Mythopoeia of undergrounding wires

Written by Sean Goldrick
Thursday, 09 February 2012 00:00

As the saying goes, each is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts. Yet when it comes to putting electric wires underground, “undergrounding,” in industry parlance, the facts are difficult to pin down.

At a Greenwich public hearing last year, representatives from CL&P asserted that it would cost $3.3 million per mile to underground electric wires in Greenwich. I followed up with CL&P engineer John Siclari who stated that the $3.3 million figure is based on a “blended average” of estimates. Tom Dorsey, CL&P manager for government relations, admitted that the figure is not based on an estimate for Greenwich, or for Connecticut, but comes from estimates in other states. Dorsey pointed to a 2009 study by the utilities industry-funded Edison Electric Institute which put the cost of undergrounding overhead wires at a maximum of $2.1 million per mile. Dorsey contends that undergrounding in Greenwich could cost more due to the town’s being “filled with rock ledge.” Yet CL&P has yet to perform an estimate for Greenwich or this region.

The emissions test fails our citizens

Written by Ed Dadakis
Thursday, 02 February 2012 00:00

I’ve just completed my emissions testing and don’t know whether I should be happy I passed or mad I had to go through this charade again.

My 1997 Chevy Blazer passed yet again. It is 15 years old and has passed every single emissions test, which I guess is as many as 10.

Each time I take the car to the testing site, first in Darien off I-95 and now in Old Greenwich, wait from 20 minutes to an hour, fork over $20, or $40 when I miss the deadline, the car comes through with flying colors.

In the 15 years I’ve owned the car I’ve never tuned up the engine or changed the spark plugs or fixed the emissions system, yet it passes year after year. This is how ridiculous the emission testing law is in Connecticut. Cars today are engineered so well they simply don’t exceed the standards mandated even if nothing is done to them. Sure some cars fail and, while I couldn’t get any statistics, it is far less then 5%, perhaps as low as less than 1%.

Let’s lose the ‘psycho’ label

Last Updated on Tuesday, 31 January 2012 10:45 Written by Claude Johnson
Thursday, 26 January 2012 00:00

Lately, I’ve been feeling that if Yogi Berra were to comment on today's political situation in this country, he would say, “Politics is 80% half-psycho.” Though I’m liberally paraphrasing Berra’s famous quote, his estimate is probably conservative, especially in an election year.

Similarly, judging from our local situation as a Giants-Patriots border region, Berra might have said, “Football is 80% half-psycho.” Take our family, for instance. Don’t ask me why, but each of our kids has a different favorite NFL team — the Chargers, Saints, and Patriots. My wife’s a Lions fan (from Detroit) and I’m also a Pats fan — my Boston-area high school football team was named the Patriots and I never left the bandwagon. Is that psycho? Probably not, because we don’t go around telling others that their team stinks.

Representing the kids

Last Updated on Thursday, 19 January 2012 13:24 Written by Jenny Byxbee
Thursday, 19 January 2012 00:00

The post of Greenwich youth services coordinator came about as a direct result of the United Way’s 2002 Assessment of Human Service Needs for Greenwich. At the conclusion of that report, a task force representative of the greater community was formed to explore why the increasing human service needs of local youth and families seemed to present such a large challenge to our community.

We knew that we were devoting ever-increasing resources to some of the highest quality public and private services available anywhere. The task force did not come up with the complete answer, but it did conclude that the community and our local youth and families would all be far better served if there was an entity charged with the coordination of all youth services. In fact, the United Way played a role in establishing the Commission on Aging through a similar process many years ago.