From the Eagle-Tribune;
Plaistow may lose its bus service
By Meghan Carey
mcarey@eagletribune.com
PLAISTOW — Soon, the bus might not stop in Plaistow.
That's because selectmen don't think it's worth $82.50 a ride. The board hasn't paid its $1,650 bill for April through June, when 20 Plaistow residents accepted rides from the Community Alliance for Regional Transportation. That works out to some pretty expensive transportation, according to selectmen.
But CART Director Lee Maloney said Plaistow is the only community in the nine-town alliance that's not paying its fair share.
Selectmen decided not to take action on the latest bill from CART this week because they wanted to see an increase in the number of residents using the transport system, but instead that number dropped.
"We wanted to see a proper level of participation," Chairman John Sherman said. "If we didn't see that, we weren't going to pay the bill. ... Unless the earlier discussion was an empty threat, if you want to call it that, we shouldn't release the money."
It's the second payment selectmen have denied to the service this year, and Maloney said it's just not acceptable. She plans to go to her board later this month and implement a surcharge or make Plaistow an out-of-region destination.
"They are the only town," Maloney said. "Every other town pays regardless of their ridership. It's just not fair."
Plaistow was billed $6,700 in January for last year's services, but only paid $500. In 2007, 16 residents used CART to take 156 rides, which the selectmen calculated to be 1.2 percent of CART's ridership.
The bill reflected 6.1 percent of CART's 2007 costs, which are distributed among the nine towns the alliance serves. Plaistow officials sent the check with a request for timely quarterly reports in 2008 — reports that were tardy last year.
The first bill of this year came late again, and asked for one-third of the annual payment. Ridership had increased to between 39 and 42 rides each month. Selectmen decided to pay, but only the quarterly payment amount.
Selectmen want to see more people use CART and don't want it taken away.
"Save a place in the budget," Selectman Dan Poliquin said this week. "I don't want to lose our seat, so to say."
Maloney said all the other towns that make up a small percentage of ridership, including Sandown and Danville, have seen an increase. Overall, CART ridership is up 38 percent over the same period last year.
CART added out-of-state rides to Caritas Holy Family Hospital in Methuen, Merrimack Valley Hospital in Haverhill and Lawrence General Hospital this year, at the selectmen's suggestion.
Maloney said 46 percent of Plaistow rides this year have been for medical appointments, but those riders may need to find another ride by the end of the month.
"It's really unfortunate for the folks who live over there and use us, especially for medical purposes," Maloney said.
The program's board is scheduled to meet Oct. 21 and make a decision.
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9 comments:
They should call our elderly affairs dept. it would only cost them the $30-$35.00 per ride it costs Atkinson
Someone recently suggested to Plaistow's Selectmen that they'd save gobs of money by just paying for people's cabfare instead of funding CART. This article shows that to be true...
Seniors need a ride to go visit friends? Just call the Atkinson PD. They advertise this in the Eagle Tribune every week. That's a fact. The Atkinson PD advertises in the paper for seniors to call the PD for a ride to Dr. appts or to go visit friends.
This is nuts. Find me another police dept in the country that does it. That's right you can't cause nobody else in their right mind would do such a thing with taxpayer dollars.
Its like a free taxi service at your beckoned call as well as a body guard. Imagine how important you can feel! Call the Atkinson PD for this Free service.
no governmental agency should be advertising for business, because ultimately the money comes from the taxpayers.
So true. Taxpayers are paying for the advertising, rides, political positions etc... The cost of our Atkinson system is much higher than the numbers given to the public by Chiefo Bigumheado. You know, in these hard times when government is having a difficult time keeping budgets , maybe cutting back would be the smart thing to do. Look what is happening all over the US, Job layoffs, Banks failing, Bailouts on a daily basis, this country is in a downfall. Removing elderly affairs out of the police dept and stop using police tax money to fund the elderly affairs unit is paramount. A volunteer with a cell phone could easily do the job and part time oncall "driving Miss Daisy driver" making $10.00 an hour vs. a policeman making $25. an hour etc....Besides, police need to be chasing bad guys and not being limo drivers. Everyone can agree with that right?
Chiefo Bigumheado is fighting this, and has no cares for saving you and me money. He needs the service to stay in the police dept to keep his political grip over the elderly voters. So you could say, you and I are really paying for it. And Paying for it, and paying again for it....
At the height of my business in 2003- 2004, I had 5 subcontractor's working for me, and 2 subs that I could call if someone was unavailable. And I did all of my dispatching with my cell phone.
I could get a call for a job, call my sub, dispatch them to the job, and have them check in as they were leaving to verify time.
There are 4 elderly affairs drivers, and approximately 100 citizens using the program, why cant this system be used to dispatch people?
Or, failing that, if you wish to use the police dispatch center, they currently dispatch, highway, fire, animal control, and police, why not just have them track and break out the elderly calls for accounting, so that people will know, with verifiable numbers, how many elderly calls were received, and how many rides were given, how many man-hours spent, miles driven, and gas used.
This is simple, and should have been being done from the start.
If you pay taxes, you have a right to know how your tax dollars are spent.
If they wanted us to know what they were really spending the money on, it would be out in the open.
Legally we have the right to know were our tax money is spent? If this is true and nobody will give us a straight answer, what would happen if NOBODY paid their taxes until this information is provided? After all, it is our money isn't it?
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