There is further evidence that parking enforcement is no doubt the most unpopular “service” that is provided by the city of Keene. Another petition, this time with 27 signatures, has been sent from downtown business owners to the city council. In the petition (pg 10-12), the business owners oppose the proposed parking rate and time changes proposed by parking director Gary Lamoureux. Mr. Lamoureux proposed that the meter rates be increased, the violations be increased, and parking hours be extended (9AM – 7PM) to try to resolve the problem of exploding costs (26% increase over the last six years) and slow-growing revenues (3.5% increase over the same last six years) in the parking department.
You may recall that there was an earlier petition by downtown business owners that was sent to the city council. In that petition (pg 9-10), 30 downtown business owners also opposed the rate increases and suggested the city instead seek ways to cut costs instead. I also collected 643 petition signatures, see pg 79-80 (Note: not all the signed pages were in the committee’s packet since I had over 38 pages). I had no problem getting downtown workers and shoppers to oppose the rate increases with the help of a few downtown businesses and some other volunteers. I submitted these signatures to the Finance, Organization, and Personnel Committee last week.
It’s clear to me that the business owners, shoppers, and workers of the Keene downtown don’t want to have pay more for tickets and meters. Instead, I agree with the business owners that a cost reduction plan should be implemented in the parking department to address the projected cost increases for the next six years that are currently estimated to grow by 16% by Mr. Lamoureux. It’ll be interesting to see if the city councilors ignore the business owners, workers, and shoppers and raise the rates anyway.
I will break down the parking budget in a future post and suggest some ways to cut costs in the parking department so rates wouldn’t have to increase.
Have you seen those news stories about the US government stealing domain names from people they don’t like? Now, if they do that to us here at Free Keene, you’ll need to use our .bit domain to find us. However, there are a few steps you must take before being able to see .bit domains. Meowbit is an easy-to-use program that allows anyone with a windows computer to access the decentralized .bit domain names. Here’s a guest blog from Meowbit creator Michael W. Dean:
Free Talk Live, the preeminent syndicated liberty radio show, has added a dot-bit mirror, so you can still access the site in case some cranky government control freak ever seizes their domain.
Ian Freeman of Free Talk Live’s site Free Keene also has a dot-bit mirror.
Get the Namecoin wallet and MeowBit dot-bit viewing software, free, here. (more…)
Seamus O’Connor and his wife, Carolyn Hanks have lived in the Monadnock region of New Hampshire for a few years now. Both have claimed participation in the Free State Project, but have also been long time critics of Free Keene bloggers, both belonging to a large “STOP FREE KEENE!!!” group on facebook. On April 23 of 2014, Seamus uploaded a video titled, “Garret”, which consisted of several repeated explicit threats of violence directed at Garret Ean. Beginning the monologue with, “Garret, I’m gonna kick your ass, you mutherfucker…”, the narrator goes on to repeat the “kick your ass” line, interspersed with references to a rough childhood, and expectations of a non-response to such violence by local authorities. (more…)
Robin Hood and the Merry People are pleased to announce a very special public event to be held on Central Square on Friday, 09 May 2014. To commemorate the first year anniversary of service of the lawsuit by the city of Keene against Robin Hood and friends, a free barbeque for the people will kick off at 5:00pm, just as the hours of parking enforcement conclude for the day. All peaceful people are invited to take part in this event and are free to bring along food and drink to share, or simply bring one’s own smile and share in the good company of others.
The people’s BBQ will be a great opportunity to meet Robin Hooders and other activists in the Keene area, and to voice one’s own ideas for how to make our community’s activities more effective. Beef tacos and bottled water will be available for all, as well as a vegan option to be determined. For more information, check out the event on Robin Hood of Keene’s facebook page.
Out with the old, in with the new! Thanks to the help of graphic design wizard Meg McLain, NHJury.com has a brand new trifold for outreach to potential jurors and others who want to learn about the right of jury nullification!
5,000 new fliers have been printed and will be filtering to activists statewide this summer (after we run dry of the original 2011 flier).
The new version features updated text that reflects the passage of the NH Jury Nullification law in 2012 as well as a more current quote from a judge about nullification among other minor tweaks and a complete graphical redesign!
Until recently, NHJury.com, a site dedicated to helping jurors understand they have the right to judge the law itself, had suffered from a lack of updates to the site’s blog. I’ve now taken over managing the site and hope to bring more content here over time by adding more NH jury activists as bloggers. There has recently been a resurgence of jury outreach in Manchester. It would be great to have outreach happening regularly in all ten counties of NH. (Grafton and Cheshire counties have had consistent jury outreach for several years.) Want to help? Join our group on facebook and step up!
Some immediate changes to the site include some graphical tweaks, updates, and the addition of a Contact Us page. You can reach NHJury.com activists statewide via the contact form here or this email address: nhjury at googlegroups.com.
friends, a free barbeque for the people will kick off at 5:00pm, just as the hours of parking enforcement conclude for the day. All peaceful people are invited to take part in this event and are free to bring along food and drink to share, or simply bring one’s own smile and share in the good company of others.
