Mr. Mayor: New Britain is not attempting to give you the boot but we are recommending that you get the boot like New Haven did.
With the employment of this electronic gadget called the “plate hunter” New Haven has collected 2.3 millions since the launching of the Boot Finder on August l6th.of this year.
A secondary benefit to this is the elimination of un-registration vehicles in our city thus reducing the insurance rates for our residents because of the reduction of accidents involving un-insured vehicles.
Mayor John DeStefano, Jr. stated that the Bootfinder was a contributing factor to our collecting 98.6% of the taxes due at city hall.
The New Haven Register, reported by Angela Carter, Hundreds turn out to pay delinquent tax bills waiting line for at least an hour in order to prevent their cars from being impounded. Resulting in added towing and storage cost.
One headline reported by the New Have Register read as follows:
BYE-bye Bootfinder; Hello Plate Hunter; by William Kaempffer of the Register who reported that the cost for this electronic doohickey was a sum of $78,000 and that this High Tech Italian made optical character recognition technology. It not only finds those that owe past tax bills but also targets parking ticket scofflaws as well.
New Haven has installed two on a Truck so that it can scan vehicles on both sides of the street as it passes by. It even captured a 15 year old parking ticket that was never paid by the car’s owner.
West Haven and Bridgeport have evaluated this system for their own use.
Why not New Britain?
Frank,
ReplyDeleteThis is pretty interesting. I'm certainly open to learning more about this technology and if New Britain could benefit from it. Thanks for the post,
Phil
The program should also be able to scan the plates for registrations that are canceled for insurance by the Commissioner of Motor Vehicles. Section 14-12h of the Connecticut General Statutes provides that such vehicles should be impounded and the owner is then prohibited from regaining possession of the vehicle until it is released to him by the Commissioner of Motor Vehicles. Implementing this scanning and impoundment into the program would go a long way to remove uninsured motor vehicles from New Britain streets and would make us all safer.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteAlderman Sherwood: I attempted to attach a picture of the Boot Finder but it won’t paste onto my reply to you so I will bring a picture for you at tomorrow’s luncheon at the VFW.
ReplyDeleteFrank
Frank,
ReplyDeleteI appreciate that but I think there is a good chance that I won't be able to make it. I'm working a Senate campaign in Danbury. (cappiello's vacated seat)
I do miss New Britain...
Did Phil say he is endorsing Capiello?
ReplyDeleteAnonymous question: Did Phil say he is endorsing Capiello?
ReplyDeleteAnswer: He said he was working the campaign involving the Cappiello’s vacant seat.
I would presume he is in Danbury supporting the Democratic candidate
Mccain's brother calls 911 twice over traffic. STUPID STUPID STUPID...
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Y6_s3O5Bj0
Obama's Aunt is an illegal alien who you are supporting in public housing with your taxes!
ReplyDeleteCRIMINAL! CRIMINAL! CRIMINAL!
Mr. Smith I agree that the Boot System you have described should be part of New Britain's
ReplyDeletedeployment right away.
That will certainly will improve the tax collections and hopefully take all the unregistered vehicles off the road in our city.
Has anyone ordered their Palin 2012 T-Shirt yet?
ReplyDeletePuh-leeze!! David Capiello does NOT need Phil Sherwood working on his campaign, moreover might not want him. Good idea: Have Sherwood work on Chris Murphy's campaign...guarantee, Capiello would win by a landslide!!!
ReplyDeletePerhaps Paul Carver should Cappiello. He seems to run a well oiled machine in New Britain and is great at coordinating republican candidates;
ReplyDeleteFrom the New Britain Herald---
"Republican Town Committee Chairman Paul Carver said Friday he would try to locate Barbara Krajewski, who is running against State Rep. John Geragosian D-25th District, and ask her to call The Herald.
At press time she had not called in."
Paul Carver’s dilemma as the Republican Party Chairman in New Britain because he has a candidate, Former Sate Senator Tom Bozek who is an outright racist touting to eliminate all the low rental units, the elimination of minorities throughout or city, Section Eight Vouchers and blaming everybody else but himself for all the ills in our city.
ReplyDeleteWe should all remember he was also was a member of the New Britain’s Common Council.
Well Mr. Carver why are you allowing your candidate to blame everyone but himself?
Why is his fellow republican candidate Mr. Nick Poaness running away from Bozek because of Tom’s radical and racial positions?
I guess you have been guiding him as his Party Chair to stay far away from Bozek and believe me the democratic Party officials are very happy of your ongoing dilemma that Bozek presents.
How did your Party leader Mayor Stewart allow you to put Bozek on your ticket? Could it have been through the demands of Bozek’s close friend, Alderman Salvio, for the Mayor’s approval to let him run on your ticket?
Iteresting! What else could be said about this racist?
Mr. Mayor Stewart; unfortunately, you have lowered your party's standards by your sanctioning Bozek as your party's senatorial candidate.
ReplyDeleteYes; with the mayor allowing Bozek on the republican ticket has me not voted for the area republicans.
ReplyDeleteBut the Democrats should vote for Bozek because he is the GOOD DEMOCRAT!
ReplyDeleteHe does have one issue that makes sense and that is to vote YES for the constitutional convention so we can reign in the out of control government.
Capiello will make a great Congressman. This is one case where we really do need a change!
ReplyDeleteAt Senator’s DeFronzo’s luncheon today I believe that the best line stated by any of the dignitaries that spoke during this event was made by the Senator himself with his asking the audience if they have ever seen his opponent’s adds on the television that indicate it’s a Republican add?
ReplyDeleteAs a footnote by Frank Smith; in reality those ads should say paid for by the Republicrat himself.
I have seen those TV ads by former senator Bozek mentioned by Senator DeFronzo at today’s luncheon.
ReplyDeleteI personally feel that Mr. Bozek is promising the voting public many things he will do, if elected, that he should have done or accomplished when he was in office the first time around.
Sorry Tom; you just trying to get a second bite at the apple.
The voting Public isn't that stupid to buy your line.
Another comment that was made by Senator Donald DeFronzo at this afternoon’s luncheon was that the city cannot elect my opponent who represents only a part of the city.
ReplyDeleteNot in these economical hard times our citizens are facing they all need representation and not just the few my opponent wishes to represent.
Why is it that the Republicans are ashamed to have their party listed on any of the Bozek ads?
ReplyDeleteBecause Bozek is a racist and that is why the Republicans don't want their name to be in his ads.
ReplyDeleteAll Bozek is looking to do is juice up one of his several government pensions so he can get even richer at the hands of the taxpayers. Does anyone else have 4 separate pensions and free health insurance for life?
ReplyDeleteObama-Farrakhan Ties Are Close, Ex-Farrakhan Aide Says
ReplyDeleteSaturday, November 1, 2008 2:59 PM
By: Kenneth R. Timmerman
A former top deputy to Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan tells Newsmax that Barack Obama’s ties to the black nationalist movement in Chicago run deep, and that for many years the two men have had “an open line between them” to discuss policy and strategy, either directly or through intermediaries.
“Remember that for years, if you were a politician in Chicago, you had to have some type of relationship with Louis Farrakhan. You had to. If you didn’t, you would be ostracized out of black Chicago,” said Dr. Vibert White Jr., who spent most of his adult life as a member and ultimately top officer of the Nation of Islam.
White broke with the group in 1995 and is now a professor of African-American history at the University of Central Florida in Orlando.
White said Obama was “part of the Chicago scene” where Farrakhan, Jesse Jackson, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr. and radicals would go to each other’s events and support each other’s causes.
“Even though Chicago is the third-largest city in the country, within the black community, the political and militant nationalist community is very small. So it wouldn’t be uncommon for [Obama and Farrakhan] to show up at events together, or at least be there and communicate with each other,” White told Newsmax.
The Anti-Defamation League has denounced Farrakhan and his Nation of Islam as a “hate group.”
Farrakhan has called Jews “bloodsuckers,” “satanic” and accused them of running the slave trade. He has labeled gays as “degenerates.” In a 2006 speech, the ADL again condemned Farrakhan when he said: “These false Jews promote the filth of Hollywood that is seeding the American people and the people of the world and bringing you down in moral strength. … It's the wicked Jews the false Jews that are promoting lesbianism, homosexuality. It's wicked Jews, false Jews that make it a crime for you to preach the word of God, then they call you homophobic!"
Obama was careful to “denounce” Farrakhan’s comments – but not the man -- during the Democratic primary season earlier this year, but only after Hillary Clinton called him out for benefiting from Farrakhan’s support.
Farrakhan endorsed Obama in a videotaped speech to his followers at Mosque Miryam in Chicago in February. “You are the instruments that God is gonna use to bring about universal change, and that is why Barack has captured the youth,” Farrakhan said.
He told the crowd that Obama was the new “messiah.”
"It is reasonable to ask whether ACORN is in fact a criminal conspiracy to subvert the voting rights of Americans. Which makes it all the more remarkable that Barack Obama paid ACORN $800,000 to register new voters, and then lied about it, falsely telling the Federal Elections Commission that the $800,000 went to a group called Citizen Services Inc. for "advance work."
ReplyDeleteMr. Obama's Wealth Redistribution Agenda
ReplyDeleteDemocrats Target Your 401k Retirement Plan with Taxes
The public outcry of real Americans like you and Joe the Plumber is finally getting some light shed on Mr. Obama's wealth redistribution agenda supported by Socialist Democrats in Congress. The corrupt media can't hide it any longer. The plan is to bring an end to the America we know and love; to bring an end to freedom and liberty.
They want total control of what you see, hear, think, and do. They will stop at nothing. NOW, they are aiming at your 401k retirement plan and they are going for the kill.
Yes that's right, Liberals in government want to seize these assets for their own. Just look at what James Pethokoukis, the money and politics blogger for U.S. News & World Report has said,
In place of 401(k) plans, she would have workers transfer their dough into government-created "guaranteed retirement accounts" for every worker. The government would deposit $600 (inflation indexed) every year into the GRAs. Each worker would also have to save 5 percent of pay into the accounts, to which the government would pay a measly 3 percent return. Rep. Jim McDermott, a Democrat from Washington and chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee's Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support, said that since "the savings rate isn't going up for the investment of $80 billion [in 401(k) tax breaks], we have to start to think about whether or not we want to continue to invest that $80 billion for a policy that's not generating what we now say it should."
Straight from the jackasses mouth, the Democratic plan is to SEIZE your 401k and take $80 billion that is currently the property of American citizens. Effectively, this plan will end all of the incentives that the majority of Americans not only enjoy but rely on. I am sure you or someone you know takes advantage of their employer matching their 401k contribution. Under the iron fist of the Democratic empire your employer would no longer receive a tax benefit for matching your contribution, so they won't do it. And you will lose half of your retirement contributions. And don't forget, that you will lose your tax breaks from the 401k plan also, so you'd be paying the government to let you retire. Sounds like fun?
Don't let the tyrannical rule of socialists take hold, put a stop to the unholy trinity of the Democrat controlled Senate and House and potential president Obama. Do not let Barrack Obama bring an end to this great country!
Mr. Obama has always been against an individuals' right to control and spend their own savings. He has a narrow, selfish and myopic view of the world we live in and the idea that he can tax whatever he wants to whenever he wants to.
Obama told a crowd in San Francisco that his administration will bankrupt the coal industry and that under his presidency, fuel costs will skyrocket. Fox News just aired a tape of Obama saying these things himself. Pay attention America, you are about to go broke!
ReplyDeleteWhen you deduct the 2% of votes from Obama that are expected to go to Ralph Nader, and then consider the Bradley effect and also consider that undecideds are flocking to McCain, this is some troubling news for Barrack Obama:
ReplyDeleteWe told you this morning this election would be a horse race — and now a major tracking poll proves it's true.
The Investor's Business Daily TIPP tracking poll released today shows Obama with 46.7% and McCain at 44.6% — just 2 points separate them!
Remember, this poll was the most accurate poll in the 2004 election.
The poll also shows that almost 9% of voters remain unsure. We believe this is incredible news.
Contrary to what the media and Obama want you believe, this election has yet to be decided!
I am very sad to say that Obama will ruin our way of life with his socialistic comments made throughout his campaign.
ReplyDeleteEspecially those he made with Joe the plumber and also those that have just been reported of his plans to end the coal industry should he becomes president.
The USA will be no longer be as it was, a great nation, but will end up just like Ireland with all their financial abilities going down into the drain because of socialism doesn’t work.
Is this truly an invasion from within as our enemies have predicted?
Wake up America before it is too late.
Before you vote; Please read the adverse comments in the New Britain Herald Editorial regarding the adversities that would result if Former Senator Thomas Bozek should get elected-------HE WOULD ONLY REPRESENT ONLY A PORTION OF THE CITY OF NEW BRIATIN.
ReplyDeletePlease read the editorial before you vote!
I helped former senator Tom Bozek with his two campaigns against former senator Joseph Harper but once Tom won the second election against Harper a dramatic change occurred, in such a manner that he wouldn’t listen to anyone in the three Towns he was to represent or in the legislature.
ReplyDeleteIt is my belief that the power went to his head and he believed that no one could beat him at his game.
Today’s New Britain Herald Editorial said it best by saying Bozek is a candidate for the few by his blaming the minorities and the poor for the problems of New Britain. He decries to get rid of all the minorities and claims that section eight is a cancer.
He doesn’t realize that many of our seniors are on the section eight rental subsidy in order to survive.
I am amazed that the Republican Party would endorse this extreme racial individual as their senatorial candidate when his philosophy is no where near that of our Mayor’s, Timothy Stewart.
Again I repeat; that the Herald’s did say it best about Mr. Bozek “that he is a candidate for the few, not for the many.”
In Pennsylvania, e-mails appeared linking Democrat Barack Obama to the Holocaust. "Jewish Americans cannot afford to make the wrong decision on Tuesday, Nov. 4," said the electronic message, paid for by an entity calling itself the Republican Federal Committee. "Many of our ancestors ignored the warning signs in the 1930s and 1940s and made a tragic mistake."
ReplyDeleteI'm a Republican, and do NOT endorse Tom Bozek. For that matter, I don't endorse Don DiFronzo, either.
ReplyDeleteI just might leave that section blank. Hmmm...no, I'll do a write in vote for John MacNamera.
Mark Levin just described the Obama campaign appropriately:
ReplyDeleteA FREAK SHOW!
How about a "write in" for Lou Salvio?
ReplyDeleteThe Herald Press- Sunday, November 2, 2008
ReplyDeleteRunning against Tim O’Brien in the 24th District is Republican Alphonse Wright. Wright says this time around — his third run against O´Brien — that people know him and know what he stands for.
O’Brien, who has lived in New Britain for 11 years, has a long career history he said arms him to serve the district. He retired 18 months ago from a position as a mortgage broker because, he said, he refused to get involved with subprime mortgages. Before that he served in the Air Force, worked in the corporate business world, financial planning and in team building. He currently runs his own small business as a life coach.
Wright was not deterred by his three prior losses, but instead feels the time is right to oust O’Brien. “I’m challenging Tim O’Brien because speaking up takes courage,” he said, adding he feels he owes it to the area.“I have a great desire to help people around me and a distinguished career,” Wright said.
Wright’s motto is “a practical common-sense approach” and his platform turns on three issues he said are key to the district’s future.
"One issue is first-rate education, then economic development and working to help reduce property taxes,” he said. Wright points to economic development efforts like Stewart’s bringing Celebration Foods to the city and the downtown redevelopment project.“That is going to help reduce taxes,” he said.
Wright served on the state board of education and has poured his own time into kids’ success. But he said more money is not the answer.
“The biggest thing I see is parental involvement,” he said of improving schools. “When anything comes up, the first thing people want to do is spend money. I’ve never seen a school that had parents involved that didn’t have a good district.”
To that end, Wright said community groups like Boys & Girls Club, sports and religious organizations and even entrepreneurial groups can be encouraged to devote time and attention to mentoring local kids and teaching parents how to get involved.
He found incredible success in one such program and said it could be implemented here.“You’ve heard it said a million times, ‘It takes a village.’ This is just using the whole village,” he said.
Wall Street is expecting a massive crash on Wednesday if the Democrats get their 60 seats in the senate as investors run to dump all their stocks out of fear for what the Democrats will do with all their new found power.
ReplyDeleteThe demonRATS caused the financial crisis. They forced banks to make loans to people who were not credit worthy, mainly minority groups.
ReplyDeleteBarney limp-wristed Frank and Chris Dodd are the main culprits of the financial crisis!
Our present economic plight is of course not the result of free market economics. On the contrary the blame lies with those politicians in Washington, D.C. who sought to circumvent marketplace wisdom.
ReplyDeleteBankers left alone tend overall to make financially sound lending decisions, but such lending practices were insufficient to meet the social goals of the "peoples party".
Democrats like Barney Frank and Chris Dodd manipulated the lending practices of banks through the Community Development Act and then created a secondary market for these worthless loans through FNMA and Freddie Mac.
The rest is history. The wrong conclusion is now being drawn by an economically illiterate populace urged on by an elitist left wing media.
We will be urged to expand as usual the tyrannical powers of the state to tax, regulate and usurp at the expense of our hard won liberty.
What is happening in America with Barack Obama is a 4 year experiment in social engineering. The people are so fed up with George Bush that they are going to the opposite extreme and experimenting with socialism and weird "off the wall" policies.
ReplyDeleteBy the time Obama ends his first and only term as president, the people will be so sick of socialism and the redistribution of wealth, that Obama will be tossed from office and moderate and/or conservative policies will again rule the American day.
So enjoy yourself, this is a once in a lifetime event, which will never be witnessed again...
I like that DEMONRATS! I used to look at the individual and decide based on the person, but no matter what the outcome, I will never forgive the Democratic party for bringing us a socialist/marxist intent on taking money from working people to support people who refuse to work with national welfare. I will never vote for a Democrat for any office again, ever, regardless of whether the socialist wins or not, and I know many people in town who feel the same way, so the local Demonrats that have had a stranglehold on local politics need to watch out.
ReplyDeleteLooking back on the four years of his first administration, President Obama can be proud: He made the US welcome among the family of nations again; he reduced our reliance on military force; and he gave us peace by reaching sensible accommodations with our enemies.
ReplyDeleteThe lies told about him in the 2008 election were exposed as sheer bigotry. Far from being “soft on radical Islam,” President Obama was the first world leader to welcome Jewish refugees after Iran’s nuclear destruction of Israel’s major cities (his only caveat - a fair one - was the refusal to accept Zionist military officers and their families in to the U.S.A., in light of Israel’s excessive retaliation).
He also demonstrated his resolve in the face of extremism when he overruled the obstructionist advice of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and ordered our military to cross the border into Pakistan in force. The subsequent debacle, as Pakistan cut off our supply routes to Afghanistan and threatened a nuclear response, was entirely the fault of our generals on the ground, not of the administration.
Fortunately, President Obama’s willingness to talk to our enemies rescued the situation. After laying down their arms, our troops were allowed to retreat and evacuate Pakistan and Afghanistan in peace.
However a Civil War in the U.S.A. was still on-going with many Americans fleeing to Canada and Alaska...
The Obama TV Effect?
ReplyDeleteIn developing the Senator Obama-like TV character, Movie Director Schulberg contemplated the hot career of Arthur Godfrey, a ukelele-strumming hick with a popular music and talk radio show in Washington who had come to a larger public's attention with his tearful coverage of Frankline D. Roosevelt's military funeral on CBS radio.
Arthur Godfrey them became the host of a popular national radio show, and when he moved to television variety programs, Godfrey grew increasingly tyrannical with his supporting cast and increasingly forward with his political opinions. However his career flamed out a few years after the release of the movie "A Face in the Crowd."
Elia Kazan directed the film "A Face in the Crowd" and in his screen debut as Lonesome Rhodes, actor Andy Griffith gives a peformance of astonishing ferocity. The film reflects the concerns of Schulberg and Kazan over the uses to which television political campaigns might be put by a glib demagogue.
In the movie scene , Rhodes (Andy Griffith) gives the dauntingly square Senator Worthington Fuller a lesson in how to transform himself into a presidential candidate through the medium of television.
Rhodes is introduced by his sponsor General Haynesworth,who advises Senator Fuller (Obama)that he need a slogan like -Time for a change, and Change in Washington" or More bang for a buck - The Obama TV Effect?
Hi Phil, getting back to the topic of "The Boot" with regard to back car taxes. Can you please inform me and the readers the amount of uncollected car property taxes that are currently due the city of NB? I have watched news reports from New Haven where single mother's cars are towed away for payment, it a tough approach. The "working poor" are trying to keep their cars on the road and the
ReplyDeletetaxes are probably the last to get paid. If an incentive were made for delinquent taxpayers to come in and pay up (such as a waiver of interest charges for a short time period of days) before "The Boot" option wouldn't that be a "win, win" for the taxpayers and the city? I think we could develop a progressive approach to collection.
Sally Eigenraam
How about allowing people to get on a payment plan and as long as they keep current on their payment plan, their vehicle is not placed on the boot list? There is nothing in the state statute that allows for partial payments, but why can't the city pass an ordinance that authorizes such an arrangement. Even a $100.00 tax bill might be prohibitive for the working poor, but why couldn't they pay $10.00 a month for 10 months in such a case? Like the previous poster put it, that would be a win-win situation as the city would end up with $100.00 they otherwise wouldn't have and the car owner wouldn't have to go bankrupt paying their car taxes.
ReplyDeleteI do agree with the two anonymous suggestions to arrange partial payment arrangement however I do not believe that there any provisions to allow these arrangements under the current ordinances of the city of New Britain.
ReplyDeleteTherefore, I would highly recommend that the City Council pass an ordinance to allow the tax collector to make such payment arrangements so that a person can retain his or her vehicle for travel to and from work and etc.
Has anyone been able to get a figure on how many delinquent motor vehicle tax payments their currently are, or is that another highly guarded secret of the super secret Stewart administration?
ReplyDeleteApparently the amount of unpaid motor vehicle taxes is as highly guarded in this city as the mayor's golf handicap!
ReplyDelete