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Showing posts from April, 2019

25% of Budget, 5 Minutes of Questions: What are the Council Republicans up to?

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  Enfield Town Council budget workshop The Town Council is currently preparing the 2026 budget. Department heads present their proposals at public workshops where council members usually ask detailed questions. However, something notable occurred during this week's Department of Public Works (DPW) budget presentation. Despite DPW accounting for nearly 25% of the town's non-education spending, the questioning lasted less than five minutes, with only a few basic inquiries from Republican council members. The Democrats, as the minority party with limited influence on the budget, remained silent. [YouTube video: Q&A starts at about 1:31. The DPW presentation begins at about 1:16) There were no substantial questions or debate during the presentation itself, and nothing raised about the pending outsourcing study—despite its direct relevance to the DPW budget. This limited discussion raises legitimate questions, particularly as the Council is actively exploring outsourcing trash ...
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Climate change impacts in Connecticut

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I can imagine mowing my lawn by next weekend, which seems early. Already the weeds are racing ahead. This is not surprising. Temperatures in Connecticut have increased 2.8 degrees since 1970 . Our average annual temp that year was about 48, it's now nearing 51. This coincides with a  dramatic rise in CO2. In 1970, the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere was at 325 ppm; it's now at about 410 ppm. Pre-industrial was 280 ppm.  Connecticut is ranked 10th among fastest warming states by Climate Central. Alaska is first. I'm not entirely sure why Connecticut, along with Rhode Island and Vermont, are seeing faster temperature rises. Clearly, we're seeing an increase in extreme weather in the U.S., which includes fires. We have been fairly lucky so far in Connecticut. It's hard to know for sure what climate change will mean for Connecticut specifically. But a 3 degree increase since 1970 does not bode well. We're doing nothing globally to address the problem, and ...
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