Another message from Tom Champion (verbatim)

[redcolumbine.livejournal.com]

(In response to my request that he read all the responses to the last one)

In fact, having surveyed the recent threads,  I am a little concerned that someone has floated the idea that I was asked by "my boss" at City Hall to discontinue my participation. That's simply not the case. This is my own decision, made for the reasons already given. One of the strangest aspects of this episode is that so many DSLJ members seem to take the attitude that I have been a link to a faceless, unapproachable bureaucracy -- when the fact is that, as a whole, city government is pretty darn approachable and human -- from the Chief of Police and the City Clerk to the Superintendent of Inspectional Services and, yes, my good friend Jim Kotzuba at Traffic and Parking.

Also, it's just not right for people to conclude that what sets this administration apart is my past willingness to post to DSLJ.  This all got started because of the Connect CTY calls (the so-called "robo-calls") which were very much the mayor's idea. From the day he took office, people have been able to email Joe directly -- and he reads every one of his messages, and often responds personally.

And people forget that Somerville was the first city in New England -- and remains one of the few small or mid-sized cities anywhere in the U.S. -- to provide a 311 customer service center.  We have trained, multilingual (and very nice) professionals standing by to assist residents with obtaining information and city services of all kinds. They can be reached by phone or email, and they are better informed about the nitty gritty of government than I will ever be. Many of the questions about Somerville life that DSLJers ask the community could be answered quickly and courteously (and expertly) if they were directed to 311.  311 makes a lot of private-sector customer service and tech support operations look pretty lame. I will talk to Sean Murphy, our excellent director of constituent service, about how to structure announcements and information for LJ and other online communities.

But enough rant. I'm not going to reactivate my LiveJournal account, but I'm certainly not expecting you to act as go-between. You can post this if you want -- and then please don't worry about maintaining a link on my behalf. We both have real work to do!

Thanks again for your assistance.

Comments

[veek.livejournal.com]

That all certainly makes sense. :) I like Tom a lot, but he's right -- his energies are better spent elsewhere.

I will talk to Sean Murphy, our excellent director of constituent service, about how to structure announcements and information for LJ and other online communities.

The first thing that comes to mind is setting up a free WordPress blog (http://wordpress.com/) and making the feeds available to anyone, on or off LJ.

[rmd.livejournal.com]

re; wordpress blog -- something like that would be great.

also, a feed for all the street cleaning routes might be useful, in case you prefer pull RSS feeds over push email for notification.

[thetathx1138.livejournal.com]

Oh God, I don't need that info and I'd subscribe just for the name.

[marphod.livejournal.com]

Please don't specify a font color. I cannot read this without highlighting it or using another style. And if I had colors set to compensate for a visual disability, this type of post makes that very difficult to read.

[enochs-fable.livejournal.com]

Yes, please go and fix this?

Specify a font color?

[redcolumbine.livejournal.com]

I just cut-n-pasted - it looks black to me. I didn't specify a font color.

Re: Specify a font color?

[ron_newman]

Just take out all the formatting, please. Post in plain text.

Re: Specify a font color?

[redcolumbine.livejournal.com]

Went into HTML and kicked out all the tags - did that work?

Re: Specify a font color?

[marphod.livejournal.com]

Yes. Thank you.

Re: Specify a font color?

[ron_newman]

Much better, thanks!

[srakkt.livejournal.com]

All of this aside, "fun while it lasted" seems to be the catchphrase that best applies. The City government, in all of my dealings with them since moving back here, have been professional, courteous helpful and approachable. Having a public affairs officer (Can't remember actual title, but PAO is close) participating in *whatever* capacity, whether official or otherwise, in DSLJ has been an enormous boon. I can also understand his reasons for moving on. It was a grand experiment, and useful things were learned.

Tom, thanks for being here on LJ for us.

[teko.livejournal.com]

Heartily seconded.

[icecreamempress.livejournal.com]

I'd love it if someone (and it doesn't have to be the aptly-named Tom Champion) could post the text of CTY calls to the community. They've given me (a Cambridge resident who's in the Davis Square area) some helpful information.

[mamajoan.livejournal.com]

You can sign up for the robocalls even if you don't live in Somerville.

[jamiesquared.livejournal.com]

I must say..I just emailed the mayors office about my weird commercial parking annoyance and they replied within minutes! I need to supply them with a license plate which I will do tomorrow, but I was really impressed with their speedy reply. I will def contact the city more often now :)

[josephineave.livejournal.com]

What kind of weird commercial parking annoyance do you have, for I too have one, well, on behalf of my painter who has become my own personal Eldon.

[jamiesquared.livejournal.com]

I originally posted it in Tom Champions post. So I will copy n paste :)

It isn't so much that the guy is doing anything to me directly...its just that my husband wants to be able to occasionally park his plumbing vehicle in front of our house even if its just till I get home for work so we dont have to do a huge car swapping thing...but we cant. I just dont get why this guy is so special. Whats the deal with your painter :)

"May I ask a strange question, I never am able to get an answer out of the parking office.

Last year we got numerous commercial parking tickets on my husbands plumbing van. Completely fine as that was our fault and the rule is no commercial parking overnight. However, around the corner from my house is a plumber who parks his van EVERY night for the last two years on the street. I complained to the parking office and they told me under no circumstances is that allowed and I should report it when I see him there. Well I have done that and I swear nothing is ever done. I walk my dogs at night and early a.m. Ive never seen a ticket. Also he has a Somerville parking sticker in his window...how is that even possible when somerville doesnt issue parking stickers for commercial cars? I normally dont complain about stuff like this but it really annoys me especially since noone will give me an answer in the parking office."

[ron_newman]

I don't understand the purpose of banning commercial parking overnight. Can someone else explain this?

[jamiesquared.livejournal.com]

Well I can see why they do it sort of. I don't really want to look out my window and see big lettered trucks all over the place. Most of the commercial vehicles cause a lot of blind spots as well.

[wildflowersoul.livejournal.com]

I don't know if this is why, but on my street there's a house being remodeled, and thank god they can't park commercial vehicles overnight because they'd probably take up a few on-street parking spots every night. They already take up 2-3 spots every day during the daytime, and they've been working on this house for at least half a year. It doesn't leave many spaces for people who paid for resident parking stickers, I consider it a lucky day if I can find a spot on my end of the street (not that I drive every day, but whenever I do drive it's a crapshoot).

[josephineave.livejournal.com]

My painter spent a few days doing some work and they ticketed his commercial vehicle during the day. The parking person told him he had been parking there too often. He can't use a guest pass more than twice in week, so what's he supposed to do? I hate having him park in my driveway, since it means the tenants will have to find him to move.

[wildflowersoul.livejournal.com]

Dude, I don't know the ins and outs of commercial passes vs. guest passes, I'm just sayin' that I'm glad there's a restriction on commercial vehicles overnight. Is it the worst thing in the world that your tenants find him and ask him to move (I speak as a tenant who isn't even allowed to park in the driveway at my house)? How often is this really a problem for you?

[josephineave.livejournal.com]

When there are parking spots on the street, yeah, it bugs me and he's at my house every other week to work on something. I also hate that he got a $50 parking ticket that doesn't make sense. I didn't expect you to know anything about commercial passes, just engaging in group whining, that's all.

[jamiesquared.livejournal.com]

You can get a special permit from the traffic office for a worker who will be working more than the 2 day visitor pass will allow :)