The Pretty Patter of a Seaboard Town

This time next week, we'll be talking about Zweite Weinachten which, considering we speak English will be a neat trick auf deutsch and is a concept we really don't have. The Second Christmas is usually reserved for friends and acquaintances with family celebrations held on Christmas day itself.

Second Christmas would be a good day to celebrate with friends, perhaps at a local restaurant as the business of government will be off for the day but in between now and then, there's a lot going on as well there should be because there's a lot that needs to be done.

You'll need to lace up your track shoes starting today because it's a busy week. Before the first 'real' business meeting of the new City Council (which we elected over a month ago already) there will be a public hearing at seven in Council Chambers (Room 319) by the Community Advisory Board on how to repurpose Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) unexpended moneys. Two words: pony rides; three more: for my birthday. Fear I already know the final four:  snowball's chance in hell.

At 7:30, it's a City Council meeting whose agenda suggests a full plate that includes formally hiring a new City Clerk through a lot of housekeeping and committee appointments work (and a really excellent summary on the various requests for use of the reclaimed CDBG money as it's the City Council that re-authorizes the re-use).

Tuesday evening at six, you have choices. There's a regular meeting of the Personnel and Pension Board in Room 319 of City Hall. You'll find their most recent meeting minutes, from October, here. Across town, specifically at 16 Golden Street at six in their training room (I always think wrestling mats, speed bags and the smell of rubbing liniment) it's a regular meeting of the Norwich Public Utilities Board of  Commissioners, with a Sewer Board Authority meeting immediately afterwards. I had so much trouble getting their website to open to look for minutes from their November meetings, I thought the site was being powered by Connecticut Light & Power (a little 'crappy response' joke there).

At seven there's another meeting doubleheader, or meeting within a meeting if you prefer, at 23 Union Street as the Commission on the City Plan holds its regular meeting; here are their November meeting minutes. In the course of that meeting will be a meeting by those on the Plan of Conservation and Development Sub-Committee. You may find it helpful to have a copy of the current Plan, and that's right here. I can't get the link on the city's website to work but I just washed my hands and can't do a thing with my fingers.

Wednesday morning at nine in The Dime Bank Community Room on Salem Turnpike it's a regular meeting of the Norwich School Readiness Council (Children First) whose meeting minutes continue to take the hindmost. I so admire consistency.

At five, in Room 319 of City Hall, it's a regular meeting of the Emancipation Proclamation Commemorative Committee, whose minutes would be here, linked to the alphabetical listings of all the volunteer panels that help make the city run and that listing would include who is on it and when it was created and what it does. Dream on.

At five thirty, in the Norwich Arts Coop Gallery, it's a regular meeting of the Downtown Neighborhood Revitalization Zone, though not the meeting noticed on the website (that meeting was a while ago) and the most recent meeting minutes are from July.

Thursday morning at 8:30 and lasting until ten at Three Rivers Community College is a workshop sponsored by the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development with Commissioner Catherine Smith. If you're a small business, or would like to be a larger one, and you're searching for avenues of  funding, this meeting is for you (and all the rest of us, too).

There's a special meeting of the Board of Education at four in the conference room of the Central Office of the Norwich Public Schools, 90 Town Street, and be grateful you don't have to attend as it's an expulsion hearing, which means it's an executive session.

And Friday morning at ten, in their offices in the Norwich Business Park, it's a regular meeting of the Southeastern Connecticut Council of Governments Route 11 Greenway Authority Commission. There are NO minutes posted for any commission meetings that may have been held in 2011 or to put it another way, there are as many words about the 2011 meetings as there are additional feet of Route 11 constructed in the last two decades. There is no truth that the logo for the committee is a self-licking ice cream cone. But thanks for playing.

By this time next week all the pretty paper and packaging is in the recycling bin and the magic is through. Back to business as usual. meh. Have yourself a Merry Little Christmas. See you at something? 
-bill kenny