The Hartford Courant reports on the increasing failures of underground transformers and powerlines around the state. Last summer Stamford suffered outages attributed to failing transformers. More recently an electric worker was killed in Waterbury performing routine maitenance work. From The Courant:

The state’s two largest electricity providers, Connecticut Light & Power Co. and United Illuminating, both have multimillion-dollar projects under way to replace and upgrade equipment above and below ground.

Officials from both companies said Thursday that demand for more electricity is driving the projects, although aging equipment is also a concern.

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Although failing to meet with a quorum, the Finance and Claims Committee indicated that the BOE request for an 8.3% budget increase was not going to fly. According to a Norwalk Advocate article, Common Council member Doug Hempstead led the discussion in the direction of cutting the BOE request “They’re asking for too much,” he said. From the Norwalk Adovcate:

The three committee members at the meeting expressed support for increasing the amount for the Department of Public Works next year to address storm drainage problems that cause flooding in numerous parts of Norwalk.

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Gordon Tully wrote an op-ed in today’s Hour about the new ethics regulations. Since he’s a rumored common council candidate, I’ve posted his piece here:

Ethics watchdogs must remain independent

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It was only a few years ago that it seemed the Norwalk DPW placed a greater priority on building speed bumps over fixing roads. Mayor Richard Moccia, then candidate, once famously commented, “In Norwalk you drive on pot holes hoping a road will pop up.” The best example of the problem is Quintard street, where, under the previous administration 3 speed bumps were installed on road pitted with potholes, ruts and erosion.

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Senator Joe Lieberman has a long track record of fighting for* reform of the US healthcare systems. His recent focus has been on Community Health Centers. He believes that community health centers play a critical role in our public health infrastructure.

Senator Lieberman thanked local community leaders and Common Council President Michael Coffey-D and Council member Herbert Grant-D for accompanying on his tour of the Norwalk Community Health Center. “The consistently number one concern of the people of Connecticut,” he said, “is about healthcare and health insurance. Its from the hundreds of thousands in our state who don’t have it, but the million plus who do [have health insurance] are paying too much and more and more as employees or employers.”

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The political process is a strange one. You have people who theoretically should be really interested in how government should work better basically fixated on the trees and ignoring that big old forest aflame. In Norwalk’s case, it’s not flames that are flickering, but floods that are the latest sign that there’s an aging, creaking infrastructure that exists out of sight just crying for some attention. Tuesday night’s DTC meeting started with a presentation by Susan Bysiewicz of the new voting machines that will be in place this fall. More on that in another post, sticking around for the rest of the show revealed another infrastructure creaking under the weight of indifference. So. what can I say about a Democratic party that takes up 30 minutes debating the merits of spending $30 on an ad for a local charity, and less than 5 minutes on the merits of focusing on city infrastructure issues? Nothing. I’m just too disgusted with the process to even begin a good rant about it.

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The presidential primary is a long way away, yet here is the latest Quinnipiac poll, which according to the Courant places Dodd a distanced fourth in a name recognition survey. The Courant reports:

A Quinnipiac University poll of 1,087 state voters, conducted Feb. 9 to 12, placed Dodd fourth among White House contenders, behind New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, at 33 percent; Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, at 21 percent and former Vice President Al Gore at 9 percent.

Gore has not said he’s running. Dodd has.

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Here’s another glaring example of why the car tax is such a bad tax. Unlike houses, cars tend to move along with the people that own them to other cities, often in other states. Stamford recently hired a collection agency to to collect outstanding taxes on cars from 1992 to 2003. The outstanding tax is about $6 million. The state law says a municipality has up to 15 years to collect, and does not need to prove that a bill was received by the taxpayer. So some former Stamford residents are shocked to find outstanding bills plus interest. A short sampling from some message boards:

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Stratford and Bridgeport have had an uneasy time over the existence of the Sikorsky airport. And that relationship goes back a long time, the very first airshow was held here in 1911. The latest battle is to turn the city owned airport into a state owned one. The city of Bridgeport has plans to sell the 800-acre site to the state after 60 years of city ownership.

From the Connecticut Post

“I think the best government agency to run an airport would be the state, not a municipality,” Ricci said last week, pointing to urgent infrastructure needs, including the demolition of an aging airport building that the city simply cannot afford.

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From the Federalist:

On the Republican side, two names come to mind: Peter Hovell and Flora Smith. The former head of the BOF, Mr. Hovell would certainly be the the choice between the two if it came to experience. This would also give the town a clear choice in November between First Selectwoman Klein’s style of leadership and Hovell’s (assuming Klein runs). Ms. Smith, however, clearly has the energy to run a campaign. She was an active supporter of the Young ticket in ‘05, and could decide that now is her time. Interestingly, someone told me that Ms. Smith formed an exploratory committee to look at a possible ‘07 run. thefederalist doubts this to be true, as it seems a little overboard…unless you are running for president.

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