Saturday, October 25, 2008
deja vu all over again
OF COURSE there will be change orders from the beginning to the end, DOZRNS and DOZENS of them, ALL at OUR request because we have only given them a vague outline of what we really want. That will lead to repeated costly cost overruns, just like they did in the past two city construction projects. The $360,000 cost overruns on the bathrooms and the $400,000 that was wasted on the CC enclosure will pale in comparison to the MILLIONS of dollars of steadily disappearing money that this gym project will entail. Council will make excuses and offer lame explanations when costs rise steadily and they rage out of control-just like the last two times. After the Council has run thru the first 2.5 million they will raise our taxes and fees again and ask for MILLIONS more in loans, until we are bankrupt. They will blame it the recession, etc., but it will really be the result of their mismanagement, ineptitude, outsized ambitions and egos, lack of common sense, fiscal responsibility, and/or the presence of corruption (your choice, any or all of the above).
contract comments
While allowing a contractor to fill in and charge in a contract whatever numbers he wants to charge is not even a consideration in any other construction project, it HAS been the case in the last TWO construction contracts the City signed, and WE, the residents got hosed. There were also NO deadlines established and, as a result, no penalties for taking TWO YEARS to complete two bathrooms OR enclose two walls at the CC. The quality of the materials used were also NOT determined because the City HAD no real detailed and complete requirements built into the contract, unlike any other real construction contract that was truly looking out for the resident's interests. There is a 50/50 chance that the costs for water, sewer, and electrical hookups will be included in this deal, although City officials apparently considered them optional for the bathrooms. Its safe to say that the general population considers bathrooms WITH water, sewer, and electric hookups a good thing, no? Of WHAT possible value would they have WITHOUT them? What are the chances we will wind up with ANOTHER - do it whenever you get around to it, with whatever materials you have left over from other jobs, and charge us whatever you want - contract? Multiple change orders are guaranteed to lead to continuous expensive cost overruns and, when the City runs out of money, they will raise our taxes and fees to pay for their incompetence, neglect, lack of concern for the residents, and/or corruption. AGAIN. The City Attorney has written TWO horrible contracts for the City's AND the resident's interests recently and if he makes a third, he should be fired. Three strikes and your OUT!
Friday, October 24, 2008
Is it POSSIBLE that the Council would approve a LINK contract that had NO final numbers on it? Thats like signing a blank check, isnt it? Even THIS Council cant be THAT stupid, can they? Never underestimate City official's ability to do something ridiculous, lacking insight, and/or any sound business principles. No contract should be signed without a thorough review and discussion- not a ten-minute breeze thru. They should have a special meeting to fully discuss and debate each and every point so that our residents can ask any questions we may have. The City's history of construction contracts is dismal, at best, and adds more need for a thorough review this time. the past two have had NO deadlines built in, and as a result the CC project AND the bathrooms took OVER TWO YEARS to complete, with NO penalties assessed. No deadlines or penalties is unheard of in the construction contract industry. 99.99% of EVERY OTHER construction contract has them, why not ours? Incompetence? Ignorance? Stupidity? Lack of common sense? Incompetent leadership? Any or ALL of the above?
commentary
When an experienced contractor can build the same 2 bathrooms for 140k, and we are paying over 500k for the 2 bathrooms the city has built, then yes, it IS presumed that the additional 360k+ paid was for work that WASNT DONE, since we already KNOW how much it costs to build it. The CC enclosure should have cost no more than 100k, yet we paid 500k, and yes, it is also presumed that additional 400k went for work that WASNT DONE. Sewer hookups on the bathrooms can be done at $8 a linear foot plus the cost of materials. Figure 400 feet tops, that comes to $3200 plus $1800 for materials = $5000. When we pay 38,500 it is assumed that the ADDITIONAL $33,500 was paid for work that WASNT DONE, because we KNOW it doesnt cost anywhere NEAR what we paid to do the actual work. When we pay 33k to elevate the bathrooms that our contractor can do in one day for 5k, we presume that the additional money went for work that wasnt done, because we KNOW it doesnt cost anywhere NEAR what we paid to do the actual work. What other answers could there be? Kickbacks? Fraud? Bid rigging? hard to prove, yet common sense tells us that additional monies went SOMEWHERE, right?
commentary
I just read an article in The New York Times by Eric Lichtblau, David Johnston and Ron Nixon that says the FBI slashed its criminal investigative work force after the 9/11 attacks to focus on terrorism. The white-collar crime team was slashed from 1,722 agents to 1,097. The number of cases pursued in financial institution fraud, securities and commodities fraud, consumer fraud, bankruptcy fraud and insurance fraud fell from 3,130 cases in 2000 down to 1,662 in 2008. To top it off, there was an overall decrease of 132 agents at the FBI. Read the article and see if it makes your blood boil.
So there you have it: No regulation, no enforcement, no transparency, no truthfulness, no watchdogs and now no one to go after the bad guys. Another piece to the puzzle of how and why this crisis happened.
So there you have it: No regulation, no enforcement, no transparency, no truthfulness, no watchdogs and now no one to go after the bad guys. Another piece to the puzzle of how and why this crisis happened.
On Thursday, almost three years after stepping down as chairman of the Federal Reserve, a humbled Mr. Greenspan admitted that he had put too much faith in the self-correcting power of free markets and had failed to anticipate the self-destructive power of wanton mortgage lending.
“Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholders’ equity, myself included, are in a state of shocked disbelief,” he told the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
Now 82, Mr. Greenspan came in for one of the harshest grillings of his life, as Democratic lawmakers asked him time and again whether he had been wrong, why he had been wrong and whether he was sorry.
Critics, including many economists, now blame the former Fed chairman for the financial crisis that is tipping the economy into a potentially deep recession. Mr. Greenspan’s critics say that he encouraged the bubble in housing prices by keeping interest rates too low for too long and that he failed to rein in the explosive growth of risky and often fraudulent mortgage lending.
“You had the authority to prevent irresponsible lending practices that led to the subprime mortgage crisis. You were advised to do so by many others,” said Representative Henry A. Waxman of California, chairman of the committee. “Do you feel that your ideology pushed you to make decisions that you wish you had not made?”
Mr. Greenspan conceded: “Yes, I’ve found a flaw. I don’t know how significant or permanent it is. But I’ve been very distressed by that fact.”
On a day that brought more bad news about rising home foreclosures and slumping employment, Mr. Greenspan refused to accept blame for the crisis but acknowledged that his belief in deregulation had been shaken.
He noted that the immense and largely unregulated business of spreading financial risk widely, through the use of exotic financial instruments called derivatives, had gotten out of control and had added to the havoc of today’s crisis. As far back as 1994, Mr. Greenspan staunchly and successfully opposed tougher regulation on derivatives.
But on Thursday, he agreed that the multitrillion-dollar market for credit default swaps, instruments originally created to insure bond investors against the risk of default, needed to be restrained.
“This modern risk-management paradigm held sway for decades,” he said. “The whole intellectual edifice, however, collapsed in the summer of last year.”
Mr. Waxman noted that the Fed chairman had been one of the nation’s leading voices for deregulation, displaying past statements in which Mr. Greenspan had argued that government regulators were no better than markets at imposing discipline.
“Were you wrong?” Mr. Waxman asked.
“Partially,” the former Fed chairman reluctantly answered, before trying to parse his concession as thinly as possible.
Mr. Greenspan, celebrated as the “Maestro” in a book about him by Bob Woodward, presided over the Fed for 18 years before he stepped down in January 2006. He steered the economy through one of the longest booms in history, while also presiding over a period of declining inflation.
But as the Fed slashed interest rates to nearly record lows from 2001 until mid-2004, housing prices climbed far faster than inflation or household income year after year. By 2004, a growing number of economists were warning that a speculative bubble in home prices and home construction was under way, which posed the risk of a housing bust.
Mr. Greenspan brushed aside worries about a potential bubble, arguing that housing prices had never endured a nationwide decline and that a bust was highly unlikely.
Mr. Greenspan, along with most other banking regulators in Washington, also resisted calls for tighter regulation of subprime mortgages and other high-risk exotic mortgages that allowed people to borrow far more than they could afford.
The Federal Reserve had broad authority to prohibit deceptive lending practices under a 1994 law called the Home Owner Equity Protection Act . But it took little action during the long housing boom, and fewer than 1 percent of all mortgages were subjected to restrictions under that law.
This year, the Fed greatly tightened its restrictions. But by that time, the subprime market as well as the market for other kinds of exotic mortgages had already been wiped out.
Mr. Greenspan said that he had publicly warned about the “underpricing of risk” in 2005 but that he had never expected the crisis that began to sweep the entire financial system in 2007.
“This crisis,” he told lawmakers, “has turned out to be much broader than anything I could have imagined. It has morphed from one gripped by liquidity restraints to one in which fears of insolvency are now paramount.”
Many Republican lawmakers on the oversight committee tried to blame the mortgage meltdown on the unchecked growth of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the giant government-sponsored mortgage-finance companies that were placed in a government conservatorship last month. Republicans have argued that Democratic lawmakers blocked measures to reform the companies.
But Mr. Greenspan, who was first appointed by President Ronald Reagan, placed far more blame on the Wall Street companies that bundled subprime mortgages into pools and sold them as mortgage-backed securities. Global demand for the securities was so high, he said, that Wall Street companies pressured lenders to lower their standards and produce more “paper.”
“The evidence strongly suggests that without the excess demand from securitizers, subprime mortgage originations (undeniably the original source of the crisis) would have been far smaller and defaults accordingly far lower,” he said.
“Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholders’ equity, myself included, are in a state of shocked disbelief,” he told the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
Now 82, Mr. Greenspan came in for one of the harshest grillings of his life, as Democratic lawmakers asked him time and again whether he had been wrong, why he had been wrong and whether he was sorry.
Critics, including many economists, now blame the former Fed chairman for the financial crisis that is tipping the economy into a potentially deep recession. Mr. Greenspan’s critics say that he encouraged the bubble in housing prices by keeping interest rates too low for too long and that he failed to rein in the explosive growth of risky and often fraudulent mortgage lending.
“You had the authority to prevent irresponsible lending practices that led to the subprime mortgage crisis. You were advised to do so by many others,” said Representative Henry A. Waxman of California, chairman of the committee. “Do you feel that your ideology pushed you to make decisions that you wish you had not made?”
Mr. Greenspan conceded: “Yes, I’ve found a flaw. I don’t know how significant or permanent it is. But I’ve been very distressed by that fact.”
On a day that brought more bad news about rising home foreclosures and slumping employment, Mr. Greenspan refused to accept blame for the crisis but acknowledged that his belief in deregulation had been shaken.
He noted that the immense and largely unregulated business of spreading financial risk widely, through the use of exotic financial instruments called derivatives, had gotten out of control and had added to the havoc of today’s crisis. As far back as 1994, Mr. Greenspan staunchly and successfully opposed tougher regulation on derivatives.
But on Thursday, he agreed that the multitrillion-dollar market for credit default swaps, instruments originally created to insure bond investors against the risk of default, needed to be restrained.
“This modern risk-management paradigm held sway for decades,” he said. “The whole intellectual edifice, however, collapsed in the summer of last year.”
Mr. Waxman noted that the Fed chairman had been one of the nation’s leading voices for deregulation, displaying past statements in which Mr. Greenspan had argued that government regulators were no better than markets at imposing discipline.
“Were you wrong?” Mr. Waxman asked.
“Partially,” the former Fed chairman reluctantly answered, before trying to parse his concession as thinly as possible.
Mr. Greenspan, celebrated as the “Maestro” in a book about him by Bob Woodward, presided over the Fed for 18 years before he stepped down in January 2006. He steered the economy through one of the longest booms in history, while also presiding over a period of declining inflation.
But as the Fed slashed interest rates to nearly record lows from 2001 until mid-2004, housing prices climbed far faster than inflation or household income year after year. By 2004, a growing number of economists were warning that a speculative bubble in home prices and home construction was under way, which posed the risk of a housing bust.
Mr. Greenspan brushed aside worries about a potential bubble, arguing that housing prices had never endured a nationwide decline and that a bust was highly unlikely.
Mr. Greenspan, along with most other banking regulators in Washington, also resisted calls for tighter regulation of subprime mortgages and other high-risk exotic mortgages that allowed people to borrow far more than they could afford.
The Federal Reserve had broad authority to prohibit deceptive lending practices under a 1994 law called the Home Owner Equity Protection Act . But it took little action during the long housing boom, and fewer than 1 percent of all mortgages were subjected to restrictions under that law.
This year, the Fed greatly tightened its restrictions. But by that time, the subprime market as well as the market for other kinds of exotic mortgages had already been wiped out.
Mr. Greenspan said that he had publicly warned about the “underpricing of risk” in 2005 but that he had never expected the crisis that began to sweep the entire financial system in 2007.
“This crisis,” he told lawmakers, “has turned out to be much broader than anything I could have imagined. It has morphed from one gripped by liquidity restraints to one in which fears of insolvency are now paramount.”
Many Republican lawmakers on the oversight committee tried to blame the mortgage meltdown on the unchecked growth of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the giant government-sponsored mortgage-finance companies that were placed in a government conservatorship last month. Republicans have argued that Democratic lawmakers blocked measures to reform the companies.
But Mr. Greenspan, who was first appointed by President Ronald Reagan, placed far more blame on the Wall Street companies that bundled subprime mortgages into pools and sold them as mortgage-backed securities. Global demand for the securities was so high, he said, that Wall Street companies pressured lenders to lower their standards and produce more “paper.”
“The evidence strongly suggests that without the excess demand from securitizers, subprime mortgage originations (undeniably the original source of the crisis) would have been far smaller and defaults accordingly far lower,” he said.
So when the well-to-do are paid for work THEY didnt do, its okay because they will spend it on new luxury cars, boats, and planes, right? But somehow, if the middle class is given a break its not okay because they WONT spend it on luxuries like food, gas in their car, car and mortgage payments, and keeping their lights on? Thats patently ridiculous, of course. Welfare cheats should be exposed and prosecuted, and that includes contractors and special interests that receive monies for work they DIDNT do (CC club addition, bathrooms), and other freebies they have received at the publics expense (pool use freebies, free electricity for Santana).
Thursday, October 23, 2008
clarity
How can it be that our strongly Republican Council, Mayor, and City Manager have NO problem handing out freebies on a regular and costly basis, at OUR expense. Somehow they have NO problem with contractor welfare and routinely give them LARGE sums of money for work they DIDNT do? The CC addition and the bathrooms are prime examples of their largesse. Why are they NOT concerned when giving away freebies to anyone and everyone who wants to use our pool for free, also at the taxpayers expense? Why are they NOT concerned when Santana is given 100k worth of electricity at OUR expense? Welfare for well-to-do business owners is OK? It seems the Republican Mayor, Council, and City Manager have NO problem giving our tax money and services to private entities on a regular basis- as long as they are already pretty well off. Giving money and services to people for work NOT done is what Republicans object to strenuously, yet the City of Miami Springs does it on a routine basis. Can it be that welfare to the poor is to be roundly criticized by Republicans everywhere- ONLY welfare to well-to-do contractors and special interests is OKAY? What are the chances those special interests and contractors are Republicans? NOW its understood what the Republicans meant- if they are the benefactors of government welfare, its okay. If anybody else could benefit, its NOT okay.
Ayers connection "groundless"
Independent political watchdogs have also challenged the McCain campaign’s assertions. FactCheck.org, the widely cited nonpartisan project of the Annenberg Foundation, published a long analysis this month saying McCain’s and Palin’s attempts to link the two (Ayers and Obama) were "groundless." “What we object to are the McCain-Palin campaign’s attempts to sway voters —in ads and on the stump — with false and misleading statements about the relationship, which was never very close,” said FactCheck, which has criticized several of Obama’s assertions on other issues. This is from an independent, nonpartisan fact-finding organization that has pointed out inaccuracies on BOTH sides. Now it appears that McCain is going to pay for his healthcare progran by cutting Medicare and Medicaid by 882 billion dollars! Taking from the elderly grandmothers and grandfathers on fixed incomes while giving tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires ?? No way !! Grandma eats cat food to survive and the rich get richer.
Miami Springs has been a Tree City for over twenty years. A significant number of our citizens recycle, feed the cats, feed the ducks, and use solar power for their homes. With all these ecologically aware and caring residents, why is it neither Bain nor Youngs can find a suitable appointee for the Ecology Board after THIRTY MONTHS? Could it be laziness, or perhaps they just dont care about the environment?! If the latter is the case, its just another situation where the council is hopelessly out of touch with the residents and what is going on in the WORLD. Shoot, it ONLY took 24 months to build those bathrooms (!), although it DID take over 30 months to enclose the Country Clubs two walls. Those were horribly-managed and hugely expensive construction fiascos, not simple appointees to an advisory board. Out of the over 14,000 residents, there is NOBODY suitable? That is impossible to believe- laziness and unconcern are much more likely.
rich hide more, and better
A new study based on unpublished Internal Revenue Service data shows the rich are different when it comes to paying taxes: They hide more of their income. The previously unreported study estimates that taxpayers whose true income was between $500,000 and $1 million a year understated their adjusted gross incomes by 21% overall in 2001, compared with an 8% underreporting rate for Americans earning $50,000 to $100,000 and even lower rates for those earning less.
(The "net misreporting rate," as the IRS calls it, includes both underreported income and inflated deductions.)
In all, because of their higher noncompliance rates, those with true incomes of $200,000 or more received 25% of all income but accounted for 40% of net underreported income and 42% of underreported tax in 2001, according to the new analysis. - Forbes.
Is there somebody who is going to say that Forbes is a part of a liberal media campaign?
(The "net misreporting rate," as the IRS calls it, includes both underreported income and inflated deductions.)
In all, because of their higher noncompliance rates, those with true incomes of $200,000 or more received 25% of all income but accounted for 40% of net underreported income and 42% of underreported tax in 2001, according to the new analysis. - Forbes.
Is there somebody who is going to say that Forbes is a part of a liberal media campaign?
bathrooms redux again
Are there REALLY people who are more worried about a few soccer players than the HUNDREDS of THOUSANDS of our tax dollars in excess profits that have disappeared into those contractors pockets for those bathrooms? Is there ANY proof the soccer players damaged the old bathrooms? or was it kids? Neither would be okay, of course, but vandalism is always a possibility. Its a LOCK that we were HOSED again on the bathrooms for at least $360,000, probably more, and the City Manager is responsible, AGAIN. STILL. ALWAYS.
vote NO
The City throws away $400,000 on the CC addition and another $360,000 on the bathrooms, and then wants us to believe they are trying to save us money by NOT having a runoff election. If they were really interested in saving us money they could have saved that $760,000 on those projects. They could have saved us another 100k by NOT paying Santana's electric bills. They could save us another 200k by closing the pool down from Sept-June, but they dont. That supposed 30k that might be saved by not having a runoff election is chump change compared to the money that has disappeared and they have NOT saved on various City projects. We could be stuck next election with somebody that doesnt even have 50% of the people behind them if Amendment 3 passes. Vote NO on Amendment 3.
the pattern is clear
The bathrooms were certainly worth a bundle to the contractors- we paid 500k+ for two small bathrooms that actually cost 140k to build and includes a FAT 25 % profit for the contractor! Where did the extra 360k go, above and beyond the actual costs? The CC enclosure should have cost no more than 100k, tops, yet we paid over 500k- where did THAT excess 400k go? LOTS of our tax money disappearing and NO explanations that make ANY sense! One expensive fiasco after another, repeatedly, continuously- and all the responsibility of this City Manager. the Council is also much to blame for NOT providing ANY meaningful oversight to any City projects. They just rubber-stamp whatever the City Manager says is right. Constant change orders and cost overruns lead to 300%, 400% and more profits for the contractors. How many ways can it be pointed out as HORRIBLE mismanagement at best, and criminal at worst? We have the ONLY 250k bathrooms this side of Trump Plaza. The worst part is that they learn NOTHING from each project and each one costs us more. When they have wasted all our tax monies they just raise our fees and tax millage rates so they have MORE money to disappear. They count on the peoples apathy and ignorance to allow them to stay in power, and so far they have been right. Enough is enough.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
costly travel
Is it true that the City paid $984 for a round-trip ticket to Tallahasse last March for Youngs? and $734 for a ticket to Tally for Garcia? I can fly to Tally for $358 today, less than HALF of Garcia's ticket and a little more than a third of Youngs ticket. Was there some kind of emergency? Or was it just another case of the city officials wasting MORE of our tax dollars?
a stolen election?
Runoff elections have endured since the 70s, for a good reason: to insure that a candidate has at least the backing of HALF of the residents- a majority. If the runoff is eliminated its very possible we could have someone elcted who doesnt even HAVR a majority of the people behind them! If one has 34%, one 33%, and one 32% of the vote, nobody will have even close to a majority! If they were truly concerned about saving money they could haved $300,000 on the bathrooms alone, not to mention the $400,000 that disappeared on the CC fiasco. Somebody is trying to steal an election. We cannot allow that to happen. Vote NO on Amendment 3!
sign me up!
Where do I sign up for a city job so I, too, can be well-paid for doing NOTHING! Doesnt that amount to a BIG raise, if anyone was to have significantly less responsibility and get the same pay as before? 440k in administration fees sounds like pretty time-intensive work but the two officials who were supposedly responsible for doing that administration have had NO reduction in pay, even tho there's NOTHING left for them to administer. NOTHING. The City has to make up for the 440k shortfall in revenues but makes NO payroll adjustments to account for or balance that out? The mayor and the council think thats good fiscal accountibility? More giveaways, lack of oversight, or common sense by any city officials. Its the job of the mayor and council to have oversight of these things. As usual, there IS no oversight or common sense utilized in this situation either.
paid to administer NOTHING
Water and Sewer are gone, along with any need to administer them. Gym is on record as saying he spent 15-20% of his time "administering" that department, as part of a way to justify his salary. The City was paid 440k per year to administer W & S. Instead of taking a 15-20% drop in his pay because he now has NOTHING to administer, he graciously agreed to forgo a 1-2% RAISE IN PAY this year, and The Council and Mayor applauded him for doing so. Such a deal. We lose the 440k in income from the county (money out of the budget and taxpayers pocket) and there are NO reductions in expenses!? They are being paid the same salaries as before to administer NOTHING !!! Just another example of fiscal irresponsibility, mismanagement, and a total lack of oversight or common sense by the Mayor and City Council! NO pay reductions when theres NOTHING to administer? Having less responsibility should = less pay, and does in most workplaces, but NOT HERE. Ridiculous. Absurd. Preposterous, but not unusual or uncommon for them, just business as usual.
sure thing
Bathroom final numbers are still not available, even tho the Certificate of Occupancy was issued over a week ago. The bathrooms have taken OVER TWO YEARS to complete so its probably not fair to expect the final numbers for another six months or so, taking into consideration the state of disarray and disorganization that exists in the Finance Dept. They have already admitted to $414,000 as of six months ago, so by the time they are finished massaging the numbers to minimize the incredibly wasteful final figures, we MAY have those final sums by Xmas. Will that meet the FOI requirements for timely disclosure? The over/under is $500,000. Take the over, its a lock. The buck stops where? Who is responsible for overseeing this, yet another, costly and wasteful (to the taxpayers) disaster? Gymbo and his Rubber-Stamp Band! They have NEVER met a City construction project whose costs they couldnt TRIPLE, at least! and 300%, 400$ and greater cost overruns are NOT beyond their capabilities either! How do they do it??? Could it be Black Magic? Or just their own special brand of a municipal Black Hole? Money goes in by the truckload and is NEVER seen again. It just disappears, truckloads at a time. OUR money. OUR tax money. While celestial scientists still dont know what causes galactic Black Holes, no oversight, constant cost overruns and change orders cause municipal Black Holes, like we have at City Hall. They gotta go.
idiocy redux
We are in a global economic crisis where people are being laid off by the thousands, leading to unemployment figures at several year highs; governments are taking stakes in large banks to prevent them from going under- and the City decides to take on ANOTHER $100,000 in payroll costs? for a guy with No real recreation experience? That would be stupendously stupid, wouldnt it? The City has already taken on another 2.5 million in debt for a new gym, is facing an ADA lawsuit that could potentially cost us MILLIONS, tax revenues are dropping like a rock as proprty values sink- and MS decides to ADD $100,000 to our payroll!!! Everybody else is laying off people and tightening their belts and budgets except US! How can that be? Do we have some magic pixie dust that we will sprinkle over the City and make our financial woes disappear? This is idiocy, of course, and the responsibilty lies with the City Manager, Council, and Mayor who allow this to happen. Remember in April, if they havent bankrupted us by then.
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
pool losses mount, officials unconcerned
What part of the pool fiasco is nonsense?- the $200,000 we are losing keeping the pool open from Sept-thru-June to indulge 6 Springs kids? or the overall $300,000+ in pool losses we are having this year at the pool? Or both? Are the numbers presented nonsense? If so, present numbers that you believe are NOT nonsense, IF you have any. Those who dont have any credible numbers to present perhaps should calm themselves down, and learn something. It is nonsensical, at least, to allow mostly non-residents and other special interests to use our pool for free, while we, the resident taxpayers, are losing $300,000 a year and footing the bill. There are liability issues when anybody uses our facilities. Without having ANY contracts delineating who is liable/ responsible for what, we are at risk. There ARE no known pool contracts. The pool is made unavailable to Springs residents for all-weekend meets that WE pay for, apparently DONT benefit from, and only add to our losses. That is nonsensical at best, and criminal at worst. Where does that rental income go? or are we providing those services FOR FREE again, at the taxpayers expense? We get NONE of the benefits, but ALL of the bills!? Sounds like the Country Club! THAT is nonsense, at best...at worst....
special interest fiesta
The pool numbers and where those numbers were derived from, have stood for months without a challenge. UNCHALLENGED. Those will be assumed to be accurate until they ARE challenged. Now the question becomes, who authorizes the year-round use of our pool for SIX Springs kids, costing US, the taxpayers, 200k a year ? This is just ANOTHER example of poor management by the City Manager, at the expense of the taxpayers. Special interests are being accomodated AGAIN and we are left footing the bill, which is considerable.The SIX Springs kids who use the pool while school is in session cost us 200k in operating expenses. Do the math- 6 kids, 200k. It costs US, the taxpayers, over 33k for EACH kid during the 9 months from Sept-June. While swimming is excellent exercise and does build character and discipline, those traits can just as easily be developed at any one of several nearby pools. Why arent they transferred there? This is a luxury we can NO LONGER afford. We are in a RECESSION, and one that is deepening daily. How much more mismanagement and special interest backroom deals by the City Manager can we afford? Isnt it enough that he gave Santana a sweetheart deal where we pay Santana's electricity on top of everything else? Or pay the contractors 300% 400% and more above the normal costs for each and EVERY city project? How many special interests of Gym's can we allow to have a FREE ride? One botched project after another, each one WORSE than the one before. The 500k CC addition, the 500k bathrooms, a free ride and free electricity for Santana- freebies for all the special interests at the expense of the taxpaying residents. Why is the City Manager NOT held accountable by the Mayor and Council? the residents? Remember in April.
Monday, October 20, 2008
bloviators united
I have no real problem with people spouting facts. I DO have a problem with spouting opinions that have NO basis in fact. If there were any factual numbers that supported their opinion they would have quoted them, but there ARE NONE. They may gain a little credibility if they quoted even ONE reliable source of information, but without any actual numbers those are just bloviating blowhards who give baseless and meaningless opinions, and waste our time reading their unsubstantiated drivel. The pool numbers have NEVER been challenged by ANYBODY who knows pool operations, have they? Is there anybody who disputes the pool numbers presented? If so, lets hear on what factual grounds you dispute them- where are your contradictory figures? Silence. The debate misstatements were from FactCheck.org. The denial of ANY factual association between the Obama campaign and those Fannie and Freddy shysters (along with their history)came from Snopes.com. Both are well known sources of impartial and factually correct information. Are you saying that either one or both of those fact-finding organizations are biased too? The multiple and myriad causes of this economic crisis presented were excerpts from MSNBC, as noted. Oh no!!! Its ALL a conspiracy! The truly telling fact is that there have been NO opposing figures presented. Zip. Zero. NONE. They want others to quote 5 sources while they offer NONE. BS. Is it pure laziness, or perhaps ignorance, a closed mind, or just that they HAVE no reliable facts or figures to offer. You decide.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
ideas
I was watching a program on TV that had a guy making jet fuel from used vegetable oil. He put it thru several processes, adding acids, bases, and other chemicals, high-pressure, and filtered it until it was undistinguishable from jet fuel. Apparently regular biofuel will freeze that high up. I think the guy is associated with NC Stae Univ. Also, New York City has ex-homeless people collecting used cooking oils to use as diesel fuel. Eco-tech- Future Fuels. it was on the Science Channel. Ten pounds of human fat distilled will move a car 50 miles. Another guy combines aluminum with gallium with water to produce hydrogen. Oxygen reacts with water to split off hydrogen. the Sun is 75% hydrogen. This alloy is in pellet form and can just be put into a gas tank. Aluminum is found in Oklahoma. Daniel Nocera at MIT is studying photosynthesis as a source of energy. In 2 seconds the Sun releases enuf energy to power 2 million cars. Dr Lonnie Ingram in Gainesville changes lawn clipping to fuel via cellulosic ethanol. 15% of all waste is yard waste. Amory Lovins from the Rocky Mountain Institute says only 3 % of a car energy goes toward moving the driver. Double-paned windows, insulation, and carbon fibers make a fuel-efficient car. FiberForge makes strong carbon panels at reasonable prices. 3-5 years to production, a SUV that makes 100 mpg.. I was thinking maybe you would be interested in installing solar panels, etc. I wqas also thinking of you when I saw something that uses a jet engine, called plasmafication i think. that sounds like it might be right down your alley. It will burn old tires, concrete, you name it.
groundless opinions?
If you agree with the points being made by others and someone presents those facts very clearly and succintly, why try to reinvent the wheel? They are talking points and are presented as a basis for discussion and debate. If there are opposing views that are supported by different numbers, lets look at them. Most of the time on this forum there ARE no opposing numbers presented; whether that is a sign of laziness, ignorance or just naysayers with a closed mind, also remains open to debate. It also may be VERY possible that fairly frequently there ARE no realistic, believable opposing numbers to propose, and THAT is why some people unsuccessfully struggle to be given much credibility in the debate/ discussion here. Spouting personal opinions that have little rationality or grounding in fact does not move this American debate process along very much, and wastes a lot of time. Those that dispute those numbers and/or opinions have an oppurtunity here to make a counter argument- but they DONT explain the rationale behind their thinking, or any figures that might back them up. There is, of course, always room for an honest difference of opinions in any debate, but to assert that ones opinion is correct just BECAUSE one says so, and has NO supporting evidence, prevents any serious weight, consideration or credibility be given to their comments, and wastes a lot of time and energy. Lets discuss the issues. Has the final numbers on the bathrooms come in yet? The Certificate of occupancy has been issued after TWO years -shouldnt they know pretty soon?
5 cheap ways to go solar
5 cheap ways to go solar
You don't have to cover your roof with expensive solar panels to reap the benefits of the sun. Cheap alternatives are available that will light your home indoors and out — and modestly reduce your electric bill.
By Sonya Stinson, Bankrate.com
More from Bankrate.com
■7 psychological money traps
■States offer foreclosure rescue loans
■Video: Which type of mortgage is best?
Thinking of going solar?
If the price tag of a whole-house photovoltaic, or PV, panel system makes getting off the grid a green dream you can't quite bankroll yet, consider starting smaller when you switch to sun power.
"People are craving solar," says Michael Strong, the Houston-based vice president of Brothers Strong Inc., a remodeling company, and GreenHaus Builders. "There is just a huge amount of interest in it. But for the most part, people have an overinflated sense of how much of that utility bill it's going to cover."
For example, Strong says a "baseline" PV system in Texas would cost $25,000 to $35,000, depending on the installation costs and the location and orientation of the house, and it would generate about three kilowatts of electricity.
"In a very well-built 3,000-square-foot home, let's say, that type of power capacity will produce anywhere from 10 (percent) to 20 percent of their electricity," Strong says.
In light of that reality check, here are five less ambitious — and much more modestly priced — solar power devices to try.
What’s your home worth?Find out what your home is worth in one easy step!
1. Tubular skylights
Tubular skylights — also known as solar tubes and tubular daylighting devices — are ideal for lighting small spaces. They typically come in 10- and 12-inch diameter models, with prices ranging from about $150 to more than $600, according to the National Association of Home Builders' ToolBase Services site.
Tubular skylights must be installed in areas that get several hours of direct sunlight per day. Installation is a fairly clear-cut DIY project, unless your home has a metal or tiled roof, making cutting the hole a trickier prospect that may require calling in the pros.
A light collector is mounted on the roof, allowing sunlight to pass through a reflective tube into a diffuser lens that is mounted on the ceiling. Unlike conventional skylights, tubular skylights don't require additional framing, and they look like regular light fixtures from the inside.
Three years ago, John Avenson installed three tubular skylights in a Westminster, Colo., house already outfitted with PV panels. He put one in the "deep end" of his home office that had no windows, one as a replacement for an old bathroom light and fan fixture, and one to swap out a ceiling fixture in the hallway near his bedroom. Adding a few optional features and using the manufacturer's buy-two-get-one-free deal, he estimates he spent about $1,500 for the whole package.
More on MSN
Unwrapping the puzzle of home insulation
Tell us: Have you taken any steps to make your home energy efficient?
5 tip-offs that a new home is an energy hog
8 cheap ways to make your home more energy-efficient
MSN Video: Does going solar pay off?
How to save on home heating bills
Slide show: Innovative home combines eco design with glam
.2. Solar outdoor lights
For another inexpensive path to solar, how about using sun power to light up your garden at night or make your entryways more secure? You can find solar path lights for less than $10 apiece. Accent lights, such as hanging lanterns and post lights, start at less than $100 each. Solar floodlight kits start at around $20.
"Rather than having to hire an electrician and, in some cases, do major construction to dig a trench and lay electrical wires down ... you can avoid those significant installation costs by just powering your lights from the sun," says Neal Lurie, marketing director for the American Solar Energy Society.
Before you buy, make sure that what you are getting can actually illuminate the landscape the way you want. Last November, George Van Dyke installed solar landscape lights and solar floodlights around his new home in Towson, Md., with mixed results.
"The landscaping lights are a bit tricky in that they can collect water easily on the lighting surface," Van Dyke says.
He discovered that the lights had to be pointed downward or sideways in order to avoid this problem, which was a bit disappointing because he had wanted to use them as up lights.
On the other hand, he loves the floodlights. "I have even gone so far as to suggest them to certain clients that have taken an interest in alternative energy products for their homes," says Van Dyke, who has a financial consulting business.
3. Unglazed solar pool collectors
If your swimming pool is for warm-weather use only, you can take advantage of these inexpensive heaters that later roll up like beach mats for winter storage. Here's how they work: Thin panels made of heavy-duty rubber or plastic absorb the sun's heat, while the pool's existing pump circulates water through these collectors and back into the pool. The panels can be set up on the ground, on the roof or in a rack.
Leah Ingram of New Hope, Pa., who writes about her family's adventures in green living and other cost-saving practices in her blog, "The Lean Green Family," says she and her husband, Bill Behre, paid less than $400 for a kit to heat their pool.
"It's helped us to keep our pool at about 80 degrees despite some 65-degree nights, and to have a heated pool without paying for extra electricity in the process," Ingram says.
A recent Internet search turned up a $480 kit containing two 2-foot-by-20-foot panels and a set of valves for turning the system on and off. Another vendor sells a similar kit for about $280.
These products are different than the solar pool heaters that use glazed sunlight collectors, which can be more complicated and expensive to install. According to the U.S. Department of Energy's Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy consumer guide, unglazed collector panels are adequate for pools that will be used only when temperatures are above freezing. Glazed collectors, which have a glass covering, are more efficient in cold weather.
4. Solar-powered attic fans
With prices ranging from about $300 to $700, solar attic fans ventilate attics and help keep them cooler. Depending on the size of your attic, you may need more than one fan to get the cooling effect.
According to the National Association of Home Builders, these devices use a 10- to 20-watt solar panel to power a direct-current motor. The fans are installed with intake vents that are usually mounted near the ridge of the roof. As with tubular skylights, the panels for solar attic fans panels must be installed in an area that receives direct sunlight.
If you are handy with tools and unafraid of heights, you can install one yourself. Otherwise, call in a roofing contractor for the job. One major caveat: Make sure that the space between your home's conditioned space and the attic is properly sealed and that there is enough intake air flowing through the attic itself. You want to avoid any potential problems with moisture in the attic or backdrafting, which is when the exhaust fan blows fumes from fuel-burning appliances back into your living space.
Strong has been using solar-powered vent fans in his clients' building and remodeling projects for about four years.
"What they like about them is that they have been maintenance-free," he says.
The energy savings are hard to pinpoint. "Most homes today are not calibrated, and they don't have the electrical dashboards to be able to tell how much (the fans) are actually saving them," Strong says.
Home energy experts say you'll get the best results when you combine installing a solar attic fan with beefing up the insulation in your attic.
5. Solar-powered chargers
You're going off on a long wilderness hike to become one with nature, but you figure you'd better take along a working cell phone to stay connected to civilization. Strap on a solar backpack, embedded with light-collecting panels that convert sunlight into energy for recharging the phone's batteries, and you're good to go.
Solar battery chargers, also available as hand-held portable devices, foldable panels and stationary units, can be used to charge all kinds of small electronic devices including laptops, digital cameras, PDAs, MP3 players and CD players. Some will even power up the batteries in your car, boat or lawn mower. There are multipurpose chargers as well as those designed for specific types of products and specific brands.
Some of the latest models give the option of either storing the power in an internal on-board battery for later use or charging your gizmo directly from the sun.
Prices vary greatly according to the manufacturer, usage, style and power capacity. You might spend less than $20 for a 1.8-watt vehicle battery charger, $35 for a multi-use charger that produces up to 2 watts of power and more than $200 for a solar backpack that produces enough electricity for a laptop.
Trying out relatively inexpensive solar products like these is a good way for consumers to become comfortable with the technology, Strong says, until "they get ready to pull the trigger on that solar PV" when it becomes more affordable.
You don't have to cover your roof with expensive solar panels to reap the benefits of the sun. Cheap alternatives are available that will light your home indoors and out — and modestly reduce your electric bill.
By Sonya Stinson, Bankrate.com
More from Bankrate.com
■7 psychological money traps
■States offer foreclosure rescue loans
■Video: Which type of mortgage is best?
Thinking of going solar?
If the price tag of a whole-house photovoltaic, or PV, panel system makes getting off the grid a green dream you can't quite bankroll yet, consider starting smaller when you switch to sun power.
"People are craving solar," says Michael Strong, the Houston-based vice president of Brothers Strong Inc., a remodeling company, and GreenHaus Builders. "There is just a huge amount of interest in it. But for the most part, people have an overinflated sense of how much of that utility bill it's going to cover."
For example, Strong says a "baseline" PV system in Texas would cost $25,000 to $35,000, depending on the installation costs and the location and orientation of the house, and it would generate about three kilowatts of electricity.
"In a very well-built 3,000-square-foot home, let's say, that type of power capacity will produce anywhere from 10 (percent) to 20 percent of their electricity," Strong says.
In light of that reality check, here are five less ambitious — and much more modestly priced — solar power devices to try.
What’s your home worth?Find out what your home is worth in one easy step!
1. Tubular skylights
Tubular skylights — also known as solar tubes and tubular daylighting devices — are ideal for lighting small spaces. They typically come in 10- and 12-inch diameter models, with prices ranging from about $150 to more than $600, according to the National Association of Home Builders' ToolBase Services site.
Tubular skylights must be installed in areas that get several hours of direct sunlight per day. Installation is a fairly clear-cut DIY project, unless your home has a metal or tiled roof, making cutting the hole a trickier prospect that may require calling in the pros.
A light collector is mounted on the roof, allowing sunlight to pass through a reflective tube into a diffuser lens that is mounted on the ceiling. Unlike conventional skylights, tubular skylights don't require additional framing, and they look like regular light fixtures from the inside.
Three years ago, John Avenson installed three tubular skylights in a Westminster, Colo., house already outfitted with PV panels. He put one in the "deep end" of his home office that had no windows, one as a replacement for an old bathroom light and fan fixture, and one to swap out a ceiling fixture in the hallway near his bedroom. Adding a few optional features and using the manufacturer's buy-two-get-one-free deal, he estimates he spent about $1,500 for the whole package.
More on MSN
Unwrapping the puzzle of home insulation
Tell us: Have you taken any steps to make your home energy efficient?
5 tip-offs that a new home is an energy hog
8 cheap ways to make your home more energy-efficient
MSN Video: Does going solar pay off?
How to save on home heating bills
Slide show: Innovative home combines eco design with glam
.2. Solar outdoor lights
For another inexpensive path to solar, how about using sun power to light up your garden at night or make your entryways more secure? You can find solar path lights for less than $10 apiece. Accent lights, such as hanging lanterns and post lights, start at less than $100 each. Solar floodlight kits start at around $20.
"Rather than having to hire an electrician and, in some cases, do major construction to dig a trench and lay electrical wires down ... you can avoid those significant installation costs by just powering your lights from the sun," says Neal Lurie, marketing director for the American Solar Energy Society.
Before you buy, make sure that what you are getting can actually illuminate the landscape the way you want. Last November, George Van Dyke installed solar landscape lights and solar floodlights around his new home in Towson, Md., with mixed results.
"The landscaping lights are a bit tricky in that they can collect water easily on the lighting surface," Van Dyke says.
He discovered that the lights had to be pointed downward or sideways in order to avoid this problem, which was a bit disappointing because he had wanted to use them as up lights.
On the other hand, he loves the floodlights. "I have even gone so far as to suggest them to certain clients that have taken an interest in alternative energy products for their homes," says Van Dyke, who has a financial consulting business.
3. Unglazed solar pool collectors
If your swimming pool is for warm-weather use only, you can take advantage of these inexpensive heaters that later roll up like beach mats for winter storage. Here's how they work: Thin panels made of heavy-duty rubber or plastic absorb the sun's heat, while the pool's existing pump circulates water through these collectors and back into the pool. The panels can be set up on the ground, on the roof or in a rack.
Leah Ingram of New Hope, Pa., who writes about her family's adventures in green living and other cost-saving practices in her blog, "The Lean Green Family," says she and her husband, Bill Behre, paid less than $400 for a kit to heat their pool.
"It's helped us to keep our pool at about 80 degrees despite some 65-degree nights, and to have a heated pool without paying for extra electricity in the process," Ingram says.
A recent Internet search turned up a $480 kit containing two 2-foot-by-20-foot panels and a set of valves for turning the system on and off. Another vendor sells a similar kit for about $280.
These products are different than the solar pool heaters that use glazed sunlight collectors, which can be more complicated and expensive to install. According to the U.S. Department of Energy's Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy consumer guide, unglazed collector panels are adequate for pools that will be used only when temperatures are above freezing. Glazed collectors, which have a glass covering, are more efficient in cold weather.
4. Solar-powered attic fans
With prices ranging from about $300 to $700, solar attic fans ventilate attics and help keep them cooler. Depending on the size of your attic, you may need more than one fan to get the cooling effect.
According to the National Association of Home Builders, these devices use a 10- to 20-watt solar panel to power a direct-current motor. The fans are installed with intake vents that are usually mounted near the ridge of the roof. As with tubular skylights, the panels for solar attic fans panels must be installed in an area that receives direct sunlight.
If you are handy with tools and unafraid of heights, you can install one yourself. Otherwise, call in a roofing contractor for the job. One major caveat: Make sure that the space between your home's conditioned space and the attic is properly sealed and that there is enough intake air flowing through the attic itself. You want to avoid any potential problems with moisture in the attic or backdrafting, which is when the exhaust fan blows fumes from fuel-burning appliances back into your living space.
Strong has been using solar-powered vent fans in his clients' building and remodeling projects for about four years.
"What they like about them is that they have been maintenance-free," he says.
The energy savings are hard to pinpoint. "Most homes today are not calibrated, and they don't have the electrical dashboards to be able to tell how much (the fans) are actually saving them," Strong says.
Home energy experts say you'll get the best results when you combine installing a solar attic fan with beefing up the insulation in your attic.
5. Solar-powered chargers
You're going off on a long wilderness hike to become one with nature, but you figure you'd better take along a working cell phone to stay connected to civilization. Strap on a solar backpack, embedded with light-collecting panels that convert sunlight into energy for recharging the phone's batteries, and you're good to go.
Solar battery chargers, also available as hand-held portable devices, foldable panels and stationary units, can be used to charge all kinds of small electronic devices including laptops, digital cameras, PDAs, MP3 players and CD players. Some will even power up the batteries in your car, boat or lawn mower. There are multipurpose chargers as well as those designed for specific types of products and specific brands.
Some of the latest models give the option of either storing the power in an internal on-board battery for later use or charging your gizmo directly from the sun.
Prices vary greatly according to the manufacturer, usage, style and power capacity. You might spend less than $20 for a 1.8-watt vehicle battery charger, $35 for a multi-use charger that produces up to 2 watts of power and more than $200 for a solar backpack that produces enough electricity for a laptop.
Trying out relatively inexpensive solar products like these is a good way for consumers to become comfortable with the technology, Strong says, until "they get ready to pull the trigger on that solar PV" when it becomes more affordable.
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