Once again, we are a "model!"
Do you really want to pattern yourself after us, America?
"Transportation payroll soared under Patrick" by Andrea Estes, Globe Staff | November 8, 2009
As Governor Deval Patrick merges the state’s transportation agencies in an attempt to reduce duplication and waste, a review of payroll records shows that his own administration presided over much of the growth in spending he must now rein in.
See: The Perils of One-Party Politics: The Problem
The two major transportation agencies more than doubled the number of six-figure jobs since Patrick won the governorship in 2006. Transportation secretaries under Patrick have been paid 25 percent more than in the prior administration. New appointees have been simply layered over old ones, with the displaced workers given new titles.
What do you mean DISPLACED? They STILL on the TAX PAYER TEAT, right?
It's called LOOTING!!! All this while SERVICES GET SMASHED!!!!!
The result: The Executive Office of Transportation and Public Works and the Massachusetts Highway Department together saw a 20 percent surge in their payrolls under Patrick, according to state comptroller records obtained under open records laws. The boost in personnel costs came as the administration, which had pledged early on to reform the transportation system, was facing an increasingly difficult financial picture....
Yes, they LOOTED YOU as you are SUFFERING, Bay State fools!!!!
And they tried to pin it all on Grabauskas?!!!!
What SCUMS!!!!
While former governor Mitt Romney’s last transportation secretary, John Cogliano, had three deputies. Patrick’s first transportation secretary, Bernard Cohen, had six, and Cohen’s successor, James A. Aloisi Jr., had eight. While Cogliano earned $120,000 a year, Cohen and Aloisi each made $150,000....
Cohen did not return a phone message; Aloisi could not be reached for comment....
But when they want to get a message out they call the Globe, who dutifully carry the message forward.
Since Romney’s last year in office, the number of officials in the Executive Office of Transportation and MassHighway earning at least $100,000 a year more than doubled, from 16 to 37, records show.
This state SO NEEDS a REPUBLICAN EXECUTIVE!!!!!!
In several cases, Patrick allowed a new manager to bring in his own staff without getting rid of the predecessor’s key aides. Aloisi, after taking office in January, chose his own chief of staff, Karen Charles, while the previous chief of staff, Amy Branger, continued to collect her $100,000-a-year salary....
This is SO HURTFUL to a STATE that is SUFFERING!!
It looks like that FAMOUS LIBERAL COMPASSION ONLY APPLIES to THEIR OWN WALLETS!!!!
Lily Mendez-Morgan, who had been a special assistant to the governor, became one of Aloisi’s eight deputies in January , taking on the responsibilities of Susan Quinones, who had been the director of interagency affairs. Quinones, as of July, continued to collect her $93,000-a-year salary and is now responsible for “tracking federal funding and policy,’’ a spokesman said; Mendez-Morgan, who is now “deputy secretary for interagency management and reform,’’ saw her pay bumped from $108,000 to $125,000 a year, records show.
While SERVICES are SLASHED and these SHIT-SCUM POLITICIANS get WAX about how painful the budget cuts are, etc, etc!!
UN-FLIPPIN-REAL!
You are DONE, guverner, so you better GRAB AS MUCH LOOT as you can on your WAY OUT!!!!!
Aloisi also brought in his own communications director, Colin Durrant, who was appointed to a $115,000-a-year deputy secretary position. Durrant’s predecessor, Klark Jessen, remains on the payroll, handling internal communications and blogging.
(Blog editor just shaking his head in enraged disgust)
Among the highest-paid employees of either agency are hires that came with a political pedigree. Albert Shaw, a retiree who served on Patrick’s inaugural committee, was given a $115,000-a-year job as “director of intergovernmental affairs.’’
This is HURTFUL to a state seeing RISING UNEMPLOYMENT MONTH after MONTH -- while THIS GUY HANDS OUT $115,000 a year TAXPAYER-FUNDED GIFTS!!!!!!!
*************
Administration officials say many employees were hired at MassHighway to handle the governor’s new Accelerated Bridge Program, a $3.8 billion blueprint to repair more than 400 deteriorating bridges over eight years. Durrant said that when Patrick became governor, the highway department was “so severely understaffed’’ it could not handle urgent construction projects and was cited for the deficiency by federal highway officials.
“Since that time, we’ve had an unprecedented investment in the statewide road and bridge program and the Accelerated Bridge Program and over $400 million in [federal] stimulus money, all to repair our roads and bridges and undo decades of neglect. The vast majority of people who have come on board have been professional engineers, inspectors, and maintenance personnel who are critical to moving projects quickly and ensuring the sort of oversight of taxpayer-funded projects that is necessary.’’
Did you GET THAT JIBBERSIH, readers?
Some critics say the administration has added layers of managers without regard to the state’s financial condition.
Senator Mark C. Montigny, a New Bedford Democrat who chairs the Committee on Bonding, Capital Expenditures and State Assets [and] who opposed creating a new transportation agency, said Patrick should have imposed a hiring freeze:
“For a year now many of us in both parties have said we need a complete hiring freeze, but we haven’t seen it yet. Anyone who’s come on recently - those positions need to be scrutinized. If we got along fine without them before, we can get along fine without them now.’’
To SAY the LEAST!
Still, Montigny said he had “full faith in this governor,’’ adding: “He wants to do the right thing. But transportation is such a big monster, it’s really difficult for even a very smart guy to get his arms around. It’s like turning around a tanker in the middle of a pond.’’
Yeah, it is NOT HIS FAULT he is a LYING LOOTER!
He "means well!"
PFFFFFFFTTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!!!
Senate minority leader Richard R. Tisei, a Republican and a top supporter of Patrick’s chief GOP rival in next year’s governor’s race, Charles D. Baker, said the administration has been irresponsible in its hiring:
“A lot of the jobs that have been created haven’t been on the ground level, where services are being provided. They’re at the top of the organization charts. Now that we’re in a fiscal crisis, all these positions are adding up and dragging down the whole state budget.’’
It's called LOOTING and the liberal Democrats that run this state excel at it!
Also see: Patty Cake, Patty Cake, Baker's Man....
Late last month, with state tax revenues missing expectations, Patrick said he would close an estimated $600 million budget gap this fiscal year in part by eliminating nearly 1,000 jobs. The Department of Transportation’s budget will be cut by $13.5 million, Durrant said, with reductions in the snow and ice removal and overtime budgets.
Yeah, who cares about your roads anyway, Bay Staters?!!
Good thing you have a transportation department looking out for your intere.....
Yeah, right.
Managers will be asked to take furloughs.
Oh, how harsh! How about ELIMINATING the VAMPIRES?!
Patrick’s handling of the budget has become a central issue in the nascent 2010 gubernatorial campaign.... The payroll records also show that more than 80 percent of MassHighway’s nearly 2,000 employees are paid out of the state’s capital budget and funded through bonds.
Unbelievable!
See: Municipal Bond Milking
Barney Frank Benefited From State Debts
Not Even Water Can Erode State Bonding With Banks
Yup, STICKING YOU WITH MORE DEBT while THEY ACCRUE INTEREST PAYMENTS FROM YOU, taxpayers!
In a parting letter Aloisi wrote to Patrick last month, he called this method “a wasteful and duplicitous practice designed to hide the real cost of our workforce while seriously shortchanging our statewide road and bridge programs.’’
Yeah, well what geniusescame up with the idea?
Also see:
Governor Guts State Services
Pigs at the State Trough
A Slow Saturday Special: Statehouse Slush Fund
Biotech Giveaway Was Borrowed Money
Massachusetts Residents Taken For a Ride
UBS Picks Up Pike
Slow Saturday Special: Day at the Movies
The Hollywood Heist of Massachusetts
Why Massachusetts Needed to Raise Taxes
Massachusetts' Business Tax Increase Was a Corporate Tax CutTax Increase Fails to Save Massachusetts Services
Blood All Over Massachusetts State Budget
State Government On Probation
The Next Taxachusetts Tax Increase
Bankers' Bark Worse Than Bite to State
Yeah, this state doesn't have any money -- and you SEE WHY!!
And look at what happens when you actually use the thing. The SERVICE SUCKS!!!
"Holbrook crash demonstrates value of cameras on T buses" by Jack Nicas, Globe Correspondent | October 15, 2009
First it was to catch terrorists, and now... ?
Pffffft!
Yeah, car crashes never leave evidence. Good thing they got cameras.
When Susan Brown allegedly fell asleep at the wheel Monday and hit an MBTA bus, it was not immediately clear what had happened. But as in many other incidents involving motorists, passengers, and possible crime suspects over the past two years, cameras on the bus captured Brown’s actions.
“The video has changed the way we conduct investigations and has vastly improved our ability to identify suspects and solve crimes,’’ said Paul MacMillan, police chief of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority. In a video released yesterday by the MBTA, Brown’s Chevy Malibu crosses the median line for approximately four seconds before hitting a MBTA bus head-on in Holbrook. As compelling as the footage is to most, transit police see it as an important tool. “I’ll tell you, there isn’t a day that goes by that we don’t use them,’’ Transit Police Sergeant Ken Sprague, said of the cameras.
You NEEDED a CAMERA for THAT, huh?
Video can help implicate some people and vindicate others....
With all due respect, I would prefer to do without the fascism.
Surveillance footage from a bus also led to the arrest of five individuals yesterday morning, each charged with assault by means of a dangerous weapon. Four were taped Sept. 9 showing brandishing knives on an bus in Boston. The footage has also helped solve crimes not committed on MBTA buses. Transit police receive outside requests for footage nearly every day, MacMillan said.
Hey, I'm glad they caught the hoods with knives, but SEE HOW TYRANNY EXPANDS once you ACCEPT IT, America?
“If the individual came on the MBTA after the crime, we may be able to identify them,’’ he said. Plus, cameras pointing outward on either side of buses can catch suspects walking on the sidewalk or accidents yards away, Sprague said.
So the BUSES are also STATE SPY VEHICLES!!!!
The revelations are not all bad, though. Video from Monday’s accident shows a man hopping off the bus to aid Brown. He helped her to the sidewalk and called police with his cellphone....
--more--"And you are ONLY GETTING MORE of the UNBLINKING ELECTRIC EYES, Bay-Stater!
"Security cameras come to trolleys; Green Line starts safety initiative" by Meghan E. Irons, Globe Staff | October 17, 2009
Yeah, and WHO could be AGAINST SAFETY, right?
First they were on the buses. Now cameras will help keep an eye out for crime on the Green Line as part of an MBTA safety initiative that one civil liberties group says raises concerns.
The MBTA will begin testing cameras on the trolleys underground as part of a pilot program that is funded with $500,000 in grant money from the Department of Homeland Security, Chief Paul MacMillan of the MBTA Transit Police said yesterday.
Yup, THANK YOU for the TOTALITARIANISM, DHS!!!
And ONCE you START a "pilot program" just TRY to GET RID OF IT!
The two-phase project is meant to increase security on the transit system by beaming images in real time from inside trolleys to the Transit Police’s operations control center in downtown Boston.
“Our hope is that the cameras will be able to be viewed in a police cruiser, so that an officer responding to a call will have real-time viewing of what is happening on the scene,’’ MacMillan said.
Remember WAY BACK WHEN they told us this was JUST because of "TERRORISTS?!!!!"
Cameras are installed on more than 300 buses, and most of the T’s subway stations. Now they are going into the tunnels, he said. Transit police have used video from surveillance cameras in nearly 500 investigations, more than 240 of which have resulted in charges, according to MBTA spokesman Joe Pesaturo. Surveillance footage from a bus also led to the arrest of five individuals this week, each charged with assault by means of a dangerous weapon. Four were taped Sept. 9 brandishing knives on a bus in Boston, Pesaturo added.
You know what? Let me carry a piece and we will see how brave these knife-brandishing youth are!
“Since we’ve installed the closed-circuit television system, we’ve had great success using it to solve crimes and identify offenders,’’ MacMillan said. “We think this enhances awareness on what is happening on our transit system and on the train.’’
Nancy Murray, the education director at the ACLU of Massachusetts, said her organization has concerns about the use of federal money to support cameras to keep watch over riders.... citing surveillance cameras across the Boston area, said the T cameras will be high-resolution devices that one day could be used to track people or be fitted with facial recognition software....
****************
MacMillan said that he understands the concerns about privacy, but that safety has a bigger role.
What EVERY GREAT TYRANT would say!
“I believe our ability to use these cameras as investigative tools outweighs the privacy concerns,’’ said MacMillan, who pointed out that the devices are standard closed-circuit television cameras....
That thumping sound you hear is the founding fathers pitching a conniption fit in their coffins.
Riders braving the afternoon commute at Park Street yesterday welcomed the news about the cameras.
“It doesn’t bother me,’’ said Richard Rosenblatt, a 68-year-old from Newton. “I’m not doing anything wrong, so I don’t care.’’
That is a SUPREMELY FASCIST MIND-SET, although I shouldn't be surprised seeing the source of such thought.
Artem Shakhramanyan, a 21-year-old student from Brighton, said the cameras will be an extra layer of protection for riders. “If people know there is a camera on the train, it will prevent them from doing something wrong,’’ he said.
Well, apparently, it doesn't prevent them from doing anything because they are still committing crimes!
Marville Peart, a 53-year-old social worker from Brockton, shrugged off concerns about an infringement on riders’ privacy. “It’s like a double-edge sword,’’ she said. “There are times when things happen on the train and [you want help but] there is no one there. And there are times when we need our privacy. At the same time, safety is the utmost concern.’’
You can HAVE your FASCISTA HUB then, Bah-stahn!
I'll never visit your "fair city" again!
--more--"
And here is a PEEK inside the monitoring room:
"New transit merger faces a few snarls; Logistics will challenge 10,000 state workers" by Noah Bierman, Globe Staff | November 2, 2009
At the hub of the state’s transportation merger is the sophisticated video control center in South Boston. (David L. Ryan/ Globe Staff)
The Massachusetts Turnpike Authority runs a sophisticated control room in South Boston, where 60 feet of video monitors display real-time views from 550 traffic cameras across the state...
So they COULD BE in YOUR TOWN and you DON'T EVEN KNOW IT!
The major problems afflicting transportation, including billions of dollars in debt and a backlog of maintenance on the MBTA and on the Massachusetts Turnpike, will not be immediately solved, according to even the most optimistic observers.
WhereTF did ALL the $$$$ go, TAXPAYERS?
Oh, you know where from above!
The new transportation law, for all the excitement it generated among legislators, will not raise an estimated $20 billion necessary over the next two decades needed to keep roads, trains, subways, and buses from crumbling....
All that money WASTED!!!
Maybe some $115,000 giveaway "jobs" could be retrieved?
The new board will have the power to award billions of dollars a year in public contracts, meaning its appointees will be some of the most powerful people in the state, despite never facing election....
Yup, you are RISKING YOUR LIFE in MORE WAYS than one when you ride the T!
"Report finds T’s riders at risk; Points to debt, years of neglect" by Noah Bierman, Globe Staff | November 4, 2009
A decade of systemic neglect and mounting financial problems has left the MBTA with public safety issues that are far more serious than previously revealed and swiftly growing worse, according to a devastating independent report ordered by Governor Deval Patrick.
Yeah, but WE NEED to WASTE MONEY on EYE-SPY CAMERAS!!!!!!!!
The report, obtained by the Globe yesterday, found that the agency has left more than 50 critically important safety projects unfunded because of a “mountain of red ink.’’
Well, when ALL YOUR MONEY goes to PAY OFF LOOTING BANKS that's what happens!
In the unsparing words of the author, if the MBTA were a private firm, it “would likely fold or seek bankruptcy.’’
The report is generally uncritical of MBTA management. Instead, it places most of the blame on a change in the way the MBTA was funded, a change approved by the Legislature in 2000.
The idea at the time was to give the T a fixed annual subsidy, abandoning the unwieldy practice of using state money to pay off MBTA expenses at the end of each year. The concept, wrote David F. D’Alessandro, the former John Hancock chairman who led the review, was laudable. But the state underestimated the agency’s expenses by $558 million between 2000 and 2008, he wrote, because of unrealistic projections for operating costs that were outside the T’s control.
Yup, they OVERESTIMATE the TAX HAULS but UNDERESTIMATE EXPENSES!
Why? So they can STEAL TAX LOOT for themselves and their friends!!!!!!
For example, the original plan left no money for workers’ health care cost increases, even though they grew by 73 percent in the first eight years. The T, the state’s largest electricity customer, saw fuel and utility costs more than double over the same period.
Yeah, HOW could you NOT SEE THAT coming?
To balance the books, managers deferred debt payments, masking the size of the T’s problems, D’Alessandro concludes.
And NOW we are PAYING the interest, 'er, price to banksters!
“As homeowners painfully learned in the subprime mortgage debacle, it is only a matter of time before those delayed payments are due,’’ he wrote. “That time has arrived.’’ By 2013, the report said, the agency’s annual debt payment will reach $525 million....
What could YOUR TOWN DO with $525 MILLION, huh, readers?
But nope, going to BANKS!!!
The T has a total of more than $3 billion in unfunded maintenance projects it considers necessary to keep the system operating smoothly, a list that is growing as trains and buses stay in service beyond their projected life and without crucial overhauls, according to the report.
The agency spends $470 million a year on maintenance, but would need an additional $224 million to keep its backlog from growing, the report said.
Why did a GAS TAX INCREASE just cross my mind, huh?
In the meantime, the T also faces an ever-growing gap in its yearly operating budget. The report predicts cumulative budget deficits of at least $550 million by 2014, a figure that will double if the Legislature declines to renew beyond this year an added $160 million subsidy it granted to the agency to prevent a fare hike.
After ALL the TAX INCREASES and everything else!!!!!!
Some of the problems cited in the report have been raised elsewhere. But D’Alessandro said that no one has previously documented the extent to which the MBTA’s deferred debt payments have created future problems and masked past failures....
The report - punctuated by foreboding subtitles such as “The outlook is bleak,’’ “A Faustian bargain,’’ and “At risk - system safety and reliability’’ - includes a list of recommendations....
A spokesman for Patrick, who faces a run for reelection next year, declined to comment on the report last night....
--more--"Hey, at least they are catching perverts with the photos!
"2 men arrested in T groping incidents
Transit police have arrested two men accused of groping young women in separate incidents. The arrests on Monday follow a recent campaign to stop sexual assaults on the MBTA that has boosted reported incidents by 32 percent and arrests by 40 percent, authorities said. On Monday at about 10 p.m., a 19-year-old Revere woman was standing at a Copley station platform when she felt someone inappropriately touch her, according to a police report. A man standing nearby told the startled woman, “I did it, and I liked it,’’ police said. William D. Carlyle, 52, of Boston, was later apprehended at Park Street station and charged with indecent assault and battery. He pleaded not guilty yesterday. Earlier Monday, at the Quincy Center station, police arrested James Williams, 44, of Chelsea, after a 29-year-old Quincy woman identified him as the man who had groped her on a Red Line train in late June, according to police. Williams was also charged with indecent assault and battery and pleaded not guilty.
--more--"
And they are EVERYWHERE, ladies!
"Everett man charged in T groping" by Jack Nicas, Globe Correspondent | November 6, 2009
Transit Police arrested a 22-year-old Everett man Wednesday in connection with the groping of a woman on the T.
It was the third such arrest in three days, part of a crackdown by the T, which has seen reported incidences of sexual assault rise by 32 percent and arrests by 40 percent since April 2008, authorities said. “We are getting more reports, and we’re also getting the info to make arrests,’’ Chief Paul MacMillan of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority Transit Police said Tuesday. On Oct. 19, police allege, Hugo Hernandez groped a woman pressed up against him in a crowded Orange Line train until she eventually struck him in the face....
I'd give her a gun. He'll keep his hands to himself then!
On Wednesday night, Transit Police stopped Hernandez at Sullivan Square station and arrested him after he identified himself in surveillance video footage....
Hernandez was charged with one count of indecent assault and battery on an adult and was scheduled to be arraigned yesterday in Boston Municipal Court. but the arraignment was postponed....
On Monday, Transit Police arrested William Carlyle, 52, of Boston, and James Williams, 44, of Chelsea, in connection with separate groping incidents.
--more--"
"Everett man charged in four T assaults
Transit Police have arrested an Everett man, charging him with groping four women on the T over the past six months, authorities said. Hugo Hernandez, 22, was apprehended at Sullivan Square station Wednesday, after he identified himself in a photograph from surveillance footage related to one of the alleged assaults on Oct. 19. His arraignment for that case was postponed Thursday, allowing prosecutors to attach charges from three more incidents, two on April 28 and one on Sept. 10. Hernandez faces four charges of indecent assault and battery and pleaded not guilty at his arraignment yesterday in Boston Municipal Court.
The message is simple: STAY OFF the T!
No, I won't be visiting your sick city ever again, Boston.
