Howdy do, sweets. By the time yew git this missive, the July Fourth holiday will be a recent memory, but effen the past holds true, the sounds and smells will continue. I don’t know what it’s like at your domicile, but in Cobina’s neighborhood the place reminds one of the third Battle of the Marne without the taxi cabs.
Fireworks don’t stop on July 4 and kind of continue for days well afterward. Cobina has been awakened on many a night each July (and even June) night to the sounds of bottle rockets and other setch items being hurled skyward. Our feline friend ain’t too happy either. Our kitty Mike has a problem with the noise and finds a place to hide.
Of course, the fireworks brought out Iyam sure the 100,000 or so that clog up our roadways and pile onto the beach. I ain’t complainin’, it’s a good thing for the city, which don’t seem to have too many good things going on right now.
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Sammy Bluejay was fluttering around the beach t’other morning and sez that there are a lotta very relieved personae (in more ways than one) down at the beach now that the city has installed time locks on the lavatories over there. As yew have probably hoid, the doors were locked over there on certain days cuz the city couldn’t afford to have somebody on duty all day to lock and unlock that facility and others.
Soooooo, hearing the pleas of the taxpayers, herroner came up with the lock solution, and everyone seems sorta happy about it.
Sammy said that the porta-potties they have down there are not fit for use many days during the week cuz of the nightlife that seems to be there after dark. Too often, the cubicles are a mess not to be described here, and people eschew their use because of it.
With the locks now on timers, most people will get the ability to use the facilities without taking life and heath into consideration.
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Meanwhile, as yew probably see in this week’s edition, a second isshew has been addressed concerning the local parks and their use on Sundays. The mayor answered our queries on it after this papyrus got queries from interested parties.
One guy said his family has been having a party down in the Painter Park grove for years and things were always fine. This year things were somewhat curtailed with bathrooms closed and limited use of fireplace locations.
Natcherly, the problem is, once again, the city’s financial problems and the fack that things hafta be curtailed. It ain’t a nice thing to see the few city perks we have here fall victim to the red ink that is our situation, but there it is, and it is the new reality. Let’s hope it don’t last long, and by next summer things are better.
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Jest a small note to Merlie Mae. As yew know she was hurt in a house fire a few weeks back and has been recovering. Cobina jest wants to send a little get-well to her and hopes that she’s up and lurking about soon. A lotta people are missing her.
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The Wag was in t’other afternoon and was wondering effen the new Shore Fair that is set for later this month is destined to replace the Savin Rock Festival. It would seem so. As yew recall, herroner decided to axe the Savin Rock Fest because it costs the city tens of thousands of dollars in overtime it don’t have.
A few weeks later Marenna Amusements filled the breach and said it was gonna run a fair. Now it looks like volunteer organizations and clubs are being recruited to join the fair much the same way they did before.
Cobina was never happy that the city decided to take the Savin Rock Festival over. It was once a part of the West Haven Chamber of Commerce. That’s how it started and that’s how it flourished for many years. Then the city decided to horn in on it, and as with most things that governments get involved in, it got complicated.
Well, this thing seems to be starting out as a private enterprise and run by private individuals. Sooo, maybe equilibrium is being restored here, who knows? The city is outta the equation for the most part, and a festival of some sort or t’other is taking place in July. The city is getting a bit of the funds, the residents are getting a place that utilizes our shore, and everyone seems happy.
Let’s hope this becomes the reconstituted Savin Rock Festival and stays around for many, many decades.
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Now, I know it is very tempting to mention the recent problems with a leaking sewer pipe and the city’s finances, but Cobina will not “go there” as they say. I guess Old Field Creek was getting the brunt of the leakage as reports say the contamination was almost three times what is legal.
It’s a funny thing, the city has spent millions on upgrades of the system over the last thirty years, and still it has problems. That’s cuz much of the infrastructure was put in about 100 or more years ago, and cast iron and lead erode after a certain pernt.
Let’s jest hope the city don’t git fined for a situation it did not contribute to and one that it has been fighting for longer than many people have been alive. Lawdy knows that where once there was the nightly stench of the sewer treatment plant, things are much cleaner and fresher over there. Most of all we don’t wanna see the city fined cuz we jest can’t afford it.
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As expected the School Bored extended the contrack of Neil Cavallaro for three years. Nelly Nuthatch was at the confab, and things went perty much the way it was thought to go. Jimmy Morrissey, the former Demmie Town Chairman, voted against the contrack – the lone dissenter by the way – cuz he thought three years was too much.
Under the terms of the contrack, Cavallaro, who has presided over the decline of the school system over the last decade, will not git a raise for two years and a one-percent raise in the thoid. There is a bit of a hue and cry about that as he makes upwards of $187,000 per annum. One percent of that is a perty hefty sum.
Tennyrate, unless he determines to find new environs in the form of another job, we’ve got him for the next three school terms. That’ll be jest enuff time – maybe – to see the high school project finished, and get his name on the bronze plaque. As one is fond of saying, “It’s all about the bronze plaque.”
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With that bit o’ chatter, I’ll close this week till next, mitt luff und kizzez,