Petition Started to Strike Down Council Vote

Today, Save the Center kicked off the petition drive to stop the changes in the Master Agreement approved by the reckless council on Tuesday. Your signature is needed in order to place this decision on a referendum. Take the power away from the biased council and put it in the people's hands. Please take the 1 minute it takes to sign the petition and the 10 minutes it takes to vote on whatever day the election takes place.

Also, On April 26th, at Town Hall, a public meeting will be held by Save the Center from 7 - 9 p.m. to tell the community what the implications are regarding the changes, possible future amendments to the Master Agreement and council actions. Feel free to sign the petition at this meeting. And I hear there may be food!!

Thanks, West Hartford RAC

Residents' Voices Go Unheard as Biased Vote Approves Amendments

Once again, the town council of West Hartford proves to be a brick wall. While resident after resident implore upon the council to let the court system do its job, they again came with speeches written prior to hearing the testimony and clearly have biased opinions of the matter before them. Why must the town be subjected to over two hours of repeated claims that the Taubman Company is trying to ruin the town management's fun when the decision was made prior to the meeting. Each town official who spoke tonight passed off anyone with a dissenting opinion as someone from the Michigan based company. Let's be clear that there are residents of West Hartford who think this project is a complete sham. I also urge you to check out what the Courant has to say in tomorrow's paper about tonight's meeting. I guarantee (and I'm writing this at 10 PM after the meeting) there will be a glowing pre-written (before the meeting) article in the paper quoting Mayor Slifka from his pre-written (before the meeting) speech and saying how wonderfully detailed the town officials were in making their decisions. I truly believe that some or all of the town officials involved in this deal are in some way benefiting from this project. How else can you have such a biased opinion before hearing what people have to say? Please, next time before you get into the Public Forum portion of the meeting, remind the people who plan to speak that you aren't there to listen to what they have to say. Remind them that your decision is made for you by Barry Feldman. Remind them that you have a speech written outlining your decision. Remind them that you don't care one ounce about what happens to anyone in the town but yourselves and your careers. The fight over Blue Back Square isn't about Taubman against the Town of West Hartford. It's about the citizens of West Hartford against a greedy, tyrannous town government and out of state developers who've concocted the deal of a lifetime, for themselves. Have a great day. Mark Quigley

E-mail to Town Council 4/12/2005

I sent this email tonight in response to some of the comments at the Town Council meeting. Please feel free to discuss... --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mr. Mayor and Town Council, I think each of you need to step back and think about what the decision you make at the special meeting on April 13, 2005 will do. If you approve this amendment, you will propogate the perception (some would call it belief) that most or all of the council made decisions last year for Blue Back Square in a biased manner. I urge you to let the appeals process run it's course, that's what it is in place for. If I were able to attend tomorrow night's meeting, I'd say exactly that. That's why we all live in this country, because there is a system of checks and balances. In addition, I'd like all of you to think about the comments you made tonight against the small parking lot proposal on Ellsworth in respect to your decision to approve Blue Back last year. Let me know how you think you sound here. Forgive me if these aren't exact quotes, I was fighting off laughter.

• Mr. Slifka stated, "...town should be more proactive on the issue of encroachment." That's interesting, I guess a parking garage in the face of Burr St. residents isn't "encroachment."
• Mr. Slifka again, "...not what the neighbors think..." is a good idea. Each member of the council dismissed pleas from the neighbors around Blue Back. In fact, many of you made it a point to talk back to some of the neighbors points in your remarks prior to voting.
• Mr. Verrengia stated that the decision on this parking lot is the ..."toughest decision he has had to make, " or something to that effect. Wow.......I guess Blue Back was an easy decision. What does that do for the town's perspective on your analysis of the decision you made in Blue Back.
• Mr. Slifka stated that he can't support the "destruction of a building with historic value." That's interesting as well. The Board of Education building may not be a "Historic" building, but I think everyone will agree that it's a building with historic value, and the town council voted 9-0 to allow a greedy developer to destroy the building and put in a movie theater, while on the other end of town a historic movie theater is being torn down right now. Oh, that's right it's in Elmwood.
• Several council members, including Mr. Coursey and Mrs. McClay likened the parking lot to a "buffer." Are you kidding? What kind of buffer? A buffer with loud cars....How is a parking lot a buffer. What kind of argument is that?

If the vote tonight reflected using your heart to make a decision, as Mrs. Cantor stated, what did you use to make the decision to approve Blue Back? One can only guess... Thank you, Mark Quigley p.s. I know you all weren't on the council for the Blue Back decision -------------------------------------------------------------------------------

West Hartford Town Councin Special Meeting 4/13/2005

A special meeting of the town council has been called in West Hartford for Wednesday April 13, 2005. The purpose of the meeting is to amend the Master Agreement between the town and Blue Back Square in order to allow for the work to begin on the project prior to the completion of litigation and/or zoning appeals. Let me just say that after what was an obviously biased process last year (including passing ordinances in advance of the application to help the developer with the process), if this amendment is passed, I'm not sure how more clear it would be that the town management and town council are owned by Richard Heapes. As the council tonight voted against the "encroachment" of a small parking lot adjacent to the center of town which included the destruction of a 1925 home, how can they justify the decision to sell off the Board of Education building and encroach on the neighbors on Burr St. You cannot use the same argument for one project against another. The world revolves around perception and if the town government makes decisions for the benefit of one developer, how can the perception be anything but corruption? Oh wait, I forgot, our Mayor was in a commercial advertisement for this development last year...seems the perception is already there.