What's More Money Down The Drain?

It takes a uniquely special kind of DPW -- and DPW Superintendent --to allow a storm drain and street to reach this level of damage.  I've heard of benign neglect.  Is there such a thing as blind neglect?

As long as one person is expected to supervise all of DPW -- as Rob Perry is expected to -- all sorts of things will fall by the wayside.  And when you come across an area around a storm drain so damaged as there has been for months on Glenwood Boulevard, you can't help but wonder where else our DPW is neglecting our fragile and worn infrastructure, both above and below our streets.  You can't help but wonder how much DPW's lack of preventive maintenance (and lack of general maintenance) is costing us in dollars.  You can't (or at least I can't) help but wonder if DPW is run by a careless, wasteful slob.  You can't help but wonder:  How much more damage is DPW willing to allow, and how much more money will we be forced to pay to repair the neglected damage?

Neglect and a lack of attention and maintenance are huge red flags in much of life.  If you don't repaint your house when missing paint is revealing bare wood, soon enough you will have to replace the damaged and rotted siding.  If you don't fill the small hole in your sidewalk, soon enough someone will be able to fit their foot into it.  If you don't replace your roof tiles when they are worn out, you just might have to pay to replace the entire roof, not just the tiles.  If you don't brush your teeth at least once every day, you will be sorry for a number of reasons, including financially.  If you don't oil your bicycle chain regularly, you will be replacing them more often than you'd like to or maybe can afford to.  If you don't fix and replace broken and missing asphalt surrounding a storm drain, soon enough the storm drain itself becomes damaged.  If you don't pay attention, soon enough you'll pay for it.

Nothing changes around here: Different Storm Drain, Same Neglect!  (from a year and a half ago)

Any obviously neglected street damage found throughout the city is concerning, ugly, dangerous and disrespectful.  But the neglected damage on Glenwood (regardless of the storm drain) is noteworthy for at least one additional reason.  This red flag happens to be in the fifth ward where one of the two council members representing that ward is blind.

I can't imagine how difficult life must be to have no vision (or very limited vision).  I wouldn't wish it on anyone.  But if I were blind (or nearly so), I certainly wouldn't ever consider representing a portion of any city as a council member to get things accomplished, particularly in an old city with serious infrastructure issues out the wazoo, many of them on and above our streets.  It seems to me that attempting to represent your neighbors and "constituents" as a blind person simply isn't fair to anyone.  

It might also be noteworthy that neither council member representing the fifth ward -- Clair Cousin or Dominic Merante -- sit on Margaret Morris's new Code & Infrastructure Committee.  It's not just that the two of them never actually see Rob Perry in the flesh once a month at City Hall for an hour or so.  Heck, Cousin and Merante don't even have the chance to interact with him, listen to his monthly DPW reports, ask him a question about something in the report, or ask him a question about (or point out) something of concern in their ward, perhaps about a badly damaged portion of street surrounding a storm drain that was probably built 150 years ago.  Of course, first they have to see the problems to get Rob Perry's attention to them, don't they?  

Out of sight, out of mind.  No sight, yes problem.

Prior to Margaret Morris's revamping of council meetings this year, all council members (at least those who showed up) heard every department head report at each informal meeting.  They all had the opportunity to interact with the department heads, either in person or virtually.  Since Covid began, all but one of Perry's reports to the council have been done virtually.  Beginning this year, though, our $125,000 DPW Superintendent now shows up in person to City Hall to the Code & Infrastructure Committee meetings.  This is an improvement!  But 6 of 10 council members are not required to show up to have anything to do with Perry, his reports or infrastructure issues the committee concerns itself with.  And the six -- including Cousin and Merante -- don't show up (or at least they haven't).  And neither does anyone from the Code Enforcement Department.  One step forward, two or three steps back.

This is a great way to get LESS done, not MORE! 

Last note:  Each of the new committees have had three monthly meetings.  At the three so-called SAFETY Committee meetings, the two representatives from the police department have remained for the entirety of the meetings, long past the HPD and parking reports given by Mishanda Franklin and David Miller.  They have taken many questions from the public (almost exclusively about parking, of course), often responding at length (when they don't refuse to answer or the committee doesn't want them to).   Over at the so-called Code & Infrastructure Committee, however, Rob Perry has not stuck around until the end of any of the meetings.  Apparently, his interest in helping out is limited, and committee chair Jason Foster is fine with that.  Last week, in a display that showed how low, inconsistent and messy things have become at committee meetings, Foster allowed Rob Perry to leave the meeting without offering the public an opportunity to ask our $125,000 DPW Superintend a question or two or offer a few comments.  Perry was certainly delighted and relieved that he wasn't forced to interact with the public or answer (or evade) any annoying questions. During February's and March's meetings, though, Foster did allow public comment time after Perry's reports and prior to him leaving the meetings before they ended.

And you wonder how a piece of our infrastructure puzzle as important and conspicuous as a storm drain can be neglected for so long.  Any reasonable person -- perhaps even a blind one -- would confidently conclude that someone needs to pay better attention or we are in real trouble (if we aren't there already).

After all, what's another $105,000 or more?