Rep. Wong (R-Wakefield/Saugus): House and Senate Approve Chapter 90 funds for local road projects

(BOSTON, May 10, 2013)—Representative Donald H. Wong (R-9th Essex District) has announced that the Massachusetts House of Representatives and Senate have approved the state’s Chapter 90 state transportation funding bill that will provide $300 million to cities and towns, an increase of $100 million over the previous year.  The measure is awaiting Governor Deval Patrick's signature.

The Town of Wakefield will receive $1,020,068.00 for Fiscal Year 2014, an increase of $340,023.00 over Fiscal Year 2013.

Created by the Legislature in 1973, the Chapter 90 program provides reimbursement to municipalities for road and bridge expenditures through the issuance of bonds.  Funds may also be used for engineering services related to highway transportation enhancement, as well as the purchase of road building machinery and equipment.

The money allocated to the Town of Wakefield is expected to create construction jobs, improve transportation and public safety all while encouraging long-term economic development across the Commonwealth.

"I am pleased that the Legislature has recognized the importance of providing additional funding to make necessary repairs to its roadways and bridges,” Representative Wong said. “I am confident that the Town of Wakefield will put this money to good use."

Funding for Chapter 90 is allocated using a longstanding formula based upon community road miles and population numbers reflected by the 2010 Census and employment.


Source:
State Representative Donald H. Wong
For information contact:
617-722-2488

Progressive rock at its best! Wow!

Amazing music!

Another loss for zealot U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz

Federal judge comes to the rescue in property rights case. Carmen Ortiz should have known better.

Jon Chesto of the Boston Business Journal has the details.

Thank goodness for the Institute for Justice. The government was out to seize owner Russ Caswell's motel in Tewksbury because several unaffiliated drug deals took place. A federal Magistrate Judge, Judith Dein, thought otherwise.

Dein’s ruling today pointed to several reasons why prosecutors didn’t have the right to seize the Motel Caswell:

• The government had identified only a limited number of qualified drug-related incidents, spread out over a 15-year period. None of the incidents — law enforcement officials eventually named 15 of them — involved Caswell or his employees, or even people that Caswell was familiar with.
• There were essentially no efforts to work with Caswell to reduce drug crimes at the property before prosecutors moved ahead with forfeiture proceedings in 2009
• There was no warning given to Caswell that the possibility of a property seizure even existed.
• Caswell, who lives next door to the motel with his family, and his employees took reasonable steps to secure the property and cooperate with police.

Prosecutors had been tipped off about the motel by a federal agent whose primary job was to identify properties for forfeiture. But prosecutors maintained that this wasn’t about raising money for the government, and was instead about helping local police crack down on the drug trade.

Amusing.

Stunningly beautiful in all its range, Bruckner's Symphony No.8, Karajan conducting

Bruckner's Symphony No.8 w/Karajan conducting "live" in St. Florian (1979)

My favorite Bruckner Symphony, No. 8 here from St. Florian.  Bruckner was no "mere country bumpkin." He was a genius who created music that gave us a glimpse of how God roars. Amazing music. It's an honor to be the 38,270th viewer of this performance.

R.I.P. James Buchanan, 1986 Nobel Laureate in Economic Science. A great man!

Economist Richard McKenzie writes a tribute to his teacher James Buchanan

 "Today, I am pleased to call James Buchanan my professor for pressing on me a remarkably simple but important point that escapes so many colleagues across the country:  Being a professor is a privileged position.  It demands scholarship, but it also demands that you give of yourself in ways that will never show up on your resume, or in your obituary."

Bravo.

Happy Birthday David Bowie and thank you for "Where Are We Now?"

I love it! David Bowie: Where Are We Now?

Winter without professional hockey is really not winter at all.

NHL lockout has chilling effect on business -

No kidding!

JEAN-LUC PONTY, STANLEY CLARKE, AL DI MEOLA "Memory canyon" - YouTube

JEAN-LUC PONTY, STANLEY CLARKE, AL DI MEOLA play "Memory canyon" from the Rite of Strings

Wherein Stanley Clarke allows us to see his soul.  Astounding music! 

Hey Hippies! Ravi was just not that much into your indulgences!

The Telegraph:

Until Ravi Shankar, most people in the West were familiar with Indian music – if at all – only as background noise in establishments with flock wallpaper, and would not have been in a position to discern the fine distinction between a morning raga and evening one, or even know whether in Shankar they were listening to a virtuoso or a rank beginner. 

But Shankar could be a fastidious man. The rock audiences who came to pay homage he haughtily dismissed in his autobiography as “these strange young weirdos”; while his appearances at the Monterey and Woodstock festivals – the great quasi-religious gatherings of the alternative society – were apparently painful ordeals, where the audiences were “shrieking, shouting, smoking, masturbating and copulating – all in a drug-crazed state… I used to tell them, 'You don’t behave like that when you go to hear a Bach, Beethoven or Mozart concert.’” Quite.

 Here is the master: 

R.I.P.

Grateful Dead Live at Alumni Stadium, U. Mass/Amherst, May 12, 1979

I am proud to say I was at this show and it was awesome. Patti Smith opened. 

Grateful Dead Live at Alumni Stadium, U. Mass. on 1979-05-12 : Free Download & Streaming : Internet Archive

HTML Embedding: Maps | Learn Muse | Adobe TV

HTML Embedding: Maps | Learn Muse | Adobe TV

Paul Kurtz, prominent "secular humanist" has died.

R. Joseph Hoffman has a good write-up at the The New Oxonian.

Be careful with that ax Allan!! Holdsworth & Chad Wackerman "Tell Me"

Allan Holdsworth remains one of the great guitarists of modern music.
Chad's not bad a drummer either.

Allan Holdsworth Chad Wackerman "Tell Me" - YouTube

Let's make this go viral! "Big Jet Plane"

With apologies to Joni Mitchell...

A great protest video!

Big Jet Plane - YouTube

Reconnecting with Mission of Burma - "Semi-Pseudo-Sort-of Plan"

My God the world has passed me by.  I just I need to get my ears out more often....