The Dracut Community Preservation Committee is proposing to purchase the land behind the Richardson Dairy Stand, located on Bridge Street, to build affordable housing for seniors. We need your help at the Nov. 5 Town Meeting.

Funding for this purchase comes out of the Community Preservation Committee account designated ONLY for affordable housing. These funds cannot be used for any other purpose.

I would like to provide you with important information regarding the project. I’ve attached the Conceptual Plan showing 60 units of elderly housing.

Greenmont Concept 10-15-12•

The Community Preservation Committee would like to purchase the land at 17 acre parcel, behind Richardson Dairy (known as 144 Greenmount Ave) and one of the family members’ house located on Bridge St. (1530 Bridge St). We would like to turn the property over to the Dracut Housing Authority (DHA)

• The town has not built affordable housing for seniors in 20 years and there are 200 people on the waiting list.
• The CPC, DHA, Finance Committee and DHA Executive Director Mary Karabatsos support the purchase 100%
• The DHA will be responsible for the development and Mary Karabatsos has been working in that direction.
• The property is located on a bus line for public transportation.
• The property is within walking distance to medical services, banking institutions, parks, shopping, and town offices
• The proposal is to build up to 60 units of single story cottage style units
• In terms of size, units will be 22 X 29, with a 10 X 16 three-season porch
• All units will be handicap accessible.
• All units will have stackable washer dryers.
• We are also looking build a Community Building to include an office area, a meeting room and a community room for community meetings.

In addition to this information, you can also view a video from the Oct. 16 public informational session on this proposed purchase and project. The video was filmed as part of a jointly sponsored broadcast of the Community Preservation Committee and the Dracut Housing Authority. This video will be rebroadcast on Dracut Access TV, Ch. 99, on the following dates:

Sundays at 2 PM
Tuesdays at 3:30 PM
Thursdays at 5 PM
Fridays at 8 PM

Once this show has aired you can view it anytime on Dracut Access TV web site under video on demand show title CPC Public Hearing 10-16-12 http://www.dracuttv.org/videoplay.php?show=21

Thanks
Brian J Bond

See Stephen King in Rare Personal Appearance

Tickets Available for Dec. 7 Event with Legendary Author at UMass Lowell

LOWELL, Mass. – If you love a good scare, you want to come to UMass Lowell for a rare appearance by Stephen King, whose words on page and screen have thrilled and chilled fans for three decades.

For one night only, Friday, Dec. 7, King will take to the stage at the Tsongas Center at UMass Lowell to read his work, answer questions, discuss his passion for writing and offer advice to aspiring authors. “A Conversation with Stephen King” will be moderated by Andre Dubus III, bestselling author and professor in UMass Lowell’s English Department, the program’s co-sponsor. King’s appearance marks the debut of the new UMass Lowell Chancellor’s Speaker Series.

General admission tickets are available to the public for $30 (plus $2 facility fee) and may be purchased at the Tsongas Center box office, www.tsongascenter.com and 866-722-8780. Admission is free for UMass Lowell students with valid ID who obtain tickets in advance at the Tsongas Center box office. At least $5 from every ticket sold for the event will go to a new scholarship fund that King and his wife, Tabitha, will endow for UMass Lowell students. King will donate his speaking fee to the scholarship fund.

Information on event sponsorship opportunities, which include preferred seating and admission to a private reception with the author, is available at www.uml.edu/Chancellor/Speaker-Series/Sponsorship.aspx.

In addition to the Tsongas Center event, King will hold a special master class for UMass Lowell creative writing majors during his visit to the university.

King’s nearly 35-year literary career includes publishing more than 50 full-length books that have sold more than 350 million copies, as well as many short stories, essays, anthologies and novellas. King’s early thrillers, like “Carrie” and “The Shining,” put him on the map, not only as a writer of popular horror novels, but also one whose work could be successfully adapted for films and television. More than 50 of his works have been turned into movies and miniseries, and many have garnered critical success, including “The Shawshank Redemption” and “The Green Mile,” both of which were nominated for multiple Academy Awards. King made his directorial debut with “Maximum Overdrive,” which was based on one of his short stories, and collaborated on “Ghosts,” a 40-minute music video with Michael Jackson.

King, who also published work under the pen name Richard Bachman, is best known for crafting tales that terrify. But he is also the author of nonfiction books like “On Writing,” his self-described “memoir of the craft,” and “Faithful,” a chronicle of the Boston Red Sox 2004 championship season co-written with Stewart O’Nan. Last year’s “11/22/63” was King’s first work of historical fiction, set around the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. King has penned columns and opinion pieces that have appeared in publications and websites, including Entertainment Weekly and the Huffington Post, and he has made several TV and movie appearances. His body of work includes comic books, audio books and the novella “Ur,” written exclusively for release as an e-book for the Amazon Kindle. King is the recipient of numerous honors, including the National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters and the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Award.

UMass Lowell is a comprehensive, national research university located on a high-energy campus in the heart of a global community. The university offers its more than 16,000 students bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees in business, engineering, education, fine arts, health and environment, humanities, sciences and social sciences. UMass Lowell delivers high-quality educational programs, vigorous hands-on learning and personal attention from leading faculty and staff, all of which prepare graduates to be ready for work, for life and for all the world offers. www.uml.edu

Traffic on 495 at 6:30 this morning was almost as full as any other day…guess there are many more essential private sector employees than non-essential city,state employees.

If Dan Lahiff, the Water Dept. Director hasn’t taken home (or sent one of his employees ahead with it) a city owned generator yet,can I put dibs in on one? Along with the worker and gas to run it also, please.

With a $22.5 million dollar budget that includes $700,000 in Overtime and a just announced grant of $900,000, a City Manager “Contingency” Account of $300,000 and being only 4 months into the budget cycle one has to wonder what made Marty Lorrey and Rita Mercier cave after voting to cut $100,000 from Police Overtime to approve restoring $87,000 to the budget that they first cut? Maybe bullying by the Mayor on his Aides Website helped after all? Joe Mendonca and others showed common sense in stating that the money should have been found in the already approved budget or the request brought back later in the fiscal year. The BS that it in anyway “handcuffed” the Superintendent is nothing but Political Spin.

Give the Manager credit, he wanted $800,000 in Police overtime and he comes real close to it with this additional $87,000…how much money does safety cost? At what point do we say work with what you have?

Bernie Lynch no doubt is a tremendous Manager when it comes to finances. However when it comes to running the various departments you have to say that he falls short. Between the Parking dept, Water dept and library the lack of proper supervision and attention shows. Why don’t we have Ralph Snow or Adam Baacke has the Asst. City Manager for Operations and have one person in charge dealing with all these dept. heads. In the past it seemed to work.

Even if Liz Warren loses in Lowell, if the loss is less than what Martha Coakley lost by, the spin will be the Mayor and Councilor Nuon have shown the ability to get people out to vote for who they support. It won’t be that Councilor Mercier or State Rep. Nangle had any impact.

I’m still betting on Brown to win Lowell and by more than what he beat Martha Coakley by. Jack Mitchell and I have a Lunch wager on this one.

My post on Erik Gitschier deserving and outside review certainly has drawn a lot of responses that reflect the infighting and poor morale that plague that school. If the Mayor and combined boards are set to go along with the Dog and Pony show questioning candidates, I hope someone has the sense to ask, What will you do to improve the communication and the overall morale at the school?

As Jack Nicholson said in the Batman Movie “This place needs an enema” and in my humble opinion it has reached that point at the Tech. Not only does the Superintendent need to go but the Dean of Discipline and a few other Dept. Chairs along with the existing Union leadership all need to go and a new team put in place. Otherwise NOTHING will change! Keeping one over the other will just make a bigger, meaner (if that is possible) divide.

If you don’t subscribe to the e-edition of the SUN, you should. Not only can you read it wherever through their mobile device appts. but from a pure technology point their ability to translate to 13 languages (and they are working on adding both Khmer and Cambodian translations) is pretty impressive. You also get to email any story, create a pdf of any story and share these as well.

All Carriers have cancelled pick up so closing the shop at 2:00 and headed back to Lowell. I’m fortunate I can work from home so there I’ll be!

Be Safe!

SPECIAL MEETING NOTICE

Notice is hereby given, as required by Rule 6 of the City of Lowell City Council Rules, that the Lowell City Council will hold a Special Meeting of the Lowell City Council in the Council Chambers on Tuesday, OCTOBER 30, 2012 at 6:30 PM. The purpose of the meeting is to discuss matters pertaining to the City Manager, including but not necessarily limited to:

UNFINISHED BUSINESS
1. Ordinance-Amend Ch. 272 re: Annual Sewer Use Charge

CITY MANAGER
2. Vote – Authorization for Greater Lowell Technical High School repair project

3. Capital Plan
- FY 13 Updated
- FY 14-17 Proposed
- Discussion regarding School Facilities

EXECUTIVE SESSION:
4. Executive Session regarding contract negotiations with non-union personnel, City Auditor.

By Order,
Patrick O. Murphy

Michael Q. Geary
City Clerk

sunLocalNews

According to today’s Sun “Greater Lowell Technical High School’s Human Resource Department and the school’s attorneys are following up on the superintendent’s statement at a public meeting earlier this month that she feels as though she’s being harassed by a School Committee member.’

School Committee member Erik Gitschier who is the member in question
said he has made two requests to Chairman Victor Olson requesting an independent, third party to investigate the matter.

In order to be fair to all involved a third party from the outside needs to be brought in to address these charges. The Supt. has a close working relationship with the Schools Lawyers and the Human Resource Dept. works for the Superintendent.

while they might be totally unbiased the fact that any sort of bias can be attached to them, makes it appear unfair to Erik Gitschier. These are far to serious charges to allow any potential appearance of bias or favoritism.

Erik Gitschier’s political and to a great degree his professional life is at risk. He works for a Municipality, if he is found guilty of harassment and/or gender bias it could effect his job in a negative way.

The Chairman owes him and all members an independent outside the building investigation into these charges.

I’ve attached the Lowell Sun Story By Sarah Favot (a great feature of the e-edition of the Sun) for your review.

Sen. Brown received some endorsements from the Lowell Police Unions today before he met with the Lowell Sun.

Chris Scott in his column Blog has the story on the Sun Meeting.

If your not familar with some of the Police officers in the picture, I notice a lot of long time Lowell Offiers who come from large families that have been committed to community service in this city, including Dennis Moriarty, Tom Fleming, Jack Dolan, Tim Golden, Bob Davidson and LPD Officer / Dracut School Committeeman Mike Myles to name a few.