Governor Rell should look at this latest CT DOT “communication” issue and whip out the governing ruler and whack the heads of the CT DOT. With much fanfare, Rell press released the idea that a new era of management was coming to the DOT. Oh, have the times changed … not.

he public has not been given enough notice to attend a hearing in Stamford about the reorganization of the state Department of Transportation, advocates said yesterday.

Details about the hearing - which will be at 2 p.m. tomorrow at Pitney Bowes’ Elmcroft Road headquarters - were posted on the DOT’s Web site yesterday afternoon, about 48 hours before the meeting.

“If they are trying to not get public input or involvement, they’re doing a great job,” said Jim Cameron, chairman of the Connecticut Rail Commuter Council who will attend the hearing.

“This is extraordinarily short notice,” said state Sen. Andrew McDonald, D-Stamford, who will not be able to reschedule a previous commitment and attend. “This is emblematic of the problems that have plagued the DOT historically and even today.”

It was unclear yesterday who was responsible for communicating the commission’s meeting schedule with the public.

Of course it was unclear who was responsible for communicating the meeting. That is how the DOT operates, no one knows anything, they are the Sergeant Schultzes of the state of the Connecticut. They see nothing, they hear nothing, they do nothing. Which is why you get contractors running amuck and installing storm drains to nowhere, roads that crack and crumble when tricycles roll over them and gridlock everywhere why they contemplate the how best to do nothing. This is the management of the DOT at its finest hour.

“Good etiquette is an important part of public policy,” said Joseph McGee, vice president of public policy for the Business Council of Fairfield County. “If you’re going to have a public process, you got to give me more than two days notice.

Yes good etiquette and the reality that Fairfield County is the economic engine of the state. You’d think that Rell would take interest in making sure that the stakeholders in the good transportation here were as involved in making the DOT better as possible.

source: The Advocate, Advocates say DOT scheduled Stamford hearing hastily, By Mark Ginocchio, SPetember 5, 2007