BY DAN VALENTI

PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY

(FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, THE WEEKEND EDITION DEC. 7-9, 2018) — Pittsfield, it’s time to play the latest round of “Take The Money and Run.” No, we don’t refer to the Pittsfield City Council’s meeting of the whole dealing with the $80 million … no, $76 million … no $74 million the city is about to waste on its sewer plant, hike that will increase sewer fees by 50% as of Jan. 1. Already, you may be pleased to know, the consultants have bagged $9 million. Neither is THE PLANET referring to the upcoming hikes for Pittsfield gas and electricity customers.

[DON PARDO VOICE-OVER] “C’mon down, David Carver, Linda Tyer, Amequisika Sedzro, Diana Marcella, The Boring Broadsheet, Deanna Ruffer, C.J. Hoss, St. Mary’s, and Tyler Street. You’re all familiar with how we play the game. Pittsfield makes millions of dollars of public money available to developers in a “public-private partnership.” Once the seed money gets used, the developer says he has run into unanticipated problems. He needs more of Mary Jan and Joe Kapanski’s hard-earned and vanishing shekels. That’s when the mayor, developer, and consultants huddle in secret. At the 11th hour, they spring a “hurry up” on the city council, which OKs the money. The project then fails to deliver as advertised, the public loses, and everyone else makes out pretty well … or good, if you are not so grammatically choosy.”

It’s a fun game, one that’s been a huge ratings hit in Pittsfield.

This week, yet another high-paid consultant presented a series of pretty renderings. The drawings showed Tyler Street as envisioned by the BSC Group. The renderings featured pretty white cars, gray silhouette people, aqua bike paths, and not one $600 trash can (oh well, you can’t have everything).

———- ooo ———-

Tyler Street, don’t you know, isn’t Tyler Street. It’s a Transformative Development Initiative (TDI). Which leads us to the Bierce-inspired definition of “development” as used in Pittsfield: “n., a temporary condition kleptomania employed to relieve taxpayers of their money.” Get the acronyms out. BSC says the Tyler TDI needs some TLC, untold millions worth.

They and city planner C.J. Hoss tossed around dedicated bus stops, safer pedestrian crossing, slower vehicles, wider sidewalks, new bike lanes, and storefront improvements, all without widening the street itself. Question: How you widen sidewalks and add east-west bike lanes without widening the street? Answer: That’s why you hire consultants. Pay them enough, and they tell you what you want to hear.

No one from the city mentioned how much has been thrown into this latest sinkhole. They only told THE PLANET that “capital funds were set aside years ago.” Yeah, when the electorate was asleep, a slumber from which they have yet to awaken. On Thursday, the city held a CYA public input session at Morningside School. They were careful to have the meeting at 6 p.m., a time when most working stiffs had to get home from work and start dinner.

Amequisika “Sike” Sedzep from The Dick and Jane Reader by way of Ghana has been tagged as the “Economic Development Professional.” Sedzep is a “TDI fellow” at MassDevelopment, itself a Frankenstein creation brought to life in the lab of state bureaucrats at Mass Inc. Don’t ask.

Does THE PLANET have to translate what all this gibberish will mean for the Kapanskis in the end?

Diana Marcella, head of the Tyler Street Business Group, bragged of Sedzep, “I helped pick her out.”

Ouch.

———- 000 ———-

Into all this, comes North County developer David Carver.

Stop us if you’ve heard this one before.

Sedzep helped Carver secure a “bridge loan” of $385,000 so he could buy the former St. Mary’s Church property. Why Carver wouldn’t be required to put up his own money THE PLANET need not explain. This is Pittsfield.

Immediately after mayor Linda “Two Cents” Tyer and eight members of the city council (not Melissa Mazzeo or Kevin Morandi) let developer Richard Stanley commit the perfect murder, Carver went to The Boring Broadsheet crying about running into unanticipated problems with St. Mary’s. He wants taxpayers to fund millions in infrastructure improvements. Carver claims he’s surprised to find the infrastructure at the century-old property to be “dated.”

Carver’s also asking for TIFs and exemptions from all taxes for five years.

Stop the presses.

After that, we’ll hear that if he doesn’t get what he wants, the entire project will be jeopardized and Tyler Street will implode along with Jules Verne to the center of the earth.

As Yogi Berra might say, “It’s deja vu all over again.”

Have a great weekend, everybody.

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“Acquisition without effort leads to a devaluation of knowledge” — Sir Tiberius Fruitjuice.

“OPEN THE WINDOW, AUNT MILLIE.”

LOVE TO ALL.

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