Not a very Merry Christmas Gassport!

Christmas in Glassport is like that aunt that gets you a fruitcake for Christmas every year and it does not even taste very good. Well we received that fruitcake at Council’s December meeting. At that meeting two things happened, the first would be the appointing of Councilman Foster to Councilman Zebroski seat. Yes it was like they where playing a game of musical Council chairs.

Now you will say, what’s the big deal, they did it in accordance to the law. Yes that is true, there was nothing illegal about it, but it was still wrong. Councilman Foster was appointed to fill the seat of the late Councilman Pasinski. This seat’s term ended at the end of this year. Mayor Terry DeMarco will be filling this seat in 2010; please read “Glassport’s Puppet Government” post for my view of that mess. In November Councilman Zebroski resigned and the posting for applicants to the vacant seat went in The Daily News. According to The Daily News, the borough received three letters from residents; one was from Councilman Foster and one was from David Kowalski. Many of you will remember Mr. Kowalski as the write in candidate from the general elections. Mr. Kowalski was 4th in votes for the three open council seats in November. Getting the number of votes that Mr. Kowalski did, it would make sense that he would be appointed to Councilman Zebroski’s seat, since the voters clearly gave him a mandate to run for office. The appointment of Councilman Foster over Mr. Zebroski would not have been as bad, if Councilman Foster was not already on council and had to resign his current seat to take appointment of Councilman Zebroski’s seat. Laughter was even heard form the resident when this took place at the Council Meeting. It really is ridiculous if you think about it and is an example of the good old boys club, like when a state rep or senator is voted out of office and the Governor pulls some strings and gets them hired in his administration or state agency. It all might not be illegal, but it is wrong!

The second issue is that I believe council voted illegally on the borough budget. The legal notice was posted in the Daily News that Monday and was stated that the ordinances where to be read at Wednesdays Council Meeting. The ordinances where not read, but voted on! A reader pointed out this issue to me; so I do not have hard evidence, but what I do have confirms what was stated to me. We do know that this was not the fist time something like this has happened. A couple months before, council was set to vote on a new ordnance for landlords that, again was not posted in the required time before the vote. A resident brought this to the attention of the council and the vote was postponed to the next meeting. Now these situations could be nothing more then administrative mistakes by borough employees not submitting the legal notice in time to The Daily News, but what ever it is, it needs to stop because it does not allow the public to review and comment on action being taken by council. Furthermore, it can bring the borough up for lawsuits; in which a person can challenge ordnance or budge as illegal.

On a different note, do we have to put up that ugly and broken, Santa sign up at the honor roll? If you don’t’ know what I am talking about, it is the back lit sign that is in the shrubs and usually has a flag on it. This Santa sign is cracked and has been fixed from behind with duck tape, which since it is a back lit sign, can be clearly seen. This year it looks as if there is also a big chunk taken out of the side if it. Now how do we expect to bring in new residents and business when the borough itself puts up a sign that should clearly be thrown into the trash? It clearly sends the message that we just don’t care anymore if this town becomes Trashport and falls apart. So I will probably make some people upset, but as far as the rest of the display, it is really kind of pathetic. I know people worked very hard on it and new displays where purchased on a very tight budget, but could we have something classier then the Wal-Mart clearance rack. Again, it just does not send the right message.

Idiots Please Leave!

I have solved all of our problems in Glassport. We just need to deport all the idiots to another town. Wait that might not work, considering the whole town is full of idiots. If you are wondering what I am talking about, just start reading comments on Topix Glassport. You can google it.

It does not take long to figure out that many people in this town love to belch out tons of hot air about how we need to do this or do that, and how this sucks and that sucks, but the second you suggest these people to join a volunteer group or support local groups through a fundraiser, they come back at you with the argument of, what's the point. I even had one person post that doing clean ups and park and rec activities are "feel good" events that last about an hour or two. They argue that until jobs come into this town or people move here to increase our tax base, anything else is just a waste of time.

Listen up all ye idiots! Why would any decent middle class family want to move into a town littered with trash, with rusted out parks, over grown public spaces, and no community activities or recreation? NO ONE! The only people who move into a town like that are trashy, slumlords, and criminals.

So yes if you want this town to continue to go down hill and really become hell on earth, continue to do nothing as you continue to complain. Oh and if one more person says we need jobs and new industry I am going to scream. We do not live in the 50's anymore! People do not Live, Work, Shop, and Play in the same town. You could put in a huge plant with tons of good jobs and people will commute from Washington Co, South Hills, or anywhere else that is nice to live. Clairton has had the coke works for decades and that has not saved that town.

The best thing Glassport can do is turn into a bedroom community for Pittsburgh, it will take a lot of work and some luck, like getting 43 finished to Pittsburgh, but it can happen. We need to take the dump and build new homes, we need to destroy the left over factories and build condos and a waterfront. We need unique stores to come in and take over our vacant store fronts, not more places that serve pizza and pasta.