1. Background.
2. Harvard Responsibility Organizers Position.
3. Editor’s Position.
1. Background.
I have done two reports on a Harvard manager in Romania being detained for corruption. The initial report passed on a press release of the Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition. The second provided a link to the very well written Bloomberg report on the matter.
They are posted at, respectively:
a. Original Post:
http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2014/01/harvard-manager-detained-in-romania-for.html.
b. Bloomberg Report.
http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2014/01/bloomberg-harvard-agent-detained-for.html.
2. Harvard Responsibility Organizers Position.
Sandra Korn of the Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition comments as follows:
***********
The Bloomberg story is accurate -- Harvard's former managing director is accused to taking bribes in exchange for overpaying for land. As we stated in our press release, the Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition is concerned that this represents another manifestation of the lack of accountability Harvard has over its directly-held companies. Irresponsible actions by corporate directors sometimes harm workers, sometimes neighbors, and, apparently, sometimes they harm the company's own revenues. Either way, our university needs to be a responsible owner of its directly-owned timber plantations. We've called for Harvard to establish a system of accountability and transparency to ensure that scandals like this don't happen again.
3. Editor’s Position.
As I said in the first report, Harvard’s tree chopping investments are highly compatible with the outrages going on on the Charles River for the benefit of Harvard and its buddies.
Friday, January 31, 2014
Thursday, January 30, 2014
Bloomberg: Harvard agent detained for shafting Harvard in purchase of forest land.
Bloomberg, earlier today, at http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-29/harvard-overpaid-for-timber-as-romanian-agent-held-for-bribery.html#disqus_thread, has given a report on the Romanian agent of Harvard detained for bribery. This report has much more detail than my recent report. The content is not changed from the prior report, but the emphasis is quite a bit different.
My prior report was published at http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2014/01/harvard-manager-detained-in-romania-for.html.
While clearly stated in both reports, it must be emphasized that the victim in this matter is Harvard University through its related company.
The Bloomberg article is an excellent write up.
The article provides strikingly good detail, especially the latter parts, in going into the Harvard timber investment.
My prior report was published at http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2014/01/harvard-manager-detained-in-romania-for.html.
While clearly stated in both reports, it must be emphasized that the victim in this matter is Harvard University through its related company.
The Bloomberg article is an excellent write up.
The article provides strikingly good detail, especially the latter parts, in going into the Harvard timber investment.
Friday, January 24, 2014
Harvard Manager Detained in Romania for Corruption?
Harvard Manager Detained in Romania for Corruption?
1. Context.
2. Press Release.
1. Context.
This is the key allegation of a Press Release from the group which is watching Harvard University’s investments.
The press release may be read below.
Too much of the environmental horrors being inflicted on the Charles River are very clearly related to or a spinoff of Harvard University’s empire building in the Allston neighborhood of Boston, MA, USA, across the Charles River from Cambridge, MA.
Currently of major interest is $24 million bond authorization included as “Historical Parkways” by the Governor in the presently pending House Bill H3332 in the Massachusetts state legislature. This would destroy hundreds of trees on Memorial Drive lining the Charles River in Cambridge, MA, between the Magazine Beach Playing Fields and the Longfellow Bridge three bridges east of Magazine Beach.
The falsely named Charles River “Conservancy” has been roping people into “support” for this destruction claiming they are seeking support for a $4 million “underpass” project under the next three bridges to the west. They do not mention that the two are connected. They are thus talking about one project and sneaking in a project six times the size which the CRC has described and incidental to the “underpasses”. $24 million of tree destruction is incidental to $4 million of underpasses?
That is the way things are done in the environmentally reprehensible City of Cambridge, MA.
To make it worse, the Massachusetts Department of Transportation, responsible for the “underpass” project, condemns the “underpasses" as environmentally destructive on their own.
2. Press Release.
CONTACT: Sandra Korn, sandrakorn@college.harvard.edu, (732) 796-8052
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 24, 2013
HARVARD MANAGER DETAINED IN ROMANIA FOR CORRUPTION
Managing director of Scolopax accused of accepting bribes
Cambridge, MA—On Tuesday, Romanian authorities detained Drago? Lipan Secu, the managing director of the Harvard-owned forestry company Scolopax SRL, along with his wife Mariana, for illegal business practices.
Romanian news sources reported that between 2007 and 2008, Mariana and Drago? Lipan Secu accepted bribes totaling to 4.450.000 leu, or more than $1.3 million USD, in addition to a vacation to Gran Canaria and a Chrysler Sebring car. In exchange, they purchased land on behalf of Scolopax at prices and under conditions favorable to the sellers.
Scolopax SRL is fully owned by Harvard University and directly controlled by Harvard-owned holding company Phemus Corporation. According to Romanian news sources, Scolopax is the largest private owner of forests in Romania, with over 35,000 hectares of land.
Scolopax is the fourth Harvard-owned company to recently come under scrutiny for corporate misconduct. Last summer, Harvard-owned Agricola Brinzal was found guilty of illegal destruction of native forests in Chiloe, Chile. In October 2013, the Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition and the Oakland Institute exposed irresponsible labor and environmental standards at two of Harvard’s timber plantations in the Argentinian wetlands, EVASA and Las Misiones.
Agricola Brinzal, EVASA, Las Misiones, and Scolopax are all 99.9 or 100% owned by Harvard, according to the university’s tax filings.
Harvard currently has no verifiable system of oversight or accountability for the practices of its fully-owned companies,” said Aryt Alasti from the Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition. “We are demanding that Harvard adopt a Position of Responsible Ownership that works to maintain legal compliance, fair environmental and labor practices, respect for land rights and non-discrimination policies, and transparency in corporate governance.”
Thus far, Harvard President Drew Faust has failed to respond to RI@Harvard’s request.
###
The Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition is a group of students, alumni, professors, and workers advocating for the university’s endowment to become more responsible, transparent, and accountable.
1. Context.
2. Press Release.
1. Context.
This is the key allegation of a Press Release from the group which is watching Harvard University’s investments.
The press release may be read below.
Too much of the environmental horrors being inflicted on the Charles River are very clearly related to or a spinoff of Harvard University’s empire building in the Allston neighborhood of Boston, MA, USA, across the Charles River from Cambridge, MA.
Currently of major interest is $24 million bond authorization included as “Historical Parkways” by the Governor in the presently pending House Bill H3332 in the Massachusetts state legislature. This would destroy hundreds of trees on Memorial Drive lining the Charles River in Cambridge, MA, between the Magazine Beach Playing Fields and the Longfellow Bridge three bridges east of Magazine Beach.
The falsely named Charles River “Conservancy” has been roping people into “support” for this destruction claiming they are seeking support for a $4 million “underpass” project under the next three bridges to the west. They do not mention that the two are connected. They are thus talking about one project and sneaking in a project six times the size which the CRC has described and incidental to the “underpasses”. $24 million of tree destruction is incidental to $4 million of underpasses?
That is the way things are done in the environmentally reprehensible City of Cambridge, MA.
To make it worse, the Massachusetts Department of Transportation, responsible for the “underpass” project, condemns the “underpasses" as environmentally destructive on their own.
2. Press Release.
CONTACT: Sandra Korn, sandrakorn@college.harvard.edu, (732) 796-8052
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 24, 2013
HARVARD MANAGER DETAINED IN ROMANIA FOR CORRUPTION
Managing director of Scolopax accused of accepting bribes
Cambridge, MA—On Tuesday, Romanian authorities detained Drago? Lipan Secu, the managing director of the Harvard-owned forestry company Scolopax SRL, along with his wife Mariana, for illegal business practices.
Romanian news sources reported that between 2007 and 2008, Mariana and Drago? Lipan Secu accepted bribes totaling to 4.450.000 leu, or more than $1.3 million USD, in addition to a vacation to Gran Canaria and a Chrysler Sebring car. In exchange, they purchased land on behalf of Scolopax at prices and under conditions favorable to the sellers.
Scolopax SRL is fully owned by Harvard University and directly controlled by Harvard-owned holding company Phemus Corporation. According to Romanian news sources, Scolopax is the largest private owner of forests in Romania, with over 35,000 hectares of land.
Scolopax is the fourth Harvard-owned company to recently come under scrutiny for corporate misconduct. Last summer, Harvard-owned Agricola Brinzal was found guilty of illegal destruction of native forests in Chiloe, Chile. In October 2013, the Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition and the Oakland Institute exposed irresponsible labor and environmental standards at two of Harvard’s timber plantations in the Argentinian wetlands, EVASA and Las Misiones.
Agricola Brinzal, EVASA, Las Misiones, and Scolopax are all 99.9 or 100% owned by Harvard, according to the university’s tax filings.
Harvard currently has no verifiable system of oversight or accountability for the practices of its fully-owned companies,” said Aryt Alasti from the Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition. “We are demanding that Harvard adopt a Position of Responsible Ownership that works to maintain legal compliance, fair environmental and labor practices, respect for land rights and non-discrimination policies, and transparency in corporate governance.”
Thus far, Harvard President Drew Faust has failed to respond to RI@Harvard’s request.
###
The Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition is a group of students, alumni, professors, and workers advocating for the university’s endowment to become more responsible, transparent, and accountable.
Tuesday, January 21, 2014
Boston Globe subsidizes Charles River Destruction.
The following email was distributed by the creator and head of the Falsely named Charles River “Conservancy.”
The Boston Globe is subsidizing this environmentally reprehensible entity.
***********
G R A N T
Globe Readers And Non-profits Together
If you are a subscriber to The Boston Globe or boston.com, you are eligible to participate in GRANT. The newspaper's GRANT initiative enables readers to show their support for non-profits by choosing which ones are given free advertising space in The Boston Globe.
I hope you will show your support of the parklands and choose the Charles River Conservancy!
The Boston Globe is mailing vouchers to all print and online subscribers (look for the silver envelope in your mailbox!). Seven-day newspaper subscribers' vouchers are valued at $100; all other subscribers (including website-only readers) have been sent vouchers valued at $50.
It is up to Globe readers to decide which non-profit is deserving of this voucher. The organizations with the highest donations will be awarded free advertising in The Boston Globe to highlight their work.
Make your Globe subscription count! Please help advance the Conservancy's mission by showing your support of through the GRANT initiative.
Thank you in advance for your support.
Renata von Tscharner
President
www.thecharles.org
**************
Von Tscharner has fought for the destruction of hundreds of trees on Memorial Drive between Magazine Beach and the Longfellow Bridge.
This was before the state bureaucracy tried to get Obama moneys lying that those trees were diseased, a lie disproved by their filing with the City of Cambridge.
When the state started construction on the Longfellow Bridge, von Tscharner cooed at the first tree needlessly destroyed.
The Boston Conservation Commission has called them to task for destroying native vegetation on the Boston side.
They have destroyed all the ground vegetation between the Grand Junction railroad tracks and the Boston University boathouse and the most of the ground vegetation in the Destroyed Nesting Area which was not destroyed in the BU Bridge project.
They have been the most visible supporter of the multiple outrages at the Magazine Beach recreation area. Von Tscharner even led a swim bragging, falsely of the improved swimming there. The wall of bushes blocking access from Magazine Beach which were secretly installed directly proved her chearleading false, albeit, she was publicizing the lie the bureaucrats used to get the money for the destruction and bizarre walling off of Magazine Beach.
Now she is fighting for destruction of the same hundreds of trees she supported before. This time it is under the lie that she is fighting for underpasses under the next three bridges.
The underpasses certainly are part of the project, but her numbers are $4 million for the underpasses and $24 million for the tree destruction and related and the underpasses and the tree destruction are all combined, something she never tells anybody, except for the one time when she got the governor to sign off on the destruction in House Bill H3332, seeking bond authorization.
H3332 even buries it, using the phrase “Historical Parkways” in one heading. That is the bureaucrats code word for the tree destruction. The “underpasses?” She is fighting for the bill, those are not visible to the public.
**************
Shame, shame, shame on the Boston Globe.
They really stooped low.
The Boston Globe is subsidizing this environmentally reprehensible entity.
***********
G R A N T
Globe Readers And Non-profits Together
If you are a subscriber to The Boston Globe or boston.com, you are eligible to participate in GRANT. The newspaper's GRANT initiative enables readers to show their support for non-profits by choosing which ones are given free advertising space in The Boston Globe.
I hope you will show your support of the parklands and choose the Charles River Conservancy!
The Boston Globe is mailing vouchers to all print and online subscribers (look for the silver envelope in your mailbox!). Seven-day newspaper subscribers' vouchers are valued at $100; all other subscribers (including website-only readers) have been sent vouchers valued at $50.
It is up to Globe readers to decide which non-profit is deserving of this voucher. The organizations with the highest donations will be awarded free advertising in The Boston Globe to highlight their work.
Make your Globe subscription count! Please help advance the Conservancy's mission by showing your support of through the GRANT initiative.
Thank you in advance for your support.
Renata von Tscharner
President
www.thecharles.org
**************
Von Tscharner has fought for the destruction of hundreds of trees on Memorial Drive between Magazine Beach and the Longfellow Bridge.
This was before the state bureaucracy tried to get Obama moneys lying that those trees were diseased, a lie disproved by their filing with the City of Cambridge.
When the state started construction on the Longfellow Bridge, von Tscharner cooed at the first tree needlessly destroyed.
The Boston Conservation Commission has called them to task for destroying native vegetation on the Boston side.
They have destroyed all the ground vegetation between the Grand Junction railroad tracks and the Boston University boathouse and the most of the ground vegetation in the Destroyed Nesting Area which was not destroyed in the BU Bridge project.
They have been the most visible supporter of the multiple outrages at the Magazine Beach recreation area. Von Tscharner even led a swim bragging, falsely of the improved swimming there. The wall of bushes blocking access from Magazine Beach which were secretly installed directly proved her chearleading false, albeit, she was publicizing the lie the bureaucrats used to get the money for the destruction and bizarre walling off of Magazine Beach.
Now she is fighting for destruction of the same hundreds of trees she supported before. This time it is under the lie that she is fighting for underpasses under the next three bridges.
The underpasses certainly are part of the project, but her numbers are $4 million for the underpasses and $24 million for the tree destruction and related and the underpasses and the tree destruction are all combined, something she never tells anybody, except for the one time when she got the governor to sign off on the destruction in House Bill H3332, seeking bond authorization.
H3332 even buries it, using the phrase “Historical Parkways” in one heading. That is the bureaucrats code word for the tree destruction. The “underpasses?” She is fighting for the bill, those are not visible to the public.
**************
Shame, shame, shame on the Boston Globe.
They really stooped low.
Saturday, January 18, 2014
The Cambridge, MA, USA Machine rejects reality, as usual — Clarification on Marc McGovern
1. No intent to claim positive behavior in other members of the Cambridge Machine.
2. The one comparable public pronouncement — Jarrett Barrios.
3. Barrios and McGovern succinctly.
4. McGovern’s explanation belied.
1. No intent to claim positive behavior in other members of the Cambridge Machine.
Earlier today, at http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2014/01/re-cambridge-ma-usa-machine-rejects.html, I reported on the shunning of two statesmanlike people in Cambridge by the Cambridge Machine.
I made a comment “McGovern is one of the few members of the Cambridge Machine who publicly supported the destruction at Magazine Beach.”
It would be totally false to interpret my comment in any way to interpret meaningful levels of environmental responsibility in any visible member of the Cambridge Machine. The routine is always to do terrible things as secretly as possible and then lie, lie, lie about environmental sainthood.
Newly elected Cambridge City Councilor McGovern, at the beginning of this mess, put his support for destruction on Magazine Beach into a Letter to the Editor in the Cambridge Chronicle.
2. The one comparable public pronouncement — Jarrett Barrios.
The only other Cambridge Pol to go so public with regard to such an outrage has been then State Representative Jarrett Barrios. Barrios, with the falsely named Massachusetts Society for Protection Against Cruelty to Animals, cosigned a letter to the editor published in the Cambridge Chronicle which was comparable to McGovern’s letter.
The Barrios letter dripped with saccharine, reasonableness and political correctness. Barrios proposed “humane treatment” for the Charles River White Geese. He sounded oh, so reasonable, and oh, so good.
Barrios clarified the meaning of his letter to the editor in an appearance on Cambridge Cable the following weekend.
In the meantime, I splattered the neighborhood with a flier going into great detail about Barrios’ letter, which had appeared in the Thursday Cambridge Chronicle. My letter responded to the Barrios letter’s saccharine holiness, point by point. I, in my conclusion, with extreme and very clear sarcasm, proposed “humane treatment” for Barrios.
Barrios indignantly appeared on Cambridge Cable that Sunday, an hour after my show concluded. He accused me of advocating his “assassination.”
3. Barrios and McGovern succinctly.
Barrios and McGovern are more public than the rest of the Cambridge Machine. They, as is the custom in Cambridge, have been and are running as far away from their irresponsible environmental record as they can.
4. McGovern’s explanation belied.
Interestingly, with regard to McGovern, McGovern claimed that he was only for “improvement” of the public facilities at Magazine Beach and had no responsibility whatsoever for any and all negative consequences.
Even if that were not total nonsense, the reality is that there is nothing positive that has been done at Magazine Beach that could not have been done without the destructiveness.
The state and Cambridge have even reduced the size of the playing fields in order to drain off poisons which should not be dropped on the banks of the Charles River in the first place. He bragged of improvement of the playing fields.
But McGovern’s “concern” for public facilities does not extend to objecting to the reality that he was lied to and that he achieved exactly the opposite of what he claimed to stand for This is not even counting the multiple, blatant outrages, all of which were accomplished in direct violation of promises made or done otherwise in secret.
The poor dear. Not only has he accomplished exactly the opposite of what he claimed to be doing, but he is very clearly happy with achieving the opposite of what he claimed to be doing.
That is the way things are done in Cambridge, MA, USA.
2. The one comparable public pronouncement — Jarrett Barrios.
3. Barrios and McGovern succinctly.
4. McGovern’s explanation belied.
1. No intent to claim positive behavior in other members of the Cambridge Machine.
Earlier today, at http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2014/01/re-cambridge-ma-usa-machine-rejects.html, I reported on the shunning of two statesmanlike people in Cambridge by the Cambridge Machine.
I made a comment “McGovern is one of the few members of the Cambridge Machine who publicly supported the destruction at Magazine Beach.”
It would be totally false to interpret my comment in any way to interpret meaningful levels of environmental responsibility in any visible member of the Cambridge Machine. The routine is always to do terrible things as secretly as possible and then lie, lie, lie about environmental sainthood.
Newly elected Cambridge City Councilor McGovern, at the beginning of this mess, put his support for destruction on Magazine Beach into a Letter to the Editor in the Cambridge Chronicle.
2. The one comparable public pronouncement — Jarrett Barrios.
The only other Cambridge Pol to go so public with regard to such an outrage has been then State Representative Jarrett Barrios. Barrios, with the falsely named Massachusetts Society for Protection Against Cruelty to Animals, cosigned a letter to the editor published in the Cambridge Chronicle which was comparable to McGovern’s letter.
The Barrios letter dripped with saccharine, reasonableness and political correctness. Barrios proposed “humane treatment” for the Charles River White Geese. He sounded oh, so reasonable, and oh, so good.
Barrios clarified the meaning of his letter to the editor in an appearance on Cambridge Cable the following weekend.
In the meantime, I splattered the neighborhood with a flier going into great detail about Barrios’ letter, which had appeared in the Thursday Cambridge Chronicle. My letter responded to the Barrios letter’s saccharine holiness, point by point. I, in my conclusion, with extreme and very clear sarcasm, proposed “humane treatment” for Barrios.
Barrios indignantly appeared on Cambridge Cable that Sunday, an hour after my show concluded. He accused me of advocating his “assassination.”
3. Barrios and McGovern succinctly.
Barrios and McGovern are more public than the rest of the Cambridge Machine. They, as is the custom in Cambridge, have been and are running as far away from their irresponsible environmental record as they can.
4. McGovern’s explanation belied.
Interestingly, with regard to McGovern, McGovern claimed that he was only for “improvement” of the public facilities at Magazine Beach and had no responsibility whatsoever for any and all negative consequences.
Even if that were not total nonsense, the reality is that there is nothing positive that has been done at Magazine Beach that could not have been done without the destructiveness.
The state and Cambridge have even reduced the size of the playing fields in order to drain off poisons which should not be dropped on the banks of the Charles River in the first place. He bragged of improvement of the playing fields.
But McGovern’s “concern” for public facilities does not extend to objecting to the reality that he was lied to and that he achieved exactly the opposite of what he claimed to stand for This is not even counting the multiple, blatant outrages, all of which were accomplished in direct violation of promises made or done otherwise in secret.
The poor dear. Not only has he accomplished exactly the opposite of what he claimed to be doing, but he is very clearly happy with achieving the opposite of what he claimed to be doing.
That is the way things are done in Cambridge, MA, USA.
The Cambridge, MA, USA Machine rejects reality
1. Reality according to the Cambridge Pols.
2. Patty Nolan.
3. Nadeem A. Mazem.
4. Reality.
a. Nolan and Mazem.
b. Voting activity.
1. Reality according to the Cambridge Pols.
The Cambridge Pols live in their own world. From an objective point of view, a very significant part of the “reality” of the Cambridge Pols are flat out lies.
But part of the technique of lying is to simply omit reality or people with their feet or their minds in reality.
The Cambridge Pols' organization, the Cambridge Machine, and its destructiveness is definitely a small minority in the City of Cambridge, but it is a well organized minority and a very and falsely pious minority.
Two examples appear in sections 2 and 3.
2. Patty Nolan.
There is a letter posted on the Cambridge Chronicle’s page at http://www.wickedlocal.com/cambridge/news/opinions/letters/x1515010945/LETTER-More-democracy-needed-in-Cambridge.
This is a letter from Charles Teague dated January 14, 2014.
My edits as relevant. Please feel free to read the full text:
**********
Cambridge — Jan. 6 was not a very democratic day for Cambridge.
On that day, five city councilors chose our mayor/chair of the School Committee for us, picking the councilor who was a distant second with less than two-thirds the No. 1 votes of the first-place finisher. Then the School Committee chose as vice chair [ed: the mayor sits as chair] the man who finished second by an even greater margin to Patty Nolan. Extraordinarily, Nolan alone had nearly one quarter of all No. 1 votes cast in a field of nine candidates.
[3 paragraphs omitted]
Cambridge has a 50 percent decline in City Council voter turnout over the past 40 years. Municipal voting has declined in general, but it is remarkable that in a city of over 100,000 population, a councilor was just elected with less than 1,000 No. 1 votes.
[2 paragraphs omitted]
*********
3. Nadeem A. Mazem.
On January 16, 2014, the Cambridge Machine’s front organization for Cambridgeport held a badly attended meeting.
The guest of honor was the newly elected city councilor, Marc McGovern. This is no surprise. McGovern is one of the few members of the Cambridge Machine who publicly supported the destruction at Magazine Beach.
What was surprising was his listing of the newly elected councilors in his presentation. As I recall, he did not mention Nadeem A. Mazem.
I will include the caveat that this is my memory since I am constantly faced with people with strikingly different memories than mine. I am talking about my memory.
4. Reality.
a. Nolan and Mazem.
I know nothing about the politics of either Patty Nolan or Nadeem A. Mazem.
I know that I have publicly seen Patty Nolan shunned in a ward caucus by the Cambridge Machine pols in the room. That combined with these two comments strikes me as the nicest thing anybody can say about Patty Nolan and Nadeem A. Mazem.
My commendations to Patty Nolan and Nadeem A. Mazem.
You have excellent taste in enemies.
b. Voting activity.
I, myself, would correlate the drastic reduction in voting to the increasing dominance of Cambridge Politics during the period by the Cambridge Machine.
2. Patty Nolan.
3. Nadeem A. Mazem.
4. Reality.
a. Nolan and Mazem.
b. Voting activity.
1. Reality according to the Cambridge Pols.
The Cambridge Pols live in their own world. From an objective point of view, a very significant part of the “reality” of the Cambridge Pols are flat out lies.
But part of the technique of lying is to simply omit reality or people with their feet or their minds in reality.
The Cambridge Pols' organization, the Cambridge Machine, and its destructiveness is definitely a small minority in the City of Cambridge, but it is a well organized minority and a very and falsely pious minority.
Two examples appear in sections 2 and 3.
2. Patty Nolan.
There is a letter posted on the Cambridge Chronicle’s page at http://www.wickedlocal.com/cambridge/news/opinions/letters/x1515010945/LETTER-More-democracy-needed-in-Cambridge.
This is a letter from Charles Teague dated January 14, 2014.
My edits as relevant. Please feel free to read the full text:
**********
Cambridge — Jan. 6 was not a very democratic day for Cambridge.
On that day, five city councilors chose our mayor/chair of the School Committee for us, picking the councilor who was a distant second with less than two-thirds the No. 1 votes of the first-place finisher. Then the School Committee chose as vice chair [ed: the mayor sits as chair] the man who finished second by an even greater margin to Patty Nolan. Extraordinarily, Nolan alone had nearly one quarter of all No. 1 votes cast in a field of nine candidates.
[3 paragraphs omitted]
Cambridge has a 50 percent decline in City Council voter turnout over the past 40 years. Municipal voting has declined in general, but it is remarkable that in a city of over 100,000 population, a councilor was just elected with less than 1,000 No. 1 votes.
[2 paragraphs omitted]
*********
3. Nadeem A. Mazem.
On January 16, 2014, the Cambridge Machine’s front organization for Cambridgeport held a badly attended meeting.
The guest of honor was the newly elected city councilor, Marc McGovern. This is no surprise. McGovern is one of the few members of the Cambridge Machine who publicly supported the destruction at Magazine Beach.
What was surprising was his listing of the newly elected councilors in his presentation. As I recall, he did not mention Nadeem A. Mazem.
I will include the caveat that this is my memory since I am constantly faced with people with strikingly different memories than mine. I am talking about my memory.
4. Reality.
a. Nolan and Mazem.
I know nothing about the politics of either Patty Nolan or Nadeem A. Mazem.
I know that I have publicly seen Patty Nolan shunned in a ward caucus by the Cambridge Machine pols in the room. That combined with these two comments strikes me as the nicest thing anybody can say about Patty Nolan and Nadeem A. Mazem.
My commendations to Patty Nolan and Nadeem A. Mazem.
You have excellent taste in enemies.
b. Voting activity.
I, myself, would correlate the drastic reduction in voting to the increasing dominance of Cambridge Politics during the period by the Cambridge Machine.
Sunday, January 12, 2014
The Charles River White Geese enjoy the rain, Charles River, Cambridge, MA, USA
1. My Visit.
2. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
1. My Visit.
Yesterday, January 11, 2013, I visited the Charles River White Geese.
They have lived on the Charles River for 32 years. They have an established community which is under attack by a really rotten city government and their friends at the state. All attacks have been done in secret, without public notice, and commonly with lies to the opposite extent.
The current outrage is Governor Patrick’s House Bill H3332 seeking bond authorization in the amount of $24 million to destroy their habitat that much further along with hundreds of trees between the BU Bridge and the Longfellow Bridge on the Cambridge side Charles River. The most aggressive fighter is running around lying about “underpasses” which are paired with the destruction in the amount of $4 million. She says fight for her $4 million and do not look at the $24 million to which it is tied.
She even has the nerve to give a fraudulent name to her destructive organization. “Conservancy” indeed.
The current weather situation was ideal for geese, heavy rain with temperatures approach 60. A pleasant day if the city, state, and their front organizations were equally commendable.
Here are some photos of the Charles River White Geese.
The vegetation in the lower left is a tiny portion of the ground vegetation which used to be everywhere between the BU Bridge and the BU Boathouse a tenth of a mile to the east. Almost all of this ground vegetation has been destroyed by the falsely named Charles River "Conservancy", by city / state / by their friends.
A better Photo of vegetation:
The Charles River can be seen in the upper right. The ground has been stripped by these rotten people.
The geese were under their favorite big tree, but they started wandering around when I came. It was a beautiful day to wander. Once again, the ground vegetation has been destroyed. This area was hit even worse being used as a parking lot for workers on the railroad on the other side of the trees in spite of the proximity of ample parking space outside the nesting area.
The Charles River, again, is to the upper right. The railroad is on top of the embankment to the left. On the lower left is native vegetation in winter.
I wandered next to the BU Bridge. The only area which needed destruction for work on the BU Bridge is this area. It was 50 feet wide. Most this strip has apparently been left uncovered. Here are two members of the gaggle who followed me.
In this photo, there is a goose toward the left and slightly above the rest of the gaggle.
See the darker area behind his head. That is gravel which was dumped there by the railroad workers. After the railroad workers, "somebody" came back and dumped even more gravel into this most sensitive area.
Nearest the camera is a goose with dark markings on her head.
There have been two females who have had a number of offspring with pure white geese. One of the females is Brown Beauty, the daughter of the long time leader of the gaggle, Bumpy. She has vestigial brown goose markings. The other female is a Toulouse Goose who was abandoned at Magazine Beach 13 years ago and joined the gaggle.
The goose you see is the offspring of one of these two, either directly or through an intermediate generation.
A better view of the Charles River, from the Destroyed Nesting Area. The figures are Canadas. The shape in the top of the photo is the Grand Junction Railroad Bridge. Harvard is maneuvering to widen this bridge and turn it into an off ramp from I90 (the Massachusetts Turnpike). Harvard owns the current exit facilities to Brighton and Cambridge. The Governor has already announced plans to move the highway to the northwest. He mentioned development in the area. He did not mention it will be tax exempt, a relocated Harvard Medical School and related facilities. Harvard’s holdings are larger than Boston’s Back Bay neighborhood.
This photo is from the railroad tracks atop that hill. It is the Charles River. To the left and not seen is the BU Boathouse. All ground vegetation between here and the BU Boathouse has been destroyed, clearly by the Charles River “Conservancy.” In the way of Cambridge’s environmental destroyers, they call all that destruction “improvements.”
Looking back through the gaggle. In the distance is the BU Bridge. The vegetation in most of my prior photos is in the middle of this photo.
I walked along the railroad and came down at the end of the trees bordering the tracks. The shape at the top of the photo is the on ramp to Memorial Drive. This ground vegetation was not destroyed. It continues to line the support for the on ramp between the area of the BU Bridge work and the railroad track broken only by a staircase illegally installed by Boston University by verbal agreement with the state.
I am not certain what happened to the nearest vegetation. That is the normal situation with vegetation destruction. Workers come in and destroy. This area was used by the railroad workers. It is the only area they should have used. They should have accessed parking on the other side of the on ramp by going up that staircase.
The gravel toward the top of the photo was installed by the state as part of “repairs” of the BU Bridge project. The damaged vegetation in the prior photo is bottom right. The bizarre extension of the gravel to the core goose area is at the bottom. At the very top can be seen the added wall to keep the Charles River White Geese from feeding on the grass on the other side of the on ramp to Memorial Drive.
To the right is the latest starvation fence. Then, moving right to left, is the sidewalk, then the on ramp, then the tiny amount of grass which was the only food not denied to them. At the top is the overpass for Memorial Drive. The Charles River White Geese are very considerate pedestrians. They look left and right and do not cross until traffic is clear. Their problem is that they are geese and do tend to meander. The drivers are very loving of the Charles River White Geese. The drivers patiently wait with big smiles on their faces.
At the top is a former Ford factory, currently owned by the Massachusetts Institution of Technology.
Looking through the latest starvation fence. The white figures barely visible at the other end of the gravel are the Charles River White Geese. Above them is the hillside holding the railroad track, the location from which I took several of the above shots, and the Charles River.
2. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
Massachusetts Governor’s Office email form: http://www.mass.gov/governor/constituentservices/contact/.
State environmental people, DES Hotline: ESF.Hotline@state.ma.us.
MassDOT Accelerated Bridges Program: 857-368-8904 or Stephanie.Boundy@state.ma.us.
All Massachusetts Legislators’ emails: http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/04/emails-for-all-massachusetts.html.
Cambridge, MA, USA city councilors: Council@cambridgema.gov.
**********
For people listening to Boston Sierra Club endorsements of environmentally destructive members of and candidates for the Cambridge City Council, you should be aware that
(1) using the world’s definition of “environmentalism,” there are no environmentally responsible members of the Cambridge City Council; Cambridge’s definition is that environmentalists protect that which Cambridge does not feel like destroying; the Cambridge pols are oh, so pious using their secret, fraudulent definition;
(2) the former school committee member who just got sworn into the Cambridge City Council fought for the outrages at the Magazine Beach playing fields;
(a) his indignant explanation is that he claims to be only responsible for the good stuff;
(b) that explanation is combined with exactly no demonstration of any meaningful opposition whatsoever to the outrages; and
(c) as is usual in Cambridge, his claims of “improvements” are belied by reality. The playing fields have been decreased in size by his project!!!!! This is to drain off the poisons being dumped to keep alive sickly introduced grasses which replaced healthy grass that survived the better part of a century without poisons; and
(3) there are Cambridge Machine activists very visible and apparently very active in the Boston Sierra Club.
If you are talking to a person associated with the Boston Sierra Club, do a credibility check. Ask if they are familiar with the “Urban Ring” rapid transit proposal. This is a subway proposal designed to link the existing subway spokes. I have been working on it since 1985. Cambridge raised the project in a comment to an environmental Impact Statement a few months ago.
If the Boston Sierra Club “expert” answers “yes,” that he / she is familiar with the Urban Ring rapid transit proposal, ask how many rail options there are. If the answer is “one,” you are getting the flat out lie put out by the City of Cambridge.
Cambridge’s flat out lie is that, of the TWO rail options, the only one that exists is the environmentally destructive streetcar option which the City of Cambridge supports. This option would be highly destructive to the environment near the Destroyed Nesting Area of the Charles River White Geese.
The reality is that THE STATE LEGISLATURE HAS SUBSIDIZED THE OTHER OPTION, the responsible Orange Line / heavy rail option, the Kenmore crossing. The state legislature has subsidized the expansion of Yawkey Station as part of the massive Fenway Park area project which has gotten recent press.
Cambridge’s nonsensical proposal would move Yawkey Station three blocks. The Cambridge proposal would not work without moving Yawkey Station. The Kenmore Crossing uses the now subsidized and being expanded Yawkey Station as part of a brilliant megastation.
You should immediately respond to such nonsense from a Sierra Club “expert” by having nothing more to do with this person. Whether the person is stupid or venal is irrelevant, the person has no credibility and is not worthy of your time.
It is frequently difficult to pin these irresponsible people down in general. The deviant behavior in my test is extreme. They are pious in their demands that, if you are politically correct and pro environment, you have to rubber stamp them. Please do not waste your time arguing about destruction they can try to wiggle around.
Turn your back on them and walk away fast.
2. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
1. My Visit.
Yesterday, January 11, 2013, I visited the Charles River White Geese.
They have lived on the Charles River for 32 years. They have an established community which is under attack by a really rotten city government and their friends at the state. All attacks have been done in secret, without public notice, and commonly with lies to the opposite extent.
The current outrage is Governor Patrick’s House Bill H3332 seeking bond authorization in the amount of $24 million to destroy their habitat that much further along with hundreds of trees between the BU Bridge and the Longfellow Bridge on the Cambridge side Charles River. The most aggressive fighter is running around lying about “underpasses” which are paired with the destruction in the amount of $4 million. She says fight for her $4 million and do not look at the $24 million to which it is tied.
She even has the nerve to give a fraudulent name to her destructive organization. “Conservancy” indeed.
The current weather situation was ideal for geese, heavy rain with temperatures approach 60. A pleasant day if the city, state, and their front organizations were equally commendable.
Here are some photos of the Charles River White Geese.
The vegetation in the lower left is a tiny portion of the ground vegetation which used to be everywhere between the BU Bridge and the BU Boathouse a tenth of a mile to the east. Almost all of this ground vegetation has been destroyed by the falsely named Charles River "Conservancy", by city / state / by their friends.
A better Photo of vegetation:
The Charles River can be seen in the upper right. The ground has been stripped by these rotten people.
The geese were under their favorite big tree, but they started wandering around when I came. It was a beautiful day to wander. Once again, the ground vegetation has been destroyed. This area was hit even worse being used as a parking lot for workers on the railroad on the other side of the trees in spite of the proximity of ample parking space outside the nesting area.
The Charles River, again, is to the upper right. The railroad is on top of the embankment to the left. On the lower left is native vegetation in winter.
I wandered next to the BU Bridge. The only area which needed destruction for work on the BU Bridge is this area. It was 50 feet wide. Most this strip has apparently been left uncovered. Here are two members of the gaggle who followed me.
In this photo, there is a goose toward the left and slightly above the rest of the gaggle.
See the darker area behind his head. That is gravel which was dumped there by the railroad workers. After the railroad workers, "somebody" came back and dumped even more gravel into this most sensitive area.
Nearest the camera is a goose with dark markings on her head.
There have been two females who have had a number of offspring with pure white geese. One of the females is Brown Beauty, the daughter of the long time leader of the gaggle, Bumpy. She has vestigial brown goose markings. The other female is a Toulouse Goose who was abandoned at Magazine Beach 13 years ago and joined the gaggle.
The goose you see is the offspring of one of these two, either directly or through an intermediate generation.
A better view of the Charles River, from the Destroyed Nesting Area. The figures are Canadas. The shape in the top of the photo is the Grand Junction Railroad Bridge. Harvard is maneuvering to widen this bridge and turn it into an off ramp from I90 (the Massachusetts Turnpike). Harvard owns the current exit facilities to Brighton and Cambridge. The Governor has already announced plans to move the highway to the northwest. He mentioned development in the area. He did not mention it will be tax exempt, a relocated Harvard Medical School and related facilities. Harvard’s holdings are larger than Boston’s Back Bay neighborhood.
This photo is from the railroad tracks atop that hill. It is the Charles River. To the left and not seen is the BU Boathouse. All ground vegetation between here and the BU Boathouse has been destroyed, clearly by the Charles River “Conservancy.” In the way of Cambridge’s environmental destroyers, they call all that destruction “improvements.”
Looking back through the gaggle. In the distance is the BU Bridge. The vegetation in most of my prior photos is in the middle of this photo.
I walked along the railroad and came down at the end of the trees bordering the tracks. The shape at the top of the photo is the on ramp to Memorial Drive. This ground vegetation was not destroyed. It continues to line the support for the on ramp between the area of the BU Bridge work and the railroad track broken only by a staircase illegally installed by Boston University by verbal agreement with the state.
I am not certain what happened to the nearest vegetation. That is the normal situation with vegetation destruction. Workers come in and destroy. This area was used by the railroad workers. It is the only area they should have used. They should have accessed parking on the other side of the on ramp by going up that staircase.
The gravel toward the top of the photo was installed by the state as part of “repairs” of the BU Bridge project. The damaged vegetation in the prior photo is bottom right. The bizarre extension of the gravel to the core goose area is at the bottom. At the very top can be seen the added wall to keep the Charles River White Geese from feeding on the grass on the other side of the on ramp to Memorial Drive.
To the right is the latest starvation fence. Then, moving right to left, is the sidewalk, then the on ramp, then the tiny amount of grass which was the only food not denied to them. At the top is the overpass for Memorial Drive. The Charles River White Geese are very considerate pedestrians. They look left and right and do not cross until traffic is clear. Their problem is that they are geese and do tend to meander. The drivers are very loving of the Charles River White Geese. The drivers patiently wait with big smiles on their faces.
At the top is a former Ford factory, currently owned by the Massachusetts Institution of Technology.
Looking through the latest starvation fence. The white figures barely visible at the other end of the gravel are the Charles River White Geese. Above them is the hillside holding the railroad track, the location from which I took several of the above shots, and the Charles River.
2. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
Massachusetts Governor’s Office email form: http://www.mass.gov/governor/constituentservices/contact/.
State environmental people, DES Hotline: ESF.Hotline@state.ma.us.
MassDOT Accelerated Bridges Program: 857-368-8904 or Stephanie.Boundy@state.ma.us.
All Massachusetts Legislators’ emails: http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/04/emails-for-all-massachusetts.html.
Cambridge, MA, USA city councilors: Council@cambridgema.gov.
**********
For people listening to Boston Sierra Club endorsements of environmentally destructive members of and candidates for the Cambridge City Council, you should be aware that
(1) using the world’s definition of “environmentalism,” there are no environmentally responsible members of the Cambridge City Council; Cambridge’s definition is that environmentalists protect that which Cambridge does not feel like destroying; the Cambridge pols are oh, so pious using their secret, fraudulent definition;
(2) the former school committee member who just got sworn into the Cambridge City Council fought for the outrages at the Magazine Beach playing fields;
(a) his indignant explanation is that he claims to be only responsible for the good stuff;
(b) that explanation is combined with exactly no demonstration of any meaningful opposition whatsoever to the outrages; and
(c) as is usual in Cambridge, his claims of “improvements” are belied by reality. The playing fields have been decreased in size by his project!!!!! This is to drain off the poisons being dumped to keep alive sickly introduced grasses which replaced healthy grass that survived the better part of a century without poisons; and
(3) there are Cambridge Machine activists very visible and apparently very active in the Boston Sierra Club.
If you are talking to a person associated with the Boston Sierra Club, do a credibility check. Ask if they are familiar with the “Urban Ring” rapid transit proposal. This is a subway proposal designed to link the existing subway spokes. I have been working on it since 1985. Cambridge raised the project in a comment to an environmental Impact Statement a few months ago.
If the Boston Sierra Club “expert” answers “yes,” that he / she is familiar with the Urban Ring rapid transit proposal, ask how many rail options there are. If the answer is “one,” you are getting the flat out lie put out by the City of Cambridge.
Cambridge’s flat out lie is that, of the TWO rail options, the only one that exists is the environmentally destructive streetcar option which the City of Cambridge supports. This option would be highly destructive to the environment near the Destroyed Nesting Area of the Charles River White Geese.
The reality is that THE STATE LEGISLATURE HAS SUBSIDIZED THE OTHER OPTION, the responsible Orange Line / heavy rail option, the Kenmore crossing. The state legislature has subsidized the expansion of Yawkey Station as part of the massive Fenway Park area project which has gotten recent press.
Cambridge’s nonsensical proposal would move Yawkey Station three blocks. The Cambridge proposal would not work without moving Yawkey Station. The Kenmore Crossing uses the now subsidized and being expanded Yawkey Station as part of a brilliant megastation.
You should immediately respond to such nonsense from a Sierra Club “expert” by having nothing more to do with this person. Whether the person is stupid or venal is irrelevant, the person has no credibility and is not worthy of your time.
It is frequently difficult to pin these irresponsible people down in general. The deviant behavior in my test is extreme. They are pious in their demands that, if you are politically correct and pro environment, you have to rubber stamp them. Please do not waste your time arguing about destruction they can try to wiggle around.
Turn your back on them and walk away fast.
Saturday, January 11, 2014
Cambridge (MA) Machine and Governor Patrick on Environmental Destruction. Kendall Square, Cambridge, MA, USA, Destruction in context.
-1. Supplement: The most visible supporter (1/12/14).
0. Before and after: First destruction in the Longfellow Bridge Project.
1. What comes before.
2. H3332, Governor Patrick Fights to Destroy hundreds of trees on the Charles River.
3. The destruction at the Longfellow Bridge.
4. One explanation for Cambridge, MA, USA’s Destructiveness.
5. Company Unions.
6. The Company Unions in Kendall Square.
-1. Supplement: The most visible supporter (1/12/14).
There is a woman running around getting support for both the Memorial Drive tree destruction and for "underpasses." She keeps the tree destruction secret but claims supporters of "underpasses" for supporters of the massive tree destruction. This is the sort of fraud which is normal in Cambridge, MA, USA when it comes to environmental destruction. And the woman claims to be representing a "conservancy." Just that much more lying.
0. Before and after: First destruction in the Longfellow Bridge Project.
1. What comes before.
In my last report, at http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2014/01/more-environmental-destruction-planned.html, I transmitted the City of Cambridge, MA, USA’s announcement of mass tree destruction proposed for Kendall Square in Cambridge extending to the Longfellow Bridge, with state assistance.
The Longfellow Bridge crosses the Charles River. It is the second bridge east of the BU Bridge.
2. H3332, Governor Patrick Fights to Destroy hundreds of trees on the Charles River.
Governor Patrick is seeking bond authority in the amount of $24 million to destroy hundreds of trees near the Charles River on Memorial Drive and an additional $4 million for underpasses under the next three bridges west. Those underpasses are all the fraudulent protective groups mention as they fight for the $28 million. And the underpasses themselves are opposed by the government entity responsible, the Department of Transportation. This is House Bill H3332. The euphemism is Historical Parkways. And the Historical Parkways destruction is NEVER mentioned as the fraudulent organization gets signatures which it will claim supports ALL the destruction.
Destruction of those trees will convert a major part of Memorial Drive into what amounts to the private property of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The euphemism is Historical Parkways.
This will assist Harvard’s relocation of its Medical School to the Mass. Pike (I90) exit in Allston and to the adjacent rail yards, all of which Harvard owns. The destruction will make Memorial Drive a quality receptacle for traffic exiting instead to Cambridge over an expanded Grand Junction railroad bridge under the BU Bridge, traffic which now passes through the future home of Harvard Medical School and related.
Details on H3332 were presented at http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/08/analysis-of-governor-patricks.html.
3. The destruction at the Longfellow Bridge.
The Longfellow Bridge is undergoing repairs. The first thing Governor Patrick’s people did, and always with close coordination with Cambridge, was the needless and outrageous destruction of an excellent grove on the Cambridge end of the Longfellow Bridge. Then Patrick’s people destroyed additional excellent trees east of the Longfellow Bridge toward the Charles River and Memorial Drive.
We have had multiple reports on the destruction.
Here are before and after photos of the first grove wastefully destroyed. It is now a parking area for debris. All a responsible government had to do was move a needed traffic crossing for the repairs a few feet closer to Kendall Square. .
Please see the following for further details on Kendall / Longfellow and many more photos. These are a tiny fraction of the reports.
http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/07/bad-news-anderson-bridge-they-killed.html
http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/07/kendall-longfellow-cambridge-ma-use.html
4. One explanation for Cambridge, MA, USA’s Destructiveness.
All this tree destruction is called “improvements” in the environmentally reprehensible City of Cambridge, MA, USA. They “improve” Cambridge by destroying its mature trees and brag about the saplings they plant in place of the mature trees.
Among other things, you see, Cambridge is a Tree City USA, but mature trees have no value to the folks designating Tree Cities USA. They only count saplings. So Cambridge destroys its excellent tree cover and brags about the replacement for this massive and outrageous waste.
Cambridge has a secret definition of environmentalism, and pretty much all Cambridge pols brag of being environmentalists. Trouble is “environmentalism” in Cambridge, MA, USA is a flat out lie because the pols use a secret definition. “Environmentalism” in Cambridge, MA, USA is secretly defined as protecting that part of the environment Cambridge is not destroying. And they get very pious in their proclamations of environmental sainthood.
5. Company Unions.
One of the big techniques in environmental destruction in Cambridge, MA, USA, is the existence of company union organizations closely connected to the City of Cambridge. These entities fight for the destruction of the environment by loudly declaring that they are defending parts of Cambridge and then fight for destruction by telling well meaning people to do exactly the opposite of responsible behavior.
The first phase of destruction of the publicly owned portions of the Alewife reservation in the western part of Cambridge has been achieved through use of such a fake organization. Cambridge is fighting for massive destruction on the Charles River. That fake organization could not be certain of the success of their fraudulent initiatives, so they have indulged in voting corruption on the issue of destruction on the Charles River.
I call the interlocked entities the Cambridge Machine. The Cambridge Machine clearly consists of interlocked groups and a lot of bad achievements.
6. The Company Unions in Kendall Square.
Dah, dah, the Cambridge Machine claims to be defending Kendall Square.
They have created a group with a global protective name which supposedly defends Kendall Square and Central Square.
And they have a very clear, very typical position on this massive environmental destruction.
The Cambridge Machine’s Kendall - Central front organization told its subjects to look the other way during the earlier totally wasteful environmental destruction next to Kendall Square as part of the Longfellow Bridge project.
They are now aggressively telling people to look at Central Square during this destruction.
Business as usual in the environmental reprehensible City of Cambridge, MA, USA.
0. Before and after: First destruction in the Longfellow Bridge Project.
1. What comes before.
2. H3332, Governor Patrick Fights to Destroy hundreds of trees on the Charles River.
3. The destruction at the Longfellow Bridge.
4. One explanation for Cambridge, MA, USA’s Destructiveness.
5. Company Unions.
6. The Company Unions in Kendall Square.
-1. Supplement: The most visible supporter (1/12/14).
There is a woman running around getting support for both the Memorial Drive tree destruction and for "underpasses." She keeps the tree destruction secret but claims supporters of "underpasses" for supporters of the massive tree destruction. This is the sort of fraud which is normal in Cambridge, MA, USA when it comes to environmental destruction. And the woman claims to be representing a "conservancy." Just that much more lying.
0. Before and after: First destruction in the Longfellow Bridge Project.
1. What comes before.
In my last report, at http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2014/01/more-environmental-destruction-planned.html, I transmitted the City of Cambridge, MA, USA’s announcement of mass tree destruction proposed for Kendall Square in Cambridge extending to the Longfellow Bridge, with state assistance.
The Longfellow Bridge crosses the Charles River. It is the second bridge east of the BU Bridge.
2. H3332, Governor Patrick Fights to Destroy hundreds of trees on the Charles River.
Governor Patrick is seeking bond authority in the amount of $24 million to destroy hundreds of trees near the Charles River on Memorial Drive and an additional $4 million for underpasses under the next three bridges west. Those underpasses are all the fraudulent protective groups mention as they fight for the $28 million. And the underpasses themselves are opposed by the government entity responsible, the Department of Transportation. This is House Bill H3332. The euphemism is Historical Parkways. And the Historical Parkways destruction is NEVER mentioned as the fraudulent organization gets signatures which it will claim supports ALL the destruction.
Destruction of those trees will convert a major part of Memorial Drive into what amounts to the private property of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The euphemism is Historical Parkways.
This will assist Harvard’s relocation of its Medical School to the Mass. Pike (I90) exit in Allston and to the adjacent rail yards, all of which Harvard owns. The destruction will make Memorial Drive a quality receptacle for traffic exiting instead to Cambridge over an expanded Grand Junction railroad bridge under the BU Bridge, traffic which now passes through the future home of Harvard Medical School and related.
Details on H3332 were presented at http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/08/analysis-of-governor-patricks.html.
3. The destruction at the Longfellow Bridge.
The Longfellow Bridge is undergoing repairs. The first thing Governor Patrick’s people did, and always with close coordination with Cambridge, was the needless and outrageous destruction of an excellent grove on the Cambridge end of the Longfellow Bridge. Then Patrick’s people destroyed additional excellent trees east of the Longfellow Bridge toward the Charles River and Memorial Drive.
We have had multiple reports on the destruction.
Here are before and after photos of the first grove wastefully destroyed. It is now a parking area for debris. All a responsible government had to do was move a needed traffic crossing for the repairs a few feet closer to Kendall Square. .
Please see the following for further details on Kendall / Longfellow and many more photos. These are a tiny fraction of the reports.
http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/07/bad-news-anderson-bridge-they-killed.html
http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/07/kendall-longfellow-cambridge-ma-use.html
4. One explanation for Cambridge, MA, USA’s Destructiveness.
All this tree destruction is called “improvements” in the environmentally reprehensible City of Cambridge, MA, USA. They “improve” Cambridge by destroying its mature trees and brag about the saplings they plant in place of the mature trees.
Among other things, you see, Cambridge is a Tree City USA, but mature trees have no value to the folks designating Tree Cities USA. They only count saplings. So Cambridge destroys its excellent tree cover and brags about the replacement for this massive and outrageous waste.
Cambridge has a secret definition of environmentalism, and pretty much all Cambridge pols brag of being environmentalists. Trouble is “environmentalism” in Cambridge, MA, USA is a flat out lie because the pols use a secret definition. “Environmentalism” in Cambridge, MA, USA is secretly defined as protecting that part of the environment Cambridge is not destroying. And they get very pious in their proclamations of environmental sainthood.
5. Company Unions.
One of the big techniques in environmental destruction in Cambridge, MA, USA, is the existence of company union organizations closely connected to the City of Cambridge. These entities fight for the destruction of the environment by loudly declaring that they are defending parts of Cambridge and then fight for destruction by telling well meaning people to do exactly the opposite of responsible behavior.
The first phase of destruction of the publicly owned portions of the Alewife reservation in the western part of Cambridge has been achieved through use of such a fake organization. Cambridge is fighting for massive destruction on the Charles River. That fake organization could not be certain of the success of their fraudulent initiatives, so they have indulged in voting corruption on the issue of destruction on the Charles River.
I call the interlocked entities the Cambridge Machine. The Cambridge Machine clearly consists of interlocked groups and a lot of bad achievements.
6. The Company Unions in Kendall Square.
Dah, dah, the Cambridge Machine claims to be defending Kendall Square.
They have created a group with a global protective name which supposedly defends Kendall Square and Central Square.
And they have a very clear, very typical position on this massive environmental destruction.
The Cambridge Machine’s Kendall - Central front organization told its subjects to look the other way during the earlier totally wasteful environmental destruction next to Kendall Square as part of the Longfellow Bridge project.
They are now aggressively telling people to look at Central Square during this destruction.
Business as usual in the environmental reprehensible City of Cambridge, MA, USA.
Thursday, January 09, 2014
More Environmental Destruction Planned in Kendall Square, Cambridge, MA, USA
1. Mishka Reports.
2. Official Notice from the website:
3. Your Editor.
4. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
1. Mishka Reports.
I received the following email from Mishka sent by him late on January 8. He was very much up on the destruction at Kendall.
***************************
I’ve seen some tree removal hearing notices today near Kendall Square subway station. The hearing was yesterday. I don't know whether dirty tricks were involved in terms of the timing of posting of the hearing notices, because I did not see those notices on Monday, Jan 6 (but I might have missed them).
This is the notice on the city Web site:
http://www.cambridgema.gov/theworks/newsandevents/news/2013/12/treehearingscheduledforjanuary7.aspx
I don't know whether anyone concerned attended the hearing, and whether any objections were entered. It's a lot of trees.
2. Official Notice from the website:
Tree Hearing Scheduled for January 7
12/27/2013
Pursuant to Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 87, Sections 3 and 4, a public hearing will be held on Tuesday, January 7th, 2014 at 5:30 pm at 147 Hampshire St, Cambridge, Mass., to consider the removal of the following public tree(s):
1. 238 Main St – Removal of 3 pear trees (9.6”, 11.6”, and 13.6”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
2. 1 Cambridge Center (on Main St) – Removal of 5 pear trees (13”, 13.2”, 12.9”, 7.7”, and 6.3”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
3. 3 Cambridge Center (on Main St) – Removal of 6 pear trees (6.3”, 5.7”, 8.7”, 15.6”, 13.8”, and 15.3”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
4. 326 Main St – Removal of 2 pear trees (15.8” and 17.1”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
5. 336 Main St – Removal of 2 pear trees (13” and 15.8”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement projects. Location will be replanted.
6. 355 Main St – Removal of 7 pear trees (15.5”, 11.6”, 8.8”, 7.7”, 8”, 9”, and 8.1”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
7. 400 Main St – Removal of 2 pear trees (16.8” and 17.9”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
[A number of irrelevant trees omitted. - ed]
The tree(s) identified above have been posted for public inspection. Any objections to their removal must be submitted in writing to the City Arborist, prior to or during the hearing. The mailing address for the City Arborist is Department of Public Works, City of Cambridge, 147 Hampshire Street, Cambridge, MA 02139; phone: 617-349-6433 email: cambridgetree@cambridgema.gov
[Formal entries omitted.]
OWEN O'RIORDAN
COMMISSIONER
3. Your Editor.
“Streetscape improvement project.”
I made a public meeting on “improvements” in Kendall which do not have the stench of this announcement. Naturally, the massive destruction was not mentioned. The discussion explained the project in connection with the Longfellow Bridge project which included totally unnecessary destruction of major trees, of course.
Clearly, there is state money involved. And there is a lot of crap about “replanting”. We are dealing with people to whom mature trees have no value.
Tree City USA does not count mature trees. Mature trees are in the way of saplings. Tree City USA counts saplings. And the contractors love make work.
Similarly, the con from the Cambridge Machine is always: “How dare you discuss this with the Cambridge City Council!!!!”
These people run around using pious words from this destructive Cambridge City Council yelling at the other guy, and they insist the Cambridge City Council should not be bothered about destruction in Cambridge.
Like Hell!
These trees have not been destroyed yet.
They still can be saved.
4. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
Massachusetts Governor’s Office email form: http://www.mass.gov/governor/constituentservices/contact/.
State environmental people, DES Hotline: ESF.Hotline@state.ma.us.
MassDOT Accelerated Bridges Program: 857-368-8904 or Stephanie.Boundy@state.ma.us.
All Massachusetts Legislators’ emails: http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/04/emails-for-all-massachusetts.html.
Cambridge, MA, USA city councilors: Council@cambridgema.gov.
**********
For people listening to Boston Sierra Club endorsements of environmentally destructive members of and candidates for the Cambridge City Council, you should be aware that
(1) using the world’s definition of “environmentalism,” there are no environmentally responsible members of the Cambridge City Council; Cambridge’s definition is that environmentalists protect that which Cambridge does not feel like destroying; the Cambridge pols are oh, so pious using their secret, fraudulent definition;
(2) the former school committee member who just got sworn into the Cambridge City Council fought for the outrages at the Magazine Beach playing fields;
(a) his indignant explanation is that he claims to be only responsible for the good stuff;
(b) that explanation is combined with exactly no demonstration of any meaningful opposition whatsoever to the outrages; and
(c) as is usual in Cambridge, his claims of “improvements” are belied by reality. The playing fields have been decreased in size by his project!!!!! This is to drain off the poisons being dumped to keep alive sickly introduced grasses which replaced healthy grass that survived the better part of a century without poisons; and
(3) there are Cambridge Machine activists very visible and apparently very active in the Boston Sierra Club.
If you are talking to a person associated with the Boston Sierra Club, do a credibility check. Ask if they are familiar with the “Urban Ring” rapid transit proposal. This is a subway proposal designed to link the existing subway spokes. I have been working on it since 1985. Cambridge raised the project in a comment to an environmental Impact Statement a few months ago.
If the Boston Sierra Club “expert” answers “yes,” that he / she is familiar with the Urban Ring rapid transit proposal, ask how many rail options there are. If the answer is “one,” you are getting the flat out lie put out by the City of Cambridge.
Cambridge’s flat out lie is that, of the TWO rail options, the only one that exists is the environmentally destructive streetcar option which the City of Cambridge supports. This option would be highly destructive to the environment near the Destroyed Nesting Area of the Charles River White Geese.
The reality is that THE STATE LEGISLATURE HAS SUBSIDIZED THE OTHER OPTION, the responsible Orange Line / heavy rail option, the Kenmore crossing. The state legislature has subsidized the expansion of Yawkey Station as part of the massive Fenway Park area project which has gotten recent press.
Cambridge’s nonsensical proposal would move Yawkey Station three blocks. The Cambridge proposal would not work without moving Yawkey Station. The Kenmore Crossing uses the now subsidized and being expanded Yawkey Station as part of a brilliant megastation.
You should immediately respond to such nonsense from a Sierra Club “expert” by having nothing more to do with this person. Whether the person is stupid or venal is irrelevant, the person has no credibility and is not worthy of your time.
It is frequently difficult to pin these irresponsible people down in general. The deviant behavior in my test is extreme. They are pious in their demands that, if you are politically correct and pro environment, you have to rubber stamp them. Please do not waste your time arguing about destruction they can try to wiggle around.
Turn your back on them and walk away fast.
2. Official Notice from the website:
3. Your Editor.
4. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
1. Mishka Reports.
I received the following email from Mishka sent by him late on January 8. He was very much up on the destruction at Kendall.
***************************
I’ve seen some tree removal hearing notices today near Kendall Square subway station. The hearing was yesterday. I don't know whether dirty tricks were involved in terms of the timing of posting of the hearing notices, because I did not see those notices on Monday, Jan 6 (but I might have missed them).
This is the notice on the city Web site:
http://www.cambridgema.gov/theworks/newsandevents/news/2013/12/treehearingscheduledforjanuary7.aspx
I don't know whether anyone concerned attended the hearing, and whether any objections were entered. It's a lot of trees.
2. Official Notice from the website:
Tree Hearing Scheduled for January 7
12/27/2013
Pursuant to Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 87, Sections 3 and 4, a public hearing will be held on Tuesday, January 7th, 2014 at 5:30 pm at 147 Hampshire St, Cambridge, Mass., to consider the removal of the following public tree(s):
1. 238 Main St – Removal of 3 pear trees (9.6”, 11.6”, and 13.6”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
2. 1 Cambridge Center (on Main St) – Removal of 5 pear trees (13”, 13.2”, 12.9”, 7.7”, and 6.3”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
3. 3 Cambridge Center (on Main St) – Removal of 6 pear trees (6.3”, 5.7”, 8.7”, 15.6”, 13.8”, and 15.3”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
4. 326 Main St – Removal of 2 pear trees (15.8” and 17.1”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
5. 336 Main St – Removal of 2 pear trees (13” and 15.8”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement projects. Location will be replanted.
6. 355 Main St – Removal of 7 pear trees (15.5”, 11.6”, 8.8”, 7.7”, 8”, 9”, and 8.1”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
7. 400 Main St – Removal of 2 pear trees (16.8” and 17.9”) due to structural issues and streetscape improvement project. Location will be replanted.
[A number of irrelevant trees omitted. - ed]
The tree(s) identified above have been posted for public inspection. Any objections to their removal must be submitted in writing to the City Arborist, prior to or during the hearing. The mailing address for the City Arborist is Department of Public Works, City of Cambridge, 147 Hampshire Street, Cambridge, MA 02139; phone: 617-349-6433 email: cambridgetree@cambridgema.gov
[Formal entries omitted.]
OWEN O'RIORDAN
COMMISSIONER
3. Your Editor.
“Streetscape improvement project.”
I made a public meeting on “improvements” in Kendall which do not have the stench of this announcement. Naturally, the massive destruction was not mentioned. The discussion explained the project in connection with the Longfellow Bridge project which included totally unnecessary destruction of major trees, of course.
Clearly, there is state money involved. And there is a lot of crap about “replanting”. We are dealing with people to whom mature trees have no value.
Tree City USA does not count mature trees. Mature trees are in the way of saplings. Tree City USA counts saplings. And the contractors love make work.
Similarly, the con from the Cambridge Machine is always: “How dare you discuss this with the Cambridge City Council!!!!”
These people run around using pious words from this destructive Cambridge City Council yelling at the other guy, and they insist the Cambridge City Council should not be bothered about destruction in Cambridge.
Like Hell!
These trees have not been destroyed yet.
They still can be saved.
4. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
Massachusetts Governor’s Office email form: http://www.mass.gov/governor/constituentservices/contact/.
State environmental people, DES Hotline: ESF.Hotline@state.ma.us.
MassDOT Accelerated Bridges Program: 857-368-8904 or Stephanie.Boundy@state.ma.us.
All Massachusetts Legislators’ emails: http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/04/emails-for-all-massachusetts.html.
Cambridge, MA, USA city councilors: Council@cambridgema.gov.
**********
For people listening to Boston Sierra Club endorsements of environmentally destructive members of and candidates for the Cambridge City Council, you should be aware that
(1) using the world’s definition of “environmentalism,” there are no environmentally responsible members of the Cambridge City Council; Cambridge’s definition is that environmentalists protect that which Cambridge does not feel like destroying; the Cambridge pols are oh, so pious using their secret, fraudulent definition;
(2) the former school committee member who just got sworn into the Cambridge City Council fought for the outrages at the Magazine Beach playing fields;
(a) his indignant explanation is that he claims to be only responsible for the good stuff;
(b) that explanation is combined with exactly no demonstration of any meaningful opposition whatsoever to the outrages; and
(c) as is usual in Cambridge, his claims of “improvements” are belied by reality. The playing fields have been decreased in size by his project!!!!! This is to drain off the poisons being dumped to keep alive sickly introduced grasses which replaced healthy grass that survived the better part of a century without poisons; and
(3) there are Cambridge Machine activists very visible and apparently very active in the Boston Sierra Club.
If you are talking to a person associated with the Boston Sierra Club, do a credibility check. Ask if they are familiar with the “Urban Ring” rapid transit proposal. This is a subway proposal designed to link the existing subway spokes. I have been working on it since 1985. Cambridge raised the project in a comment to an environmental Impact Statement a few months ago.
If the Boston Sierra Club “expert” answers “yes,” that he / she is familiar with the Urban Ring rapid transit proposal, ask how many rail options there are. If the answer is “one,” you are getting the flat out lie put out by the City of Cambridge.
Cambridge’s flat out lie is that, of the TWO rail options, the only one that exists is the environmentally destructive streetcar option which the City of Cambridge supports. This option would be highly destructive to the environment near the Destroyed Nesting Area of the Charles River White Geese.
The reality is that THE STATE LEGISLATURE HAS SUBSIDIZED THE OTHER OPTION, the responsible Orange Line / heavy rail option, the Kenmore crossing. The state legislature has subsidized the expansion of Yawkey Station as part of the massive Fenway Park area project which has gotten recent press.
Cambridge’s nonsensical proposal would move Yawkey Station three blocks. The Cambridge proposal would not work without moving Yawkey Station. The Kenmore Crossing uses the now subsidized and being expanded Yawkey Station as part of a brilliant megastation.
You should immediately respond to such nonsense from a Sierra Club “expert” by having nothing more to do with this person. Whether the person is stupid or venal is irrelevant, the person has no credibility and is not worthy of your time.
It is frequently difficult to pin these irresponsible people down in general. The deviant behavior in my test is extreme. They are pious in their demands that, if you are politically correct and pro environment, you have to rubber stamp them. Please do not waste your time arguing about destruction they can try to wiggle around.
Turn your back on them and walk away fast.
Wednesday, January 08, 2014
Photos: The Charles River White Geese: The Thaw between Extreme Cold
Photos: The Charles River White Geese: The Thaw between Extreme Cold
1. Visit during the thaw.
2. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
1. Visit during the thaw.
I visited the Charles River White Geese Sunday at the ghetto to which a reprehensible city and state have confined them on the banks of the Charles River in Cambridge, MA, USA.
This is their Destroyed Nesting Area.
For most of the last 32 years, the Charles River White Geese lived in a mile long habitat centered on the BU Bridge.
Most of their days were spent at Magazine Beach west of the BU Bridge eating and sleeping. In bad weather and when they were nesting and raising their babies, the Charles River White Geese went to their Nesting Area east of the BU Bridge.
They have been loved by commuters and residents.
The now Destroyed Nesting Area provides excellent protection from the elements, but not from reprehensible governments.
The protection from the elements is provided by meadow sloping to the river. On the south side of the slope is the Charles River with a railroad bridge above it. One the west side of the slope is the BU Bridge with its support under it forming a protective wall. On the north side is the slope with above the slope, Memorial Drive rising in the air above an on ramp. On the east side is the raised railroad with a supporting slope under it.
The state department “responsible” for the area and the City of Cambridge decided to “improve” the area.
They did a lot of terrible things to the area, ALL of which were kept secret from the public and were either lied about through omission or through direct lies which were the opposite of their claims in public. One excellent example of the outrage: the non stop claim of the key manager that he “had no intention to do any harm” to the Charles River White Geese.
When he started starving them, he repeated this outrageous lie. It was printed by the Boston Sunday Globe in its report of the commencement of starvation to the right of a massive photo showing a resident goose overwhelmed by earth moving equipment.
Most recently, the Cambridge Machine honored this embodiment of destruction and corrupt lying by having him present his proposal to double the destruction. A proposal which the Cambridge Machine fought for with typical corrupt behavior.
The Charles River White Geese have been barred from their food of most of the last 32 years, blocked from Magazine Beach and, at the same time as being blocked from Magazine Beach were blocked from their alternate feeding area to the east across from the Hyatt Regency Hotel.
Most recently, they even have been blocked from the tiny bit of grass 30 feet from the Destroyed Nesting Area under Memorial Drive.
Here are two photos of the Charles River between freezes.
Here are a few photos of the Charles River White Geese in their most cherished place, under the large tree at the far corner of the Destroyed Nesting Area kitty corner from the intersection of the BU Bridge and Memorial Drive.
During the worst of the days, they curl up in balls protected by their down coats.
This area has been devastated by agents of city and state. The most recent was the outrage in which this most cherished area was turned into a parking lot by railroad workers who were too lazy to park under Memorial Drive, 20 feet from the Destroyed Nesting Area. During the work, (1) the Charles River White Geese were excluded from their most cherished area, (2) the ground was crushed in by repeated car parking, (3) crushed stone was dumped into this sensitive ground, and (4) ground vegetation was destroyed. After they left, more crushed stone was added.
This most sensitive area was not destroyed during the recent BU Bridge work. It was held sacred and then destroyed afterwards. The areas were separated by plastic walls which were left poisoning the destroyed nesting area after the work was done and which remain as a memorial to this day.
“Vegetation remediation” in the BU Bridge work area varied between bushes which would not live and bushes which look like they could turn into the impenetrable wall of bushes was which starves them at Magazine Beach. That impenetrable wall is the way the state and city implement promises of a “meadow” to the Charles River.
There are some bushes which seem to be neutral.
The thickest items in the following photos are the remnants of the native vegetation which used to fill most of the Destroyed Nesting Area until that vegetation was destroyed.
The orange wall is the latest step in starvation, keeping the Charles River White Geese from the grass on the other side of that wall under the Memorial Drive overpass. The brick structure above the orange wall is the Memorial Drive overpass.
Part was destroyed before the BU Bridge work apparently by the falsely named Charles River Conservancy or by employees of the state / city or by employees of their friends.
The rest was destroyed by the BU Bridge project, all of the destruction more than fifty feet from the BU Bridge was unnecessary. The area within 50 feet of the BU Bridge has, mostly, been untouched by the supposed remediation and looks like it was left deliberately barren.
Hopefully, nature will remediate on its own. Unfortunately, the city and state and their friends keep coming in and furthering the destruction.
The Cambridge Machine is aggressively fighting to keep this outrage. The Cambridge Machine lies of their concern for the Charles River and tells people to look at everything except the problems. Look at a building which has not been used for 80 years.
And to reemphasize their constant lies of concern, the Cambridge Machine conducted a meeting on doubling the outrages. The Cambridge Machine was faced with a meeting in January 2013 which might have voted responsibly. So after devoting a full meeting to a lot of negative discussion, the Cambridge Machine postponed things to their February 2013 meeting which the conducted on April 23, driving away folks concerned about the Charles River. At the meeting they deferred the responsible discussion to the last 10 minutes of the meeting and submitted a complicated motion which had been kept secret until those last 10 minutes. So a meeting from which concerned folks had been driven consisted of a bunch of people totally unconcerned about the matter and some puppets.
Among other things, the fine print to the fine print supported destruction of hundreds of trees between Magazine Beach and the Longfellow Bridge, the second bridge to the west. It clearly doubled the irresponsible destruction they keep telling people not to look at, and destroys the responsible parking lot needed for that building which has not been used for 80 years and needed for the adjacent picnic area which the Cambridge Machine claims to love.
Oh, year, the entire thing, of course, continues the heartless starvation of the Charles River White Geese as part of the outrages the Machine tells people not to look at.
This is Governor Patrick’s House Bill H3332, funding of “Historical Parkways” in the amount of about $22 million. The less hidden part of the lie talks about “underpasses” away from the tree destruction. The “underpasses” are opposed by the Department of Transportation for environmental irresponsibility, among other things. This less secret part of the fine print runs 2 to 4 million dollars. To the extent the real purpose of “underpasses” is mentioned by any of its supporters, this area to which 10 times the money is allocated is referred to as associated paths.
The pitch of the Cambridge Machine is, if you love the Charles River, you will ignore the problems inflicted by Cambridge and the State, and ignore the expansion of the problems which they corruptly “supported” by the April 23, 2013 excuse for a vote. If you love the Charles River, according to the Cambridge Machine, you will look at one building which has not been used for 80 years and look at nothing else.
You will also, according to the Cambridge Machine, praise the Cambridge Machine and the folks pulling its strings as environmental saints.
The Cambridge Machine on the Charles River is repeating tactics which have so far achieved the destruction of acres of irreplaceable woodlands in the publicly owned portion of the Alewife reservation near the western terminus of the Red Line subway and near the eastern end of the east - west superhighway known as Route 2. The machine is very clearly using comparable tactics in both locations.
The big difference at Alewife is that the fraud has been sufficiently successful that corrupt voting tactics, to the best of my knowledge, have never been necessary.
2. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
Massachusetts Governor’s Office email form: http://www.mass.gov/governor/constituentservices/contact/.
State environmental people, DES Hotline: ESF.Hotline@state.ma.us.
MassDOT Accelerated Bridges Program: 857-368-8904 or Stephanie.Boundy@state.ma.us.
All Massachusetts Legislators’ emails: http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/04/emails-for-all-massachusetts.html.
Cambridge, MA, USA city councilors: Council@cambridgema.gov.
**********
For people listening to Boston Sierra Club endorsements of environmentally destructive members of and candidates for the Cambridge City Council, you should be aware that
(1) using the world’s definition of “environmentalism,” there are no environmentally responsible members of the Cambridge City Council; Cambridge’s definition is that environmentalists protect that which Cambridge does not feel like destroying; the Cambridge pols are oh, so pious using their secret, fraudulent definition;
(2) the school committee member running for Cambridge City Council fought for the outrages at the Magazine Beach playing fields;
(a) his indignant explanation is that he claims to be only responsible for the good stuff;
(b) that explanation is combined with exactly no demonstration of any meaningful opposition whatsoever to the outrages; and
(c) as is usual in Cambridge, his claims of “improvements” are belied by reality. The playing fields have been decreased in size by his project!!!!! This is to drain off the poisons being dumped to keep alive sickly introduced grasses which replaced healthy grass that survived the better part of a century without poisons; and
(3) there are Cambridge Machine activists very visible and apparently very active in the Boston Sierra Club.
If you are talking to a person associated with the Boston Sierra Club, do a credibility check. Ask if they are familiar with the “Urban Ring” rapid transit proposal. This is a subway proposal designed to link the existing subway spokes. I have been working on it since 1985. Cambridge raised the project in a comment to an environmental Impact Statement a few months ago.
If the Boston Sierra Club “expert” answers “yes,” that he / she is familiar with the Urban Ring rapid transit proposal, ask how many rail options there are. If the answer is “one,” you are getting the flat out lie put out by the City of Cambridge.
Cambridge’s flat out lie is that, of the TWO rail options, the only one that exists is the environmentally destructive streetcar option which the City of Cambridge supports. This option would be highly destructive to the environment near the Destroyed Nesting Area of the Charles River White Geese.
The reality is that THE STATE LEGISLATURE HAS SUBSIDIZED THE OTHER OPTION, the responsible Orange Line / heavy rail option, the Kenmore crossing. The state legislature has subsidized the expansion of Yawkey Station as part of the massive Fenway Park area project which has gotten recent press.
Cambridge’s nonsensical proposal would move Yawkey Station three blocks. The Cambridge proposal would not work without moving Yawkey Station. The Kenmore Crossing uses the now subsidized and being expanded Yawkey Station as part of a brilliant megastation.
You should immediately respond to such nonsense from a Sierra Club “expert” by having nothing more to do with this person. Whether the person is stupid or venal is irrelevant, the person has no credibility and is not worthy of your time.
It is frequently difficult to pin these irresponsible people down in general. The deviant behavior in my test is extreme. They are pious in their demands that, if you are politically correct and pro environment, you have to rubber stamp them. Please do not waste your time arguing about destruction they can try to wiggle around.
Turn your back on them and walk away fast.
1. Visit during the thaw.
2. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
1. Visit during the thaw.
I visited the Charles River White Geese Sunday at the ghetto to which a reprehensible city and state have confined them on the banks of the Charles River in Cambridge, MA, USA.
This is their Destroyed Nesting Area.
For most of the last 32 years, the Charles River White Geese lived in a mile long habitat centered on the BU Bridge.
Most of their days were spent at Magazine Beach west of the BU Bridge eating and sleeping. In bad weather and when they were nesting and raising their babies, the Charles River White Geese went to their Nesting Area east of the BU Bridge.
They have been loved by commuters and residents.
The now Destroyed Nesting Area provides excellent protection from the elements, but not from reprehensible governments.
The protection from the elements is provided by meadow sloping to the river. On the south side of the slope is the Charles River with a railroad bridge above it. One the west side of the slope is the BU Bridge with its support under it forming a protective wall. On the north side is the slope with above the slope, Memorial Drive rising in the air above an on ramp. On the east side is the raised railroad with a supporting slope under it.
The state department “responsible” for the area and the City of Cambridge decided to “improve” the area.
They did a lot of terrible things to the area, ALL of which were kept secret from the public and were either lied about through omission or through direct lies which were the opposite of their claims in public. One excellent example of the outrage: the non stop claim of the key manager that he “had no intention to do any harm” to the Charles River White Geese.
When he started starving them, he repeated this outrageous lie. It was printed by the Boston Sunday Globe in its report of the commencement of starvation to the right of a massive photo showing a resident goose overwhelmed by earth moving equipment.
Most recently, the Cambridge Machine honored this embodiment of destruction and corrupt lying by having him present his proposal to double the destruction. A proposal which the Cambridge Machine fought for with typical corrupt behavior.
The Charles River White Geese have been barred from their food of most of the last 32 years, blocked from Magazine Beach and, at the same time as being blocked from Magazine Beach were blocked from their alternate feeding area to the east across from the Hyatt Regency Hotel.
Most recently, they even have been blocked from the tiny bit of grass 30 feet from the Destroyed Nesting Area under Memorial Drive.
Here are two photos of the Charles River between freezes.
Here are a few photos of the Charles River White Geese in their most cherished place, under the large tree at the far corner of the Destroyed Nesting Area kitty corner from the intersection of the BU Bridge and Memorial Drive.
During the worst of the days, they curl up in balls protected by their down coats.
This area has been devastated by agents of city and state. The most recent was the outrage in which this most cherished area was turned into a parking lot by railroad workers who were too lazy to park under Memorial Drive, 20 feet from the Destroyed Nesting Area. During the work, (1) the Charles River White Geese were excluded from their most cherished area, (2) the ground was crushed in by repeated car parking, (3) crushed stone was dumped into this sensitive ground, and (4) ground vegetation was destroyed. After they left, more crushed stone was added.
This most sensitive area was not destroyed during the recent BU Bridge work. It was held sacred and then destroyed afterwards. The areas were separated by plastic walls which were left poisoning the destroyed nesting area after the work was done and which remain as a memorial to this day.
“Vegetation remediation” in the BU Bridge work area varied between bushes which would not live and bushes which look like they could turn into the impenetrable wall of bushes was which starves them at Magazine Beach. That impenetrable wall is the way the state and city implement promises of a “meadow” to the Charles River.
There are some bushes which seem to be neutral.
The thickest items in the following photos are the remnants of the native vegetation which used to fill most of the Destroyed Nesting Area until that vegetation was destroyed.
The orange wall is the latest step in starvation, keeping the Charles River White Geese from the grass on the other side of that wall under the Memorial Drive overpass. The brick structure above the orange wall is the Memorial Drive overpass.
Part was destroyed before the BU Bridge work apparently by the falsely named Charles River Conservancy or by employees of the state / city or by employees of their friends.
The rest was destroyed by the BU Bridge project, all of the destruction more than fifty feet from the BU Bridge was unnecessary. The area within 50 feet of the BU Bridge has, mostly, been untouched by the supposed remediation and looks like it was left deliberately barren.
Hopefully, nature will remediate on its own. Unfortunately, the city and state and their friends keep coming in and furthering the destruction.
The Cambridge Machine is aggressively fighting to keep this outrage. The Cambridge Machine lies of their concern for the Charles River and tells people to look at everything except the problems. Look at a building which has not been used for 80 years.
And to reemphasize their constant lies of concern, the Cambridge Machine conducted a meeting on doubling the outrages. The Cambridge Machine was faced with a meeting in January 2013 which might have voted responsibly. So after devoting a full meeting to a lot of negative discussion, the Cambridge Machine postponed things to their February 2013 meeting which the conducted on April 23, driving away folks concerned about the Charles River. At the meeting they deferred the responsible discussion to the last 10 minutes of the meeting and submitted a complicated motion which had been kept secret until those last 10 minutes. So a meeting from which concerned folks had been driven consisted of a bunch of people totally unconcerned about the matter and some puppets.
Among other things, the fine print to the fine print supported destruction of hundreds of trees between Magazine Beach and the Longfellow Bridge, the second bridge to the west. It clearly doubled the irresponsible destruction they keep telling people not to look at, and destroys the responsible parking lot needed for that building which has not been used for 80 years and needed for the adjacent picnic area which the Cambridge Machine claims to love.
Oh, year, the entire thing, of course, continues the heartless starvation of the Charles River White Geese as part of the outrages the Machine tells people not to look at.
This is Governor Patrick’s House Bill H3332, funding of “Historical Parkways” in the amount of about $22 million. The less hidden part of the lie talks about “underpasses” away from the tree destruction. The “underpasses” are opposed by the Department of Transportation for environmental irresponsibility, among other things. This less secret part of the fine print runs 2 to 4 million dollars. To the extent the real purpose of “underpasses” is mentioned by any of its supporters, this area to which 10 times the money is allocated is referred to as associated paths.
The pitch of the Cambridge Machine is, if you love the Charles River, you will ignore the problems inflicted by Cambridge and the State, and ignore the expansion of the problems which they corruptly “supported” by the April 23, 2013 excuse for a vote. If you love the Charles River, according to the Cambridge Machine, you will look at one building which has not been used for 80 years and look at nothing else.
You will also, according to the Cambridge Machine, praise the Cambridge Machine and the folks pulling its strings as environmental saints.
The Cambridge Machine on the Charles River is repeating tactics which have so far achieved the destruction of acres of irreplaceable woodlands in the publicly owned portion of the Alewife reservation near the western terminus of the Red Line subway and near the eastern end of the east - west superhighway known as Route 2. The machine is very clearly using comparable tactics in both locations.
The big difference at Alewife is that the fraud has been sufficiently successful that corrupt voting tactics, to the best of my knowledge, have never been necessary.
2. Contacts, Miscellaneous.
Massachusetts Governor’s Office email form: http://www.mass.gov/governor/constituentservices/contact/.
State environmental people, DES Hotline: ESF.Hotline@state.ma.us.
MassDOT Accelerated Bridges Program: 857-368-8904 or Stephanie.Boundy@state.ma.us.
All Massachusetts Legislators’ emails: http://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2013/04/emails-for-all-massachusetts.html.
Cambridge, MA, USA city councilors: Council@cambridgema.gov.
**********
For people listening to Boston Sierra Club endorsements of environmentally destructive members of and candidates for the Cambridge City Council, you should be aware that
(1) using the world’s definition of “environmentalism,” there are no environmentally responsible members of the Cambridge City Council; Cambridge’s definition is that environmentalists protect that which Cambridge does not feel like destroying; the Cambridge pols are oh, so pious using their secret, fraudulent definition;
(2) the school committee member running for Cambridge City Council fought for the outrages at the Magazine Beach playing fields;
(a) his indignant explanation is that he claims to be only responsible for the good stuff;
(b) that explanation is combined with exactly no demonstration of any meaningful opposition whatsoever to the outrages; and
(c) as is usual in Cambridge, his claims of “improvements” are belied by reality. The playing fields have been decreased in size by his project!!!!! This is to drain off the poisons being dumped to keep alive sickly introduced grasses which replaced healthy grass that survived the better part of a century without poisons; and
(3) there are Cambridge Machine activists very visible and apparently very active in the Boston Sierra Club.
If you are talking to a person associated with the Boston Sierra Club, do a credibility check. Ask if they are familiar with the “Urban Ring” rapid transit proposal. This is a subway proposal designed to link the existing subway spokes. I have been working on it since 1985. Cambridge raised the project in a comment to an environmental Impact Statement a few months ago.
If the Boston Sierra Club “expert” answers “yes,” that he / she is familiar with the Urban Ring rapid transit proposal, ask how many rail options there are. If the answer is “one,” you are getting the flat out lie put out by the City of Cambridge.
Cambridge’s flat out lie is that, of the TWO rail options, the only one that exists is the environmentally destructive streetcar option which the City of Cambridge supports. This option would be highly destructive to the environment near the Destroyed Nesting Area of the Charles River White Geese.
The reality is that THE STATE LEGISLATURE HAS SUBSIDIZED THE OTHER OPTION, the responsible Orange Line / heavy rail option, the Kenmore crossing. The state legislature has subsidized the expansion of Yawkey Station as part of the massive Fenway Park area project which has gotten recent press.
Cambridge’s nonsensical proposal would move Yawkey Station three blocks. The Cambridge proposal would not work without moving Yawkey Station. The Kenmore Crossing uses the now subsidized and being expanded Yawkey Station as part of a brilliant megastation.
You should immediately respond to such nonsense from a Sierra Club “expert” by having nothing more to do with this person. Whether the person is stupid or venal is irrelevant, the person has no credibility and is not worthy of your time.
It is frequently difficult to pin these irresponsible people down in general. The deviant behavior in my test is extreme. They are pious in their demands that, if you are politically correct and pro environment, you have to rubber stamp them. Please do not waste your time arguing about destruction they can try to wiggle around.
Turn your back on them and walk away fast.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)