00:32secs
A representative from the Alexandria Historical Society asked for an additional 6 month moratorium. The original delay of the sale of the Old Chamber Building was first requested 6 months ago. That request was granted by the VB and was due to expire 8.26.09. Tonight the VB granted an additional 6 month extension so the Historical Society can possibly obtain grants for the building.
2min:42secs
This started out as a HO_HUM kind of a concern. I really thought it was a NO Brain er! I thought the VB would just say something like........."we recognize this problem and have taken every measure to make sure it does not happen again". That did not happen!
It is all about Garbage Cans Downtown and the process of removing trash. This is not a big deal but the VB made it one ........so this is just cause and effect.
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| From Garbage IN! But NOT OUT |
Pirates week is a huge event for the village and it draws tons of day tourists and overnight boaters. The boaters started arriving on Wednesday. By the weekend every slip was full and other fellow boaters started rafting outwards 2,3,4 wide. WOW! All overnight boaters are charged a dollar a foot, even the rafting boats! By Friday morning there was almost no more room at the inn! Taking into account the per foot revenue, not to mention all the money the boaters were spending at local business's .....this is cash flow at its finest. Not to mention all the fun our guests[the tourists/boaters] were having!
With the huge influx of people in our village their was a proportionate increase in garbage. Keep in mind the overnight boaters are paying a fee for dockage and with that goes an expectation of basic services like trash removal and clean bathrooms with TP [see the topic about let them drip dry]. On Saturday and Sunday trash removal was scheduled to be picked up as needed between the hours of 6AM to 3PM. HELLO MAC FLY the boaters do not stir till 10AM or so, if even that early! Are you telling me that nobody was going to put garbage into the cans after 3PM on Saturday? Take a look at the picture I took of an over flowing garbage can on Saturday at 7:01PM. THAT IS DINNER HOUR! CAN YOU SAY LOSS OF APPETITE?
6min:16secs
If this happens again the mayor says he will volunteer to remove the garbage out of the cans with his own personal vehicle. Good For Him.......it is an election year! Read between the lines........the DPW Supervisor is being micromanaged and he does not even realize it.......or does not care!
7min:45secs
The mayor thinks that one way to solve the garbage problem is to eliminate the rafting at the docks. Which according to him will get rid of 2/3 of the boats Welllllllll .........IF the mayor wants to eliminate the garbage problem then maybe he might just want to get rid of ALL THE TOURISTS! Remember the Poll about who said PHUCK The Tourists!!!!
8 min:38secs
Trustee Sweet says that we thought the dock revenue problem was more important than the garbage problem
VB Meeting 8.11.09 from p guston on Vimeo.
16 comments:
It's rare that I comment on VB meetings , but I must say that was some of the most ignorant dialogue regarding this topic comming from the VB I think I have ever heard. VB ! DON'T YOU GET IT ?? THE JOB IS NOT GETTING DONE GOOD ENOUGH !! It's just not pirates week where this is a problem. It's all the time ! Hey VB , go on international websites like tripadvisor.com. Here you will see comments from Abay visitors that aren't all that good. " Dirty, and Run Down" " Stay in Clayton" are the norm. It's not just JC and JQ trying to bust your stones . Are you proud of your village ??
And the comment about eliminating rafting to eliminate the garbarge problem.. Are you an imbicile ?? When you look up the term "stepping over dollars to pick up pennies" is it your picture we see there ? If you thought the politicians at town hall meetings had it rough discussing nationalized health care, wait till it your comment gets back to the COC Members.
I guess you can recognize an Abay VB member on the street by how they limp from shooting themselves in the foot on a weekly basis .
Hammonite,
Don't worry! The COC heard all of it, LIVE! Hope they are proud....
Just to set the record at least a little bit straight, I was in the Bay between 8:00 pm and 10:00 pm on Saturday night and did see a village employee going around and emptying garbage cans.
Bibliophile - Appreciate that, but the point is the village is not investing enough manpower, funds etc to do the job properly .While it's become painfully more obvious during pirate weeks, the problem is really season long and is more involved than just garbage cans busting to capacity . The village consistantly gets low marks from visitors saying the bay is " dirty" . Maybe if the village invested more in it's own aesthetics , the tourists might feel better about staying here in lodging in the Bay that is sub par ,with a few exceptions . Don't even get me started on that.
Just another thought. Wouldn't the village realize a return on thier investment (ROI) by installing additional temporary floating docks during high attendance events ? I would try to make it appealing to get as many people into the Bay as possible I think the village missed the mark by not investing in more dock space at scenic view park installing break walls etc utlizing the backside of island attached to it . (Coordinate with RiverWalk etc. ) Oh well
I think what Hammonite is referring to is called...Forward Thinking
Bib...you did see the trash picked up late Saturday night, three hours after I called the Mayor to describe the problem to him.
What you also might have seen is a village worker doing weed whacking duty, Saturday, while the garbage was piling up.
According to the DPW chief, there weren't enough employees to do the job?
I believe x-mayor Simpson was the one who instituted the dpw worker on weekends/holidays to just pick -up garbage. Previously, the streets got sweep in the am and that was it.
Now, poor john says we need more trash pick-up on upper james every weekend.
Last weekend was the first time we have had a garbage problem.
Thank you dpw for helping keep our village clean, now we need some business owners to do the same.
It's hard not to say something here. Myself and my fellow boaters (tourists to you) have started spending our time and money in Sackets harbour where we pay for and get good dockage, Kingston and Brockville. the last 2 places have public docks w/power. oh my!! the idea of that. All 3 places are clean!!!! All 3 places appreciate the business. The restaurants are great and we get dock attendants that care and know what they are doing. All of that is unlike here now. This has been a pathetic year in Alex Bay and proof was one night in Sackets when 8 boats we knew all happened to be there that used to hang out at the town dock and frequent the local restaurants. Everyone said the same thing about the Bay. The short sightedness of this village amazes us all. it's filthy. Services are poor. It IS the best spot on the river but for our money we are all boating to elswhere for a better experience. That attitude here seems to be "tourist go away" (but leave your money) Guess what, you're going to be half right!!! This place is so mismanaged that if it was a business it would have gone under years ago. The attitude and culture have to change. With very few exceptions most things here are run down sliding futher into the abyss. It requires a positive outlook and appoach to gain the business back. Instead, the one time people are here in droves spending money, you want to NOT allow rafting???? hello? myself and several others have already secured dockage in another town next year after seeing this village slide for too long to want to be here any longer.
MsCoffee,
More diligent garbage management on the Big Event weekends......not every weekend
I guess Ms. Coffee wasn't around 4th of July weekend when you coud have skiied off the mountain of trash in the can by Jreck Subs .
I have to say I agree and I try to state fairly neutral these days...(don't want to get the boot again)but going downtown in the Bay lately has been quite the ordeal. We quite frequently go downtown to the Chez for breakfast and that is normally around 9 a.m. and the streets are normally still pretty grungy. It is rather embarassing. Maybe we should have a litter law and try enforcing it. I have seen kids, and local kids even, along with adults, just toss their trash into the street. Now I do have to say that one time they did do it because the trash can was too full. At other times, they were just damn inconsiderate. Maybe our local PD could start writing some littering tickets (and of course that is IF the trash cans are empty). Maybe having two shifts for the Village crew would make it better in the summer. Also, maybe some should spend less time riding around in the trucks and more time on the street cleaning them. I have seen that alot this week.
I don't think the problem lies with just one Village Official. It's kind of a "trickle down" effect. People are just lazy. They don't care. A lot of the business owners have the same mentality. They don't care. Get the money while they can and screw the Village. To hell with trying to improve their location. They are here for the money...plain and simple.
I thought it nice when the Village put up the doggie receptacles. What gets me is when people let their dog poop right next to the doggie receptacle and don't bend over and pick it up and put in it the damn trash.
It takes a community to make a community. Instead of everyone butting heads all the time, maybe we should try to step back and take a look at the bigger picture. Who cares "whose" idea it was, or "who" will get the credit. Let's work together to make this a nicer place to visit and help promote the community in a positive light. We don't want people to go to other places to spend their dollars. If things don't change, the summer streets will look like the winter streets...EMPTY! You know how when your kids are teenagers and the more you try to "tell" them what to do the more they do the opposite? Well maybe that is how the VB feels...the more you yell the more they laugh and the more they say they are not going to do anything about? Not sure, just thinking out loud.
Crabbyappleton
The trickle down effect .... has to start at the top.....just ask Newton! The Top is the source of the problem..... Your last paragraph is on the money! You do not have to be a visionary to predict the near future of our community.
just empty the garbage cans.....even a caveman can do it
Rock Star's excellent comment should be an alert to wise villagers, but most will probably say "bye now!!" I worked around the Bay for 20 years, and I spend my tourism dollars elsewhere now.
Joe
MsCoffee.....you gotta stick your head out the door more often. The garbage has been a problem for quite a while. We're just getting around to it because it has become a CRITICAL problem.
Knee-jerk reactions by the VB seldom solve long term infrastructure breakdown issues.
The board should be tasking the various village departments to deal with these problems before they happen.
To try to put a positive spin on this thread , I was down at the town dock last Friday at 10 PM and there was a village truck there filled with garbage bags. Hopefully by virtue of this blog they will keep it up from now on . You can't run the village like a burgular alarm . I.e. when the alarm sounds , you have already been ripped off. It's about identifying the " achilles heel" of the system and correcting it before problems occur
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