How Deep Will They Cut?

It sucks to lose a job any time, any place. A long holiday weekend thinking about what may come is unnerving.

The city is poised to unleash pink slips in a few days. Some city unions require 30-day notice before layoffs can actually take place. The longer the city waits the tougher to close an $8 million budget hole crafted by Mayor Bill Finch’s bean counters and approved by the City Council. A lot of little people will be served layoff notices. Last in, first out as bumping rights kick in.

Will the mayor pink-slip discretionary appointments? Not likely. He’ll take the position that his hires have/will give something back. The unions say haven’t we given enough? You’re bleeding us dry. The fireworks will extend right into next week. Sometime as the first round of layoffs are announced other unions will step up to avoid their own layoff hit. But this time may be different. Some union leaders are saying enough is enough, we have to dig in. But at what job cost?

P.T. Birthday Bash At Barnum Museum

Just a reminder that 820 Main Street in Bridgeport will be bustling with activity on Monday, July 5 from noon to 3 p.m. during the Biggest and Best Birthday Celebration in Bridgeport all year! See schedule below.

Barnum, the famed showman, philanthropist and one of Bridgeport’s best-known citizens was born in Bethel CT in 1810. This is a rain or shine event with discounted or in some cases free admission. See the details below.

Celebrating the 200th birthday of Phineas Taylor Barnum, born July 5, 1810 in Bethel CT, during 2010, The Barnum Museum will chronicle the life and times of this extraordinary showman and the history of Bridgeport where Barnum served as Mayor. For a complete listing of anniversary year events celebrating this amazing – and sometimes outrageous – showman, civic leader and politician, visit www.barnum-museum.org. The original museum building, owned by the City of Bridgeport is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

What: Barnum’s Birthday Bash: A Celebration 200 Years in the Making

Where: The Barnum Museum, 820 Main Street, Bridgeport, CT 06604

When: Monday, July 5, noon to 3 p.m.

Who: Families and Children of All Ages

Cost: Free for all Barnum’s Kids Club members and residents of the City of Bridgeport who bring proper identification. Also free for any child with a July 5 birthday. Discounted admission applies for this special event as follows:

Adults $5, seniors and college students $4 and children 4-17 $3.

As always, children under the age of 4 are free.

OUTSIDE ACTIVITIES- FREE FOR EVERYONE

• Barnum Festival Floats Line Main Street
• Bridgeport Fire Department Fire Truck on Main Street
• Bridgeport Public Library Book Mobile on Main Street
• Kids Crafts
• Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Clowns
• Tony Ferrigno Band – Live Music!
• Discovery Museum Interactive Display
• Read to Grow Storytelling, with Storyteller, Myra Healy

1:00 PM – Senator Chris Dodd and Mayor Bill Finch to Commemorate P.T. Barnum’s 200th Birthday with Proclamation Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey check presentation

INSIDE STAGE PERFORMANCE

1:00–1:50PM Barnum’s World of Wonder!

Presented by Centerring Productions

2:00PM Barnum Festival Ringmaster, Tom Santa and the 2010 Royal Family

American Jenny Lind, Jen Caraluzzi sings Happy Birthday!

Luigi’s Birthday Cake!

For more information call Jaime Knoedler, at 203-331-1104, ext. 102 or visit www.barnum-museum.org

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13 comments

    1. CitiStat was off to a good start under the leadership of John Gomes. But when he uncovered wasteful spending by some sacred cows, he was terminated. Now CitiStat is run by a crew of political cronies. They are costing the city over $1/2 million in salaries and benefits. They should be terminated to help close the budget gap. This is not the time for frivolous unnecessary programs.

      If Keila Torres has her facts straight, that one union is being asked to give back 1/12 of their salaries which equates to a 7% pay cut if my math is correct. Isn’t Finch and his staff taking a 4 – 4.5% pay INCREASE? No wonder the unions aren’t agreeing to concessions. And the fire union will lose 21 people? Won’t that just increase the OT as there are mandatory staffing levels?

      How much is the city paying Dave Ryan and Don Houston to negotiate these contracts? Why can’t Orcutt Boys Club Osborne do his job? There’s another waste of $119,000 (yes he got a raise too as of July 1; check the mayor’s budget). This is the worst case of a double standard I have ever seen. Finch and his people get richer and the unions give back or lose jobs. November 2011 can’t come soon enough.

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  1. My thinking on the Fire Department give is as follows. If he wants the amount of dollars that equal 21 jobs he will eliminate a fire company thus negating any OT built in by the manpower clause.
    This company more probable than not will affect one of the poorer neighborhoods in the city where the fire load is heavy.
    The past administrations have carved up the fire department pretty good with past closings.
    Since 1969 when I first went on the job the city has closed the following companies:
    Engine 14 located on Oldtown & Sylvan
    Engine 7 located in Black Rock
    Engine 5 located in the hollow running out of headquarters
    Engine 8 located on Central Ave
    Truck 3 located on Wood Ave
    Engine 2 on Clarence street
    That’s 6 fire companies since 1969. They are running with a minimum of coverage. Which the city still claims is adequate when in fact it is not.
    The city has no idea what it is doing when it closes fire houses and has no idea what it’s doing when it moves fire houses.
    Everyone says yeah close a fire company no problem. No problem until you have a major fire and people die because there is no longer a fire company assigned to a particular area and response times have increased by 3 to 4 minutes because of closures. Literally this administration is playing with fire, we have had to rely on surrounding towns for coverage because we have closed so many companies. What company is next to be closed? What neighborhood is going to be put in danger next?

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  2. Rumors are all cuts will come from the ancillary positions, who will then bump down folks below them. Then the admin, Fire Marshall, Training, and motor pool, will all suffer for workers … but that means nothing to the current chief, or mayor.

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  3. Happy 4th to everyone and a big thank you to those original signers of the Declaration of Independence.

    As to Finch and Co. maybe they see the writing on the wall, that this is their last year. They have proved to be selfish and self-serving, earning the name corrupt, the battle cry of Caruso. They say power corrupts absolutely, but these guys were well on their way there before they took office. Just look at the slick lie they told about reducing property taxes $600.00. They knowingly out-and-out lied to the public. Well if Lamont has no coattails Finch can hang behind and Wood takes another hit to his stellar record of 1 marginal win, they are toast. And they know it, so they are basically fiddling while Rome is burning down or in this case Bridgeport blowing away.

    Well after cuts to the Fire Dept maybe burning down too.

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  4. As America celebrates another 4th of July I would like to leave a little history. The Declaration justified the independence of the United States by listing colonial grievances against King George III, and by asserting certain natural rights, including a right of revolution. But what about the slaves? Here is what Frederick Douglass had to say on July 4, 1852.

    Frederick Douglass – July 4, 1852

    What to the American slave is your Fourth of July? I answer, a day that reveals to him more than all other days of the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mock; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are to him mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy – a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation of the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of these United States at this very hour.

    Go search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the Old World, travel through South America, search out every abuse and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.

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  5. Yeah that was then and this is now. You just keep throwing this up don’t you. Not that many years after that speech was given, many, many Americans died fighting against slavery. Today we have a black president, black senator and black congress people. We have a black supreme court justice. We have black teachers, firefighters and the list goes on.
    Is America perfect? No it’s not but I don’t see a long line waiting to leave either.
    When you talk about the slaves it was wrong and I don’t think too many will deny it was wrong. Many of us who are here today did not even have relatives living in America during the time of slavery. Do I feel bad about slavery? Yes. Do I feel guilty? No, my people were not involved and you can’t paint the whole white race with that brush.
    It’s too bad you can’t just enjoy the holiday without looking through the history books for some quote that knocks America and the white race. Ron, look in the mirror before you start throwing the term racist around.

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  6. “town committee,” once again you have totally gotten it wrong. What I posted is American History. Also Our President is half white. I never started throwing the term racist around at any time in my post.

    I do enjoy the holiday. I am a proud veteran who as a teenager enlisted in the US Air Force and was a firefighter and serve from 1965 to 1969 during the Vietnam War where I served stateside.

    “town committee,” I tell you what, say what you said to me to the Jews about the Holocaust.

    “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” — George Santayana.

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  7. Ron what you said had nothing to do with the Holocaust. Of all the things in America on her birthday you decided to post a speech from 1852 that points to one man’s opinion in that time and place. I found the timing of your post offensive.

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    1. We also had a “black” president before the signing of the Constitution and George Washington by the name of John Hanson. He designed what is now and was then the Presidential seal. He helped to finance George’s army and was a signer of the Declaration of Independence. He, like most “black” citizens at the time, was a FREE man … Oh and he was very wealthy.

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  8. “town committee,” here is what you said, “Yeah that was then and this is now. You just keep throwing this up don’t you” I then asked you, I tell you what, say what you said to me to the Jews about the Holocaust. So you find me posting American History offensive?

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  9. New York Times July 2, 2010

    Fourth of July 1776, 1964, 2010
    By FRANK RICH

    ALL men may be created equal, but slavery, America’s original sin of inequality, was left unaddressed in the Declaration of Independence signed 234 years ago today. Of all the countless attempts to dispel that shadow over the nation’s birth, few were more ambitious than the hard-fought bill Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law just in time for another Fourth of July, 46 summers ago.

    With the holiday weekend approaching, Johnson summoned the television networks for the signing ceremony on Thursday evening, July 2. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, first proposed more than a year earlier by John F. Kennedy, banished the Jim Crow laws that denied black Americans access to voting booths, public schools and public accommodations. Johnson told the nation we could “eliminate the last vestiges of injustice in our beloved country” with the help of a newly formed “Community Relations Service” and its “advisory committee of distinguished Americans.” Talk about an age of innocence!

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  10. Comparing the Jews and the Holocaust to what Fredrick Douglas said is like comparing apples and oranges. The Holocaust was an attempt to kill every living Jew living within the grasp of the Nazis.
    While slavery was 100% wrong it was not an attempt to kill every single black person in America.
    After all is said and done you revert to the Civil Rights act signed by LBJ.
    Look everyone knows that America has its warts and is not perfect but every holiday that celebrates America you trot out the same message.
    Ron like I said and you did not address where is the long line waiting to leave America.
    There are not too many places in the world where we could have this type of discourse.

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