I've been coordinating a community effort to gather support for and assist with Newton's application to be a pilot Google Superfast Internet community, which is sort of the continuation of my previous efforts to get citywide WiFi in Newton.

Another project I'd like to see finished is the installation of a solar-powered heating system for the Gath pool. As I put together more information on that, I'll post it here.

Is there something else that I promised to do but didn't finish during my years on the Board? If you know of something, please post it here. I've tried to avoid taking on any new civic responsibilities (e.g. committees, commissions, task forces, etc.) until I tie up the loose ends from my Aldermanic work.

There will be a new, live episode of Common Ground on NewTV tonight. We have a panel that includes three members of the Board of Aldermen. We'll be talking about budget myths, clearing snow from sidewalks, and whether or not Newton Aldermen do (or should) run the universe. Tune in at 8:00 PM on NewTV's blue channel for the discussion. . . and to find out about a Newton policy initiative that might make a real difference in your life.

In researching my NewtonNet wireless Internet access proposal, I had a question placed on the city census a few years ago regarding computer use in Newton and I believe we could use those data to make a great case to Google that Newton would make a perfect place to test their new service.

I'm hoping our city officials will act quickly to jump on this opportunity.

Here's a link to a New York Times article about Google's new initiative.

Kelly in Colorado Springs with Pike's Peak (7/5/07)

More than a third of the streetlights in Colorado Springs will go dark Monday. The police helicopters are for sale on the Internet. The city is dumping firefighting jobs, a vice team, burglary investigators, beat cops — dozens of police and fire positions will go unfilled.

The parks department removed trash cans last week, replacing them with signs urging users to pack out their own litter.

Neighbors are encouraged to bring their own lawn mowers to local green spaces, because parks workers will mow them only once every two weeks. If that.

Water cutbacks mean most parks will be dead, brown turf by July; the flower and fertilizer budget is zero.City recreation centers, indoor and outdoor pools, and a handful of museums will close for good March 31 unless they find private funding to stay open. Buses no longer run on evenings and weekends. The city won't pay for any street paving, relying instead on a regional authority that can meet only about 10 percent of the need. (The Denver Post, 1/31/10)

Are we headed in this direction in Newton? My sense is that unless we can get the rate of employee health insurance cost growth under control, we will be faced with either significant property tax increases or cuts in services similar to what Colorado Springs is experiencing. Sound far-fetched? Already, many of our parks and playgrounds are as poorly maintained as those described in the article and our buildings and streets are in far worse shape than what I saw in Colorado Springs on a visit last year.

Of course, problems with maintenance in Newton are not just budgetary in nature. There are basic management issues that need to be addressed. But it is becoming increasingly clear that we need to take significant action now in order to achieve long-term fiscal health or we may be forced to deal with cuts in services similar to those now being implemented in Colorado Springs.

What Spring-indicators to you rely on? How do you know that winter is over?

ZV: One personal question. Do you go to the polls? Do you vote?

HZ: I do. Sometimes, not always. It depends. But I believe that it is preferable sometimes to have one candidate rather another candidate, while you understand that that is not the solution. Sometimes the lesser evil is not so lesser, so you want to ignore that, and you either do not vote or vote for third party as a protest against the party system. Sometimes the difference between two candidates is an important one in the immediate sense, and then I believe trying to get somebody into office, who is a little better, who is less dangerous, is understandable. But never forgetting that no matter who gets into office, the crucial question is not who is in office, but what kind of social movement do you have. Because we have seen historically that if you have a powerful social movement, it doesn’t matter who is in office. Whoever is in office, they could be Republican or Democrat, if you have a powerful social movement, the person in office will have to yield, will have to in some ways respect the power of social movements.

We saw this in the 1960s. Richard Nixon was not the lesser evil, he was the greater evil, but in his administration the war was finally brought to an end, because he had to deal with the power of the anti-war movement as well as the power of the Vietnamese movement. I will vote, but always with a caution that voting is not crucial, and organizing is the important thing.

When some people ask me about voting, they would say will you support this candidate or that candidate? I say: “I will support this candidate for one minute that I am in the voting booth. At that moment I will support A versus B, but before I am going to the voting booth, and after I leave the voting booth, I am going to concentrate on organizing people and not organizing electoral campaign.”

http://www.revolutionbythebook.akpress.org/an-interview-with-howard-zinn-on-anarchism-rebels-against-tyranny/

I believe that it will now be possible to balance Newton's Fiscal Year 2011 budget without cuts in services or increases in class size if the union contracts can be settled for and amount that does not exceed the rate of increase in our costs. That probably means either a freeze in base salary or health insurance concessions, since offering the same health insurance package and a base salary hike would likely push our costs beyond revenue increases.

The logical position for the School Committee and Mayor to take in contract negotiations is that our increased local revenues (mostly property taxes) will be needed to pay increased health insurance costs, so without an increase in state aid, we cannot offer a wage increase in FY '11. Of course, most of the unions have yet to settle their Fiscal Year '10 contracts with the city, so a great deal of work remains to secure a balanced budget without service cuts in the new budget. The key indicator of Mayor Warren's intentions will be whether he budgets any funds for salary increases in the budget reserve account of his Fiscal Year 2011 proposed operating budget.

President Obama Addresses Congress and the Nation

Last night's speech laid down the gauntlet. If the Republicans only strategy is to create gridlock, President Obama will call them out on it and appeal directly to the American people to elect reasonable, toughtful leaders to Congress who are willing to put the public interest before their own political ambitions.

Anyone who filibusters the Presidents Jobs Bill or Climate Change legislation is now warned that they will be held accountable for their actions.

And somehow President Obama managed to get this tough message across without seeming heavy-handed. In fact, his admissions of mistakes and humble tone made his speeh all the more powerful.

If ever a speech can alter the course of history, this one is a strong candidate to do so. Now, with a little backbone from the Democrats in Congress and continued pressure from the President, we might make real progress toward President Obama's goal of a full-employment economy in 2010.