Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Got Rats? Burn your house down

For those of you who didn't catch last night's BOS meeting, please have a look.
http://www.framinghamma.gov/614/Video-Broadcasts

Go to the 31 minute mark and listen to what Christeen McKernen has to say about her interaction with the DPW and BOH. This poor women has been spending her own money to safeguard her home. Her statement "ignorance of an issue" when talking about her interaction with the DPW and BOH and her comment that went on to say "it was all lip service" should have caught the attention of the BOS to do something to get to the truth. But.. as you will see and hear, Mr. Smith's mic was not on when he was talking on TV last night, but it's clearer on the web.

Second "rat issue" came (48:10) from Carol and Gregory from Woodland Road. This women was brought to tears explaining to the BOS that her calls to the BOH resulted in an employee telling Carol to "burn your house down" to get rid of the rats. The BOS sat their motionless as Carol told the board of her troubles dealing with the Town.

There is no excuse for such abhorrent customer service in this Town. During the meeting it was revealed that the sanitation department has had a 100% turnover and that th BOH had no idea of that fact. We also found out that Framingham does not have a licensed exterminator on staff and that contractors can be hired with the proper licenses to exterminate the rats.

At the very least, the BOS could have directed the Town Manager to investigate these complaints about the lack luster responses to residents' complaints.... but no, our current BOS keeps their heads in the sand, not wanting to hold any Town employee to any standard of customer service. They could have directed the Town Manger to find out who the employees were that dropped the ball and hold them accountable to the Town's Customer Service Policy.

None of this made the paper of course, as the reporter can't stay out that late and make the deadline. But these 2 residents who clearly have done their job in contacting the Town, only to be ignored and insulted, call into question the complete reporting of the BOS meetings by the paper. Many other residents in different parts of Town may be faced with the same issue in regard to the Town's response to their complaints, both from the employees who are paid to address these complaints and our elected and salaried leaders who are responsible for overseeing those employees.

This non sense has been going on for years and no one at the top wants to hold anyone accountable.
This is why I'm running for Selectman.

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5 Comments:

At January 23, 2015 at 2:09 PM , Anonymous Anonymous said...

If this were not so stupid it would be funny. I hope the idiot who said burn the house down gets fired. My question though is where in Framingham is there a rat problem? We should put the coyote there to clean it up

 
At January 23, 2015 at 3:55 PM , Blogger jim pillsbury said...

I was thinking the same when the cops called last night about the carcass found.

I can't imagine what those employees were thinking when resident's are begging for help.
Everyone involved with this issue should be scheduled for customer service policy training immediately. And there needs to be more direction from Town Manager/BOS to create a policy for departments to share information about residents complaints and escalation procedures.

Why these 2 residents cases couldn't have been resolved before having to beg the BOS for help is what needs fixing.

Fountain Street and Woodland Road I believe. One resident is by the service plaza on the Pike... the other is at the bend on Fountain, close to the gas station on Fountain.

 
At January 27, 2015 at 9:22 PM , Blogger jim pillsbury said...

so the employee in question is no longer employed with the Town. We don't know what the circumstances or facts are, but the BOH Chair wants nothing to do with this conversation.

But there's many more questions that need answers and perhaps he'll be answering them to me if I'm elected.

 
At February 4, 2015 at 10:51 AM , Blogger jim pillsbury said...

A small win for residents who complain to the BOH. We now have a way to contact the Town about rodents. I would hope that people don't e mail the address with names of rodent like people in Town who spread disease, hatred and bigotry.

rodents@framinghamma.gov

 
At February 5, 2015 at 11:26 AM , Blogger jim pillsbury said...

Thanks to Susan at the Patch for reporting on what the results were from the investigation into the Town's response to a rodent problem.
http://patch.com/massachusetts/framingham/town-manager-framingham-failed-3-times-deal-rodent-issue-0

At the end of the day, one editorial that I wrote in the MWDN was enough embarrassment for the Town's leaders to take action. Town Manager Halpin did the right thing and was honest with what he found. Once again, the lack of oversight and the status quo made this problem bigger than it should have been to begin with.

The pen is indeed mightier than the staus quo.

 

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