way.
The problem with these grants is that they come with conditions. On state level it is why Pittsfield has so many group homes, drug addicts, and the like, whom you can see every day in full force downtown.
I don’t like talking this way but my frustration gets in the way, Pittsfield has cut its own throat.
You are so right, Gene! And along with all those conditions you stated, add Section 8 housing. I understand that Pittsfield has one of the highest number than any other city in the state.
And I learned this from DV when he had his radio show. He had a fairly long segment about welfare, food stamps, etc. It blew my mind at the time. To think we were selling our souls for these grants.
Why didn’t our fearless leader Obama come forward last night and demand that parents get their children off of the streets? Do you think if this was happening in Michelle and Barack’s neighborhood, it would be allowed to go on all night scaring the good people of the city and destroying property? The leadership of this country just doesn’t exist and in fact enables the violence. The mayor of Baltimore should lose her job for coming out and saying “we need to give them space for the destruction”. What mayor of a city would say something that crazy? She should lose her job, but will not since she is a Democrat.
One mother was seen punching and screaming at her kid who was wearing an ISIS like hooded black outfit to stop the looting and violence. Social media also seems to be behind the violence promoting a “purge” for when the children got out of school.
Not to worry Pat, Rev Al Sharpton is due in Baltimore today.
Oh great. The guy who likes to fan the flames.
I personally think the feds need to come in and clean up this disaster of a city called Pittsfield or the “pitts” as many people have no problem calling it. The corruption is out of control. The corrupt school people brag about what they are doing to local taxpayers. This is how bad this city has become.
I want a job in the school system. But I am waiting for the Assistant to the Assistant to the Deputy Superintendent to the Assistant Superintendent’s Deputy to the Superintendent’s job to open up. That way I am assured of a big fat salary with no work requirement. That will give me time to focus on the ‘Church of the Valenti’ so I won’t have to pay taxes either.
Good luck with getting a job in the Pittsfield Public School system. Many have tried and so many have failed since they mainly let friends and relatives of the corrupt school people in their exclusive club. Their hiring system is corrupt. They will invent do nothing jobs for their buddies. This is why I laugh when they say the new Taconic will need air conditioning when supposedly the school will be occupied during the summer. By who? The adults who can’t get out the door fast enough when school ends in early June?
Pat please prove your point. You seem to blame Obama for all the problems in the world.
Obama is in a powerful position to influence these young people toward positive outlets and to help them in positive ways, but he only focuses on making them believe they are victims. He reinforces this victim mentality. Today he begrudgingly admitted he needs to help get jobs in the area to help these people in practical ways. It’s about time!!! If he has been so worried about this population of people and knows they have been suffering for years, he could have done far more for them before now. Instead he has been focusing on immigrants, gay marriage, and climate change as his top priorities and this country has been suffering from his single minded obsession on these topics. Nothing else has mattered except his special interest agenda. His solution to fighting ISIS was to get good jobs for these young people so they won’t want to join ISIS and kill people. He could make this leap in imagination, but not apply it to the people in these poor communities who are beaten down by poverty and realize that helping them with employment might solve some of their issues of drugs and crime and hopelessness. I guess I just don’t understand how Obama’s mind works or doesn’t work as the case may be.
This is why out next president needs to focus on the needs of all Americans not the favored few and their pet projects like green energy and this insane fear (which we know is all based on promoting green energy) that we will all die tomorrow from climate change. It’s outrageous!!! We have real serious issues in this country and this president is just not tuned in to what they are.
Not that it is the only reason that I would and will say Councilor Simonelli gets the best Councilor award for at least trying to fix his ward seven roads, and now Pecks Rd is decent for travel.
But I thought that the councilor’s weren’t responsible to request the pothole repairs. Are you sure it wasn’t the Mayor’s Office and Bruce Collingwood ? Election year!
If you seen the Dan Valenti show last Thursday night on PCTV where his people traveled and filmed Pittsfield roads in all their glory holes you would know why they are being fixed. He embarrassed the hell out of the mayor, especially when he showed the mayors road all flat and pretty as a contrast.
Great show and it finally got the mayor off his ass.
I don’t know who is more incompetent The Mayor of Baltimore or Tes? Quite frankly it’s darn close.
Here is my Mayoral Dream Team
Mayor: Craig Gaetani
Director of Adminstrative Services : Doreen Wade
Of a public Services : Dr. Wang
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I don’t get you jimmy gee. First you were all squiggy this and squiggy that. Now you lick the boots of tyer. Hey next time you talk to her tell her there’s a new invention out called a toothbrush. Man she’s got some toll house morsels.
no comprendo Nota? Do you mean Commisioner of Public Services?
What did you think it meant Liver? The road guy!
Maybe you two didn’t see the Planet last Thursday? There was great camera work by the Planet and Mr. Gaetani might want to consider that person for the P S C currently held by Clownwood and Dortmund.
This blog kills me! I love all your crazy input!
Anyone interested. A toilet on outer Wahconah St. Just sitting on a hill for the taking!
Just driving around the filthy city, must have seen at least four dogs unleashed and many more on leashes dropping doo on lawns and city ways. Where is the Health Department and Animal Control.
Good luck Discreet. Pittsfield is a haven for irresponsible pet owners. Don’t bother to call animal control or the PD. You will get nowhere.