"I would like to respond to some of the press that John Patton and the A Sentinel Party have been getting of late leading up to the November election in Willington, particularly over the water project for Hall Memorial School, their missing selectman signs and Patton’s lawsuit over cross-endorsement of candidates by the Democratic and Republican town committees. Patton complains that no one is listening to him about the alternative of a second well instead of bringing public water to Hall Memorial School. I am a member of the water committee and do not recall John Patton even once approaching the water committee directly about his concerns."
When was I supposed to attend a water committee meeting? One had not been scheduled for months. Even the members don't know when they are. Their agendas are given to the Town Clerk but sporadically posted on the website. At a Selectmen’s meeting scheduled to discuss the water main project with the Chairman of project in attendance, the Engineer went through the work to be done and the cost estimate and then indicated the cost of the water main project construction was going to be around three hundred thousand dollars. At that time, I asked the Chairman (Mark Palmer) to look into the possibility of drilling a well as an alternative to this project. The well would have been drilled to establish yield and water quality of the well. School property is over the same underground aquifer that feeds the water main. I was told by the First Selectman and the Chairman that it could be done and that was the end of that. They got out of that meeting and nothing more was done.
"Where was Patton when the water committee considered all the options, including a second well, about two years ago? The committee (and the first selectman) have answered his concerns about the second well option many times: 1) the water system in the school is archaic and held together by the constant monitoring and repairing by the school system’s head maintenance person; 2) testing of the water has to take place constantly and at great expense; 3) the water contains high levels of minerals and often looks brown (although potable, students do not want to drink it); 4) the school system would have to put in, not one, but two wells to meet the state requirements for well placement and water availability (and still have the above issues); 5) the state consent order (with a deadline of Dec. 31) requires public water be brought into the school; and 6) Patton did not even attend the recent town meeting (Oct. 3) where more than 60 townspeople attended and voted unanimously to approve the additional funding of the water project, with none dissenting nor anyone abstaining."
Contrary to Ms. Semprebon’s assertion, an engineering report done three years ago by Lenard Engineering indicated that installing a new well and water system was quite feasible and was estimated to cost around $210,000 which included replacement of the “archaic” system. The $210,000 was eligible for an approximate 70% cost sharing by the State leaving the Town share to be around $65,000. We already have one well on-site (which is where we get water from today) and we would have to drill another one. The existing well would have to be throttled back to produce a yield of less than 10 gallons per minute – not a big deal. The new well was the preferred method until a new cost came in for the water main extension bringing the cost of the project to $300,000 of which the Town was eligible for a $300,000 STEAP grant. Given my experience with the First Selectman, I should have been a little more jaded and asked what came first – the amount of the grant available or the cost estimate. As far as the Town meeting, Semprebon mistakes voting to approve the funding, which I indicated when I voted to call the Town meeting, to approval of the management of the project.
I will repeat what I had said often in public meetings. Given the information we had at the time when we voted to install the water main, it was the right decision. We now have better information, should you not reevaluate your decision at that time to see if it makes sense? You may come to the same conclusion but you owe it to the Townspeople to reevaluate decisions made when the assumptions change significantly. If we had evaluated the option of drilling the well, we could have found out that it was feasible, not feasible, costly, or that the water main still provides the best investment. We will never know now because you and your cohorts did not have the intellectual curiosity to find out.
"Patton also complains about the project not being estimated very accurately — does anyone want to remind him of who was first selectman when the senior housing project was started and went into huge overruns (the water system was estimated at $250,000 and cost over $800,000 — this for under 100 people, while the Hall School water serves more than 350 staff and students) — Patton himself?"
I did not realize that Semprebon’s memory is that poor. The project went into huge overruns when Eldredge was First Selectman and for many of the same reasons we see today in the water main extension. He does no planning, no parallel investigation of alternatives to solve a problem and does not follow through and creates an impossibly short schedule to complete a project when finally forced to do something. The Senior Housing water system is an interesting example. I will quote from an entry I made into the Willington issues blog in January 2006:
“The town agreed to construct a water system to help with Phase II and III of this project. After the HUD 202 contract was awarded in November 2004, an aggressive schedule was developed for construction of the water system. That was the last anyone saw of the schedule. After emergency Board of Finance meetings in January of 2005 to call a town meeting for funds to develop the necessary wells, contract award and drilling did not begin until 5 months later. During the last year, multiple and vocal requests for schedules, finances and projectBack in January 2006, Jack Lewis and I were ridiculed and publicly denounced by Sembrebon’s cohort, Palmer, and others for “blocking” the Senior Housing. After seeing the problems, we took the project out of the First Selectman’s hands and we formed a Senior Housing Project committee to ensure that Town commitments were actually completed whatever the cost. The water system project came in over budget and despite the housing schedule slipping by six months we received our approval to operate the water system only one week before opening of the Senior Housing Apartments. If Jack and I did not force the issue then, we would not be opening today. Due to the short timeline, we were unable to respond using any sort of alternative construction method to reduce costs and have any sort of confidence that we could finish the project. The project cost was raised significantly because we forced the contractor to perform the construction during the winter and gave him a short time frame to completion. Despite the schedule, we made time to change the project guidelines and rebid the construction project when our first request for proposals received only two bids and they were about $100,000 higher than the ultimate bid selected.
meetings were denied. We were assured by the First Selectman that everything was okay. In summer of 2005, a meeting was finally called to discuss the status of the projects. It was there that multiple questions were raised about time lines, responsibilities and funding. In January of 2006, after threats of refusing to apply for grants, the First Selectman called another meeting to discuss the project status. It was at this meeting that the Selectmen and the project engineers first saw that there was no measurable progress by the Town since the summer and the project deadline was February 1, 2007. At the point we are at, it
will take us fourteen months to complete the project - if everything goes right. We will also need to identify and commit anywhere from $300,00 to $600,000 in additional town funding between now and March 31, 2006. Despite the continued assurances of the First Selectman, this project and the $4 million dollar funding are in jeopardy.”
We did have more time to deal with the other Town commitments such as a drainage area and the septic system where they were dealt with in a professional, competent manner and came in well below budget. You would think that Jack and I would be thanked for standing our ground when we knew it was the right thing to do but I am not going to hold my breath.
"It’s also interesting that Patton created such effective news coverage of a few missing selectmen signs for the upcoming election. Since both Democratic and Republican signs have also gone missing, why are the A Sentinel Party signs of more importance and getting more coverage?"
I think part of the reason is that we actually make the signs ourselves and in this particular case, they were a little different than usual. We don’t call up the sign shop and send a check and wait for the signs to arrive. We have volunteers spend their time making them. The vinyl Daves were a significant time investment (my wife and I spent a Saturday and Sunday pasting him together) and they were also different and fun. The other difference is that over the years, we have been the victim of substantial thefts or vandalism of signs while the Democrat and Republican signs usually fall apart in the weather and blow away.
"I’m sure part of the reason Patton is getting more coverage is that Patton is a politician who knows that he can get publicity by calling up the newspapers with controversial issues; the rest of us are regular townspeople busy serving on the boards to which we have been elected, working cooperatively with all other boards and committee members (regardless of political affiliation) to get projects completed and the work of those committees and boards done, defending ourselves against trivial lawsuits, and not creating controversy where none exists."
I am sorry that newspaper coverage upsets some people. I also did not realize that I am an irregular townsperson. The newspaper reporters normally call me because a.) I will answer my phone or call them back; b.) I am typically well informed on the issues and if I am not I will tell them so; c.) I respect them for the job they do and part of that is they have deadlines to meet; and d.) I am usually able to speak in complete sentences.
I always believed that newspapers help inform the public of what happens in Town government for good and bad. One of the bigger complaints I hear is the lack of news coverage in Town. It was one of the reasons I worked to create the Town website so people could be aware of what is happening. Many people do read the minutes. I look nostalgically upon the days when we had assigned reporters from the Chronicle, Courant and the Tolland County Times.
I have been the recipient of one her “cooperative” letters and Hugo Chavez would be so proud. I would also be happy to put my record of past and present community service up against Ms. Semprebon anytime.
"Don’t forget that Patton (along with his protégé Dave Charette) sued 11 members of both major town parties, the parties themselves, our town clerk, the secretary of state, and the head of the state Elections Commission over actions by those persons that are legal in the state of Connecticut, namely cross-endorsement of candidates in the upcoming election. The very volunteers who are willing to serve their town with countless hours of unpaid work are having to defend themselves in court because they are being supported by another political party in the upcoming election and Patton doesn’t like it."
The Democrats and Republican leadership are working together to eliminate the only people who provide a choice to the voters of Willington. They do not wish to do this through an active campaign of informing voters of their platform and vision of the future and asking for their vote but through their ability to exploit a loophole meant as a reward that is used sparingly. If they succeed in eliminating the Sentinel Party (which Republican Chairman John Blessington calls “the greater evil”) there will be no reason to hold an election in Willington. The elected officials will be hand picked by the major party leadership and the voters be damned - there will be “cooperation”
"Patton does not appear to appreciate cooperation and effective functioning of the boards in Willington — just read the minutes from many selectmen meetings to see his lack of cooperation and lack of interest in what’s best for the town. The board of selectmen is the only board in town controlled by the A Sentinel Party and the only board that is dysfunctional."
I like cooperation; it is silent acquiescence to incompetence that I dislike. I also do not mind disagreement on issues. I am happy to argue points of view and then wait for a vote. As far as the Board of Selectmen being dysfunctional, I am not sure what the Board has failed to accomplish. When it gets to the point of making a decision on an issue, Jacka and I will force a vote. If I assume that Semprebon is correct, then maybe the reason is that they do not give us the same courtesy of cooperation as we give them.
Please read the minutes of the Board of Selectmen. You will then realize how often the Selectmen have to bring up the same issue to get the First Selectman to do his job. You will see how often I have warned him of issues that he ignores. Just last September, we had a meeting where I informed Eldredge and Palmer that the water main extension project would fall under the prevailing wage statutes. I was told that it was not true and that I was “simplistic” for thinking that. I also told them that they would have to revise their cost estimate because it did not assume prevailing wage rates. You will then see at the next meeting that of course it was a prevailing wage job but that the cost estimate was still valid. Well, you know the rest of the story (another town meeting on October 30th). In 2006, you can read about how the First Selectman didn’t ask for more money for public works (even though he said he would two months earlier) so we didn’t have money to meet payroll until an emergency meeting of the Board of Finance was called. Even worse, he didn’t realize we were out of money and he didn’t consider it a big deal.
"Patton, are you really interested in what’s best for Willington, or are you more concerned about what you want and what’s best for you and the major A Sentinel Party contributors? The public is getting plenty of onesided information that you disseminate — either through publicity stunts like the “missing Daves,” creating controversy where none exists (the water project), or by calling the papers."
The question sounds almost sinister. She asks about the “major A Sentinel Party contributors” like there is some big money trails to be discovered if people would just look little farther. If anyone is interested, the records are on file at the Town Clerk’s office. She would be happy to show them to you. I can’t help it if the major parties or their elected officials can not explain their positions on issues. I am not sure why I should apologize for trying to inform voters. The bottom line is that the Semprebons of the world will find out that neither I nor other Sentinel Party members caused their deficiencies. Having to defend your ideas when you are in a position of authority is part of the democratic process. I know, I have had to do it for years, which is why we now have Senior Housing, a new Library, Recreation Fields, an award winning financial office, reserve money, a working Capital Plan and money to work on some of these road issues. Yea, I think I'm interested in what’s best for Willington. I don't just say it, I have results to show for it.
