Tuesday, July 29, 2008
"The price was really wrong"
America's first public library is getting a makeover.
At its July 9 meeting, Town Council authorized the borrowing of $350,000 to remodel and make "extraordinary repairs" to the leaking library, located at 118 Main St.
The renovations will include landscaping, paving and other site improvements, which should be completed by year's end, said Town Administrator Jeffrey D. Nutting.
"I'm hopeful we can finish during this construction season," he said.
The town received seven bids, with $292,000 as the low bid and $700,000 as the highest bid, he said. The $350,000 bond assumes the town will proceed with the low bidder while leaving funds available for unexpected issues that may arise during the project, Nutting said.
Franklin has the option of paying for the repairs with money from the sale of the former Four Corners School, he said.
Read the full article in the Milford Daily News here.
FM #7 - 3 Things Town Council Mtg 7/23/08
Time: 19 minutes, 0 seconds
MP3 File
Session Notes:
Music intro
My intro
Three things today: What you need to know from the Town Council meeting on 7/23/08
- bylaw amendment to adjust notifications
- DPW update on projects around town
- Storm water presentation/fee or tax
I want to see the answers to the questions Bartlett and Doak asked.
How much will we save?
What notices does this affect?
Tombstone ads can go away, but with new web site still under transition, I would not bank on that
2 - While waiting for the presentation to be setup, DPW director Robert A. (Brutus) Cantoreggi provides an update (approx 5 ½ minutes)
I hope the insights on the various projects underway and upcoming was beneficial
3 – The presentation on Storm Water provided plenty of good information, too much to include in this podcast. What will come out of this is further discussion on a Storm water fee – tax or good idea?
I sent a question to the DPW to confirm that this is projected to be an annual cost. At $500,000, that is a lot of money. We aren’t spending anything now so going from zero to 500K might be a bit much. Can we do it for less?
PS – It did not make it into the recording but Brutus Cantoreggi did confirm that the 40 dollars and $500,000 are projected to be annual amounts.
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This podcast has been a public service provided to my fellow Franklin citizens and voters by Steve Sherlock
For additional textual information, please visit Franklinmatters.blogspot.com/
If you have questions or comments you can reach me directly at shersteve @ gmail dot com
The musical intro and closing is from the Podsafe Music Network
Jon Schmidt - Powerful Exhilarating Piano Music
Monday, July 28, 2008
FM #6 - 5 Things: SchCom 7/15/08
TIme: 26 minutes, 9 seconds
MP3 File
Music intro
My intro
Five things today: What you need to know from the school committee meeting on 7/15/08
- Citizens comment
- Final budget for FY09
- Budget for year end FY08
- Fiscal audit status
- Late bus returns
• Citizen comment from Herbert Hunter, 432 Oakland Parkway; Brick School Assoc
• Questioning agenda items, Asst Supt. Maureen Sabolinski updates the agenda immediately after
Final status on the Brick Classroom remains outstanding
2 - Intro on FY09
• Miriam Goodman updates on the final budget for FY 09 with all adjustments (override, facility transfer, etc.)
• Final budget number for FY09 - $49,940,242
I understand that the School Committee has been over this a number of times before but this is “show time” and a little more information around what the budget means would have been good.
3 - Intro on FY 08
• Miriam updates on the FY 08 budget finish, approx $200K unencumbered, likely to end up about 100K left over
4 - Intro on Audit
• Miriam continues and updates on the Audit report and action items
Again some closing comments to help the viewers would be good to frame the discussion and prevent unanswered questions
5 - Intro on late bus, Supt Ogden provides overview on the four options for the late bus
• Due to increased ridership, above the budgeted amount, the late bus can stay with support from the extra funding from pay-to-ride, Ed Cafasso comments, 41mins
Did you follow that? The budget started with a decline in ridership with the increase in fees. Now that the ridership is higher, the increase in fees will raise more revenue than they had projected. This increase in revenue is enough at this point to allow for covering the late bus. They will continue to monitor the situation closely. We get another update in one of the August meetings (Aug 12th or 26th)
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This podcast has been a public service provided to my fellow Franklin citizens and voters by Steve Sherlock
For additional textual information, please visit Franklinmatters.blogspot.com/
If you have questions or comments you can reach me directly sending by an email to shersteve @ gmail dot com or by commenting on the Franklin Matters blog
The musical intro and closing is from the Podsafe Music Network
Jon Schmidt - Powerful Exhilarating Piano Music
Sunday, July 27, 2008
"We can speak our minds"
A local property owner has donated office space to the Downtown Partnership, and several companies have supplied furniture, technology and equipment, to help the group continue its work to revitalize downtown.
"It's exciting we now have a downtown office," said Jane Curran, secretary of the Partnership and owner of Jane's Frames, 11 East Central St. Her landlords, Diane and Michael Glass, gave the partnership some office space at 9 East Central St.
The Partnership is a nonprofit organization dedicated to making downtown Franklin "an exciting place to live, work, shop and learn," and is comprised of residents, merchants, community leaders and town officials.
Dean Bank donated a computer, printer, desk and chair for the office, and Joel Carrara of Printsmart Office Products at 109 Marvin St., gave office supplies, said Curran, who donated framed art and Web access through her shop.
"We're excited to be downtown, and it's really exciting to have an office downtown and continue to work closely with Brian (Taberner, Planning Department director) and (Town Administrator) Jeff Nutting," said Lisa Piana, executive director of the Downtown Partnership and former downtown manager.
Read the full article in the Milford Daily News here
Saturday, July 26, 2008
Just words
These are just the words here.
Deval Patrick made an important speech during his campaign for Governor where he repeated the phrase "just words".
Franklin Matters because there are more than just words here!
Friday, July 25, 2008
Sponsor the Harvest Festival
The Franklin Downtown Partnership, a non-profit organization, is seeking sponsors for its annual Harvest Festival on Sunday. Sept. 21, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.. The festival will take place in downtown Franklin center, on Main and East Central streets. The rain date will be Sunday, Sept. 28.For more information on how to sponsor this event, click through here