MOVING SALE

Well friends it's time to move.  Our new blog address is
captainamerica195.blogspot.com

Keep following us and you'll get an idea of what is going on here in Saratoga.

We have for sale 4 - dented and rusted shields
                            2 - Wonder Woman outfits (I may keep those myself)
                            1 pair of the Hulks ripped David banner pants.

Until the next post.

MESSAGE FROM THE SARATOGIAN 20 YEARS AND STILL NO GO!

I have been bombarded by posters and facebook friends that have posted it for their friends and have been getting messages from Saratoga Citizen to print an editorial from the 90's that the Saratogian wrote regarding changing the form of government.  So here it is.

 The Saratogian, November 1991 Editorial "Time to Trade In Antique Form of Government"

"The faces may change from election to election, but the City Council will remain an unwieldy, five-headed monster until the form of government is changed.
Saratoga Springs is a city rich in history, but the commission form of government is a tradition whose time has come and gone.
The form has all but disappeared from city governments. Yet Saratoga Springs hangs on to the commission form, the same one in place when the city was chartered in 1915. It’s like hanging on to a Model T – and still trying to drive it.
It’s time for a trade-in.
The problem with the commission government is not its age, but its set-up.
 The City Council comprises five council members, each of whom is in charge of one of the city’s five departments. A council member cannot simply be a legislator. A council member must also be responsible for a specific department; finance, accounts, public safety or public works. The only lone ranger is the mayor, although the engineering department is under the auspices of the mayor’s office.
 The four council members who are responsible for a department get to hire their own deputy commissioner, which is a full-time administrator, to run the office. The deputy commissioner therefore serves at the whim of the one council member responsible for that department.
 No one is in charge. "Mayor" sounds important, but don’t be fooled. The Mayor of Saratoga Springs has no more power than any of the other four heads of the council monster. One head, one vote. That sounds fair, but it makes for ineffective government.
Think of your workplace with no one in charge. The supervisors are left to work things out with one another. As the "Dilbert" cartoon character has pointed out, if one department needs the cooperation of another on some matter, but the matter is not one of the other’s top 1,000 priorities, it won’t get done. At least not right away.
The only hint of accountability comes every two years at election time, when council members can take credit for what got done and blame colleagues for what got stymied.
Over the years, the volunteers and the private sector in Saratoga Springs have done more to enhance the city than has the City Council. The form of government is in part to blame.
Instead of a city run by five disparate departments, one person – be it a manager, administrator, or mayor – should be overseeing the government.
Changing the form of government should be a priority in the coming term. Mayor A.C. Dake – who is unopposed this term – has said she would pursue charter revision. She should hold fast to that commitment to bring Saratoga Springs into the 20th century, before the 21st rolls around."

SAVE OUR HERITAGE or WHAT THE HECK?

After reading an article in the Saratogian, penned by non other than embattled Historic Preservation Director Samantha Bosshart, it made me wonder what other historic beauties she left out of her article.

We’ll start our series ‘What the Heck?” looking at 2 buildings that must meet Ms. Bosshart’s strict preservation standards.

First, we will take a look at the wondrous structure at 66 Franklin St.  Notice in the picture below the wonderful lines of distinct architecture that defines the Winans-Crippen style.  The famed tilting structure was not taken of the Victorian style that defines Saratoga Springs, but the Italian style of Pisa, yes the leaning style.  This building should and will be put on the showcase of Homes tours, which take place in the City.

The next example in our series “What the Heck?”  is none other than the ‘Palacio de Riggi’ which you must call the house or face the ire of Michelle Riggi’s 30 so miniature fur balls.  As seen in the picture below this home is nestled among a8 blocks of beautiful Victorian houses with magnificent manicured lawns and plantings out of a magazine.  Then, with the blessing of the SSHRC, the Design Review Committee and the Planning board, this medieval style house complete with heated lawns so her dogs have a warm place to do their business during the winter blends well with the older homes of the area.

Well we will be back with more of the ever changing styles of Saratoga Springs and our series “What the Heck”?

MAYOR "ON THE ROCK'S"

Tuesday’s Council meeting really started when the Public Comment section began.  Before that the Mayor and Commissioner Scirocco were seen leaving the bar at the Mayor’s establishment Circus Café.  The Mayor loves being under the Big Top.

There were quite a few interesting comments, one of which has been started by Johnson.  He has ordered DPW to remove all political signs because most areas have the Vote Yes signs out and they do not quite fit in his martini glass.

The next comment voiced by Saratoga Citizen Spokesperson Pat Kane, congratulated the Mayor for finally announcing, after 3 years of citizens voicing concerns over his inability to bring a signed contract to the table on the leased National Grid property, that he has one in hand (contract).  Kane for years has pointed out that the City has been getting paid at the rate of 2002’s  monthly rental fees even since the contract expired in 2008 and the City lost approximately $300,000.00 in income if the deal had been signed 3 years ago.  He had backed up his figures in prior Council meetings with realtor estimates.

Now comes the funny part.  The Mayor who it has been said has been tipping the rock glass a little too much lately has the symptoms to basically prove the point (cotton mouth).  When he finally could get his tongue off of his upper palate during his part of the agenda he was quick to point out that Kane’s statements over the last 3 years regarding lost revenue was Charter Change driven, he then smacked his lips and continued that this was just a game of politics. This is a funny statement from the Mayor, not just because it isn’t true but the political spin is being dished out by him.  Many people know that National Grid has been trying to get the Mayor to the table to sign a new lease for over 2 years and the Mayor and Shauna have been ignoring the Grid.  Just think how much money we could have had in our coffers (that’s ‘in the treasury’ just so a guy from Milton will understand), it probably is close to figure that Kane uses.

Now Hizz Honor, citing that all these facts are political hay really takes the cake.  This is from the man (I wish), who we will now call ‘Mayor on the Rocks’ who for a better part of 4 years (gee, that’s when Saratoga Citizen formed) promised to appoint a Charter Commission to look at ways to improve the current Charter, then spends close to $100,000 in court and attorney costs (he lost twice in court) to keep the citizen backed Charter Change off the ballot and in those 4 years said he would appoint a Commission not less than 20 times.  Fast forward to 6 weeks before the election and he proclaims that after the election he will appoint a Mayoral Commission to see if the Charter can be tweaked, now 4 weeks before the election he signs a lease agreement for 5 years after a group of citizens forced him to do so after 3 years of sitting on his throne doing nothing about it.  He has the nerve to tell people that they are playing political games when he is the Master of Games.

Oh well,  thank the stars there was a presentation by Izzo and the Director of the Rec Center as the Mayor was struggling mightily to pry that tongue off the roof of his mouth.

I also want to applaud Commissioner Mathiesen for voting his conscience and not the Party line on the water issue.

One last thing, if you are going to the ‘Party on the Roof’ on top of the new parking garage, please bring a parachute, just in case the deck starts to crack and fall, you can run like hell and jump off the side and pull the rip cord, but please, not with a 16oz. soda.

Just one more item, this blog writing is tiring work.  I can't keep it going without your support, so would you please donate to a food pantry of your choice?  That will make me happy and those that will benefit from the food.

CAN MISINFORMATION HELP OR HURT SUCCESS??

Is SUCCESS is in trouble.   Saratoga Citizen and voters are asking this question, if spreading misinformation and it back fires will SUCCESS be in trouble?  They have no facts to back up any of their claims.  In a hand out on pretty pink paper they had some information that you can get off of their website.

BEGINNING of SUCCESS STATEMENT

“Radical Change Proposed for 
Saratoga Springs Government 
Let’s not surrender control of our city government to a stranger. We don’t know either the new City Manager czar or how the City Manager form of government will really work.

Commission: VOTERS WIN

Proven. Look at how successful Saratoga Springs has become,  
Efficient government.  
Mayor and all Commissioners are elected and accountable to voters every two years.  
Direct responsibility. 
No tax increase. Large reserves. 
Strong, knowledgeable council 

City Manager: VOTERS LOSE

Unsuccessful. Used by many depressed upstate New York cities.

Bigger bureaucratic government costing more.

*Undemocratic. City Manager is unelected and unaccountable to the taxpayers. 
All city administrators are appointed by city manager. 

Council members denied contact with department heads and employees.   
*Significantly higher cost/taxes. Total cost still unknown. *Strong, knowledgeable council Weak council, completely isolated from the departments

 Commissioners are accountable to the voters every two years. Four year staggered terms mean it could take 4 years to clean house of bad council members.”  End of partial SUCCESS STATEMENT!

If Jane Weihe is one of the best SUCCESS can put forward in a debate, they have a problem.  A well respected former Mayor Ken Klotz made more sense.  Also, he agreed at times with statements made by Kane & Martin but did tell why he felt this form we have provides some of the same points.  One big agreement he had was, and you must remember that Mayor Klotz appointed a Commission that passed a tweaked Commission Charter in 2000.  He said one weakness of this government was that the tweaked Charter mandated some very important departments in the City.  A full time Human Resource position and a Director of open land a spaces to name a few that can’t even be implemented. 

Jane said that as drawn up she couldn’t live under this proposed new Charter.  Let’s hope if the new Charter passes we don’t lose Jane as a Saratogian, she’s too funny.

                                                   

KAREN KLOTZ IS KOO KOO FOR KOKOA PUFFS

Reading a letter to the editor in a local paper penned by Karen Klotz, one has to wonder at her comparisons to the current and proposed charters.  There will be a vote on either keeping the current form of government or switching to a new Professional/Council/manager form.

Mrs. Klotz, wife of respected past Mayor Ken Klotz has now become the bull dog face of the anti Charter Change group called SUCCESS.  If Karen had 1/3 the class of her husband she still would be a bull dog.  She takes the reins temporarily from Remiga Foy who fell ill and we all hope Foy gets better soon. 

Anyway, as I said Mrs. Klotz is the new poster face of her group and she does present a scary profile.  She believes that a strong point of the current form is that the elected officials can see first hand how their departments are run and that they can often hear from constituents.

WHAT??  If you think this a strong point of the Commission form you must be daffy.  Under the proposed form our ELECTED Mayor and 4 Council persons can see how departments are being run and will have more time to hear from constituents who hopefully won’t have to file a FOIL request for public information like our current Mayor Johnson has everyone do.  Why you can’t even go the Building Dept. to get public information because you are told they are not to talk to citizens per Johnson’s orders.  The Mayor or Council person can take the information to the City Manager and tell him or her to look in the matter and report back to them. This is easy for everyone to understand except for Karen & Jane Weihe and the faithful in SUCCESS.  Try calling the Mayor or the Commissioner of DPW and see how long it takes to get an answer.  Mayor Johnson, 23 calls, no call back.  DPW Commissioner, 29 calls, no response.  Visiting the offices are not going to get you anywhere.  Try getting past the Doberman (Shauna) and Skip’s Mexican hairless (Diane), no dice there either.  So much for access to our Commissioner’s.

Klotz’s next miss is that a citizen told her that if the change takes place we would no longer have to grovel to the Mayor and Commissioner’s during the comment period.  This is one that even Karen should understand.

There are usually about 10 people at a Council meeting unless some issue affecting a group or proposed laws being changed (old time Saratogian’s do not like change of any kind even if it helps them in the long run).  Citizens have a time limit of 15 minutes, each citizen wishing to say something to the Council has 2 minutes to say what they want.  You cannot direct your question to a specific Council person and the Council is forbidden to engage or answer your question.  You can have no impact on the agenda that night even if an item comes up for a vote that may be against public wishes.  This scenario Mrs. Klotz sees nothing wrong with and wants to keep this feature in our current form of government.

Mrs. Klotz also interjects her ideas and those of her group that are totally false and knowingly spreads this misinformation just to confuse voters.  She says ‘it’s a stretch that an appointed City Manager won’t hire an assistant City Manager” why stretch the truth Mrs. Klotz, no one has ever mentioned this except your group. She then goes on to say that the Proposed Charter says that the City Manager doesn’t even have to live in the City, the Proposed Charter says “ The Manager need not be a resident of the City or New York at the time of appointment, but may reside outside the City while in office only with the  approval of the Council.  How about if the Manager lives in Wilton?  Will that adversely affect his or her position?  We had a Commissioner that lived outside Saratoga Springs for over 30 years and never once did I hear Mrs. Klotz at a Council meeting say that wasn’t right.

Mrs. Klotz also tries to make a point that Saratoga Springs is the envy of everyone around.  Envy, I don’t know, but Saratoga Springs is a fine city to live in and changing our government structure will not make the city anything less.  The truth is that once you get an experienced Manager in position the real savings will show how many years ago we should have made this change. 

Mrs. Klotz you are right.  The voters will not be asked if they want a City Manager, they will be asked to choose a more cost savings, efficiently run government.  What we have is a 100 year old model that if replaced years ago, Saratoga Springs could be sitting on a much higher surplus than we are now.

Read the Charter; attend the informational forum on Thursday October 25^th.  Attend to get informed and make a real decision that will be best for Saratoga Springs now and in the future.