Informational session April 4 for Pleasure Beach work. From Mayor Finch:
The City of Bridgeport has a project for the reconstruction of docks and for the procurement of water taxi vessels to service Pleasure Beach. Preliminary design has been completed and the project is slated for construction under a Federal earmark through the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users (SAFETEA-LU) and the Surface Transportation Extension Act of 2010 to be administered by the Connecticut Department of Transportation.
It is the City’s and the State’s policy to keep persons informed and involved when such projects are undertaken. It is important that the community share its concerns to assist in the project’s development. The City will conduct an informational meeting on Wednesday April 4, 2012 at 5:30pm at City Hall, Wheeler Rooms A and B, 45 Lyon Terrace Bridgeport, Connecticut.
The proposed project will include the permanent repair of the T pier at Pleasure Beach along with improvements to the existing Information depot on the site. The remainder of the Federal earmark dollars will be used to purchase new water taxi vessels for the safe transport of persons wishing to visit the island. In addition to Federal earmark dollars the city is seeking reimbursement from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for storm damages caused by Tropical Storm Irene.
Based upon a preliminary assessment, the construction cost will be approximately $2,375,000.00 plus an additional $1,000,000 in FEMA related funds.
The Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users (SAFETEA-LU) and the Surface Transportation Extension Act of 2010 will provide 80 percent of the construction cost with the City providing 20 percent.
Anyone interested in obtaining further information or providing input may do so by contacting Theodore Grabarz, Deputy Director of Public Facilities at 203.576.8439 or via email at ted.grabarz@bridgeportct.gov.
You just can’t make this stuff up.
Just another pie in the sky idea!
That would be a Sky Cab! Quick!! Call Sky King and Penny!!!
This is another pie in the sky project. This is no different than Steal Point.
They want to spend in excess of $3 million on this project. Did anyone look at the feasibility of repairing the existing bridge? Who in their right mind is going to take this taxi and hump all of their coolers and such down to the beach. The next thing you know we will be buying taxis for Pleasure Beach. Idiots.
Actually, the City itself got quotes for repairing the bridge. I remember it around $13 million. For some reason they never made it public and continue to hide it.
Imagine the jobs it would create!
Andy, do you remember how you found that “armored personnel carrier” in the Fire Department list of purchases in 2011? $245,000 of Federal grants we will assume, and we have asked where it is kept. And it has been whispered it is kept under the Annex City Hall.
As the above Mayoral announcement says: “it is the City’s … policy to keep persons informed.” That is certainly a self-serving news flash! What about the armored personnel carrier? Is that what the Mayor will use to transport himself to the three public meetings on the 2013 budget after he makes his initial statement to the City Council on April 3?
By the way, I have to keep asking readers, what is behind the changing outlook for City year-end surplus or deficit? December reported $2.8 Million surplus projection and January 2012 reported a $3.8 Million deficit projection. A change of $6.6 Million and no comments from City Hall, from Budget and Appropriations Committee (just a canceled March meeting), from the CT Post and no chatter from OIB fans. Who’s watching the store? Who is really accountable in this City for finances? Can Mayor Finch’s claims of accountability (to the Charter Revision Commission regarding accountability for educational results) be substantiated anywhere?
(And Grin Reaper went negative on Paul Vallas today because $3 Million may still be negative and make the BOE budget unbalanced for this year. But this monthly swing is twice as large and since it recognizes revenues that will not be received as well as expenses that cannot be controlled, where is the concern? Anyone have indigestion building up?) Time will tell.
What about security, sanitation, medical response. Who will maintain the Island? How much will this cost us Taxpayers! Enough is enough already!
What about fire protection? Remember, that is what started the down, fires.
John, this Finch/Woody administration is the worst in memory when it comes to keeping the public informed.
The city had a big turnout when the city bought a fire boat. We buy an armored personnel carrier and not a peep. If the B&A saw it in the budget they said nothing.
If this vehicle was bought with federal money what is the purchase price doing in the FD budget? I have to wonder if city taxes paid for it.
Suggestion: Please keep the name to always say: Finch/Wood administration. Any twisting of the combined name, even for humor’s sake, diminishes the large and glaring truth about this specific alliance; one even Bill Finch doesn’t know how deeply he is enmeshed in his “tie/chain/joined at the hip” relationship to Wood.
By the way, isn’t it incredible how out of touch with reality this Finch/Wood administration appears to be … Murders and fires and suffocating taxes and we’re hearing about a water taxi. Callahan is right. You just can’t make this stuff up.
As always it is about lusting after any money out there to be conveniently misappropriated … local, state or federal funds. Bring it on for these boys to play with as their own little treasury.
When was the last time anyone actually utilized Pleasure Beach? It has to be a dump. Talk about the bridge to nowhere.
*** Fixing the T-piers & docks would be nice, however water taxis to Plover Bird beach would be a waste of money! You want to think green ($), then lease the land to an energy wind fans & solar company with discounted first stock rights to Bpt. *** FIX SEASIDE & BEARDSLEY PARKS FIRST ***
Pleasure = Plover Beach. I like that, Mojo. Thanks.