Throughout city offices, double-sided yellow signs are going up this week that say, “Welcome to the City of Bristol – How may we help you today?”
The idea, said Mayor Art Ward, is to let the public know “we’re all here to be consumer-friendly.”
The mayor said Tuesday he gave out about 100 placards so that every city office would have at least one in the hope that it would create a mindset among employees and residents that city government exists to serve the public.
“Wherever there’s a city office, there will be a sign,” Ward said.
“It creates a sense of mutual cooperation,” Ward said.
The initiative isn’t costing taxpayers much – just some copies and plastic stands to hold them up – but if the mayor’s right, there may be a payoff in terms of improved attitudes among both municipal workers and the people they serve.
Ward said that almost every city employee “has the intent of doing the job” to benefit the community that pays the bills. He said most enjoy working for Bristol’s government.
But, he said, it doesn’t hurt to remind everyone that the goal is to aid residents who need the city’s assistance.
Ward said the department heads who received the signs during a meeting Tuesday had a “very favorable” reaction to the initiative.
*******
Copyright 2008. All rights reserved.
Contact Steve Collins at scollins@bristolpress.com
Showing posts with label city government. Show all posts
Showing posts with label city government. Show all posts
March 4, 2008
February 8, 2008
Closing in on the "tipping point"
Poverty rates are soaring in Bristol.
In just the past four months, 5 percent more elementary school children in Bristol have successfully applied for free or reduced-price school lunches because their families don't have much money.
Susan Moreau, the assistant school superintendent, said that applications are coming in daily. Many of them are the result, she said, of mothers or fathers getting laid off in the slowing economy.
In all, officials said, 37 percent of the city's elementary school students are getting discounted or free lunches.
To Tom O'Brien, a Board of Education member, the numbers are alarming.
O'Brien said that studies show that once the poverty rate hits 40 percent in a community, it's almost impossible to slow the slide. He said that "it almost always jumps to 60 percent within five or six years" after reaching that tippoing point, the result of the spiraling impact of rising taxes to cope with the cost and a middle class fleeing for greener pastures.
The community should be "very, very concerned" that poverty keeps going up, O'Brien said. "This is a very scary thing," he said.
Unless city leaders find a way to attack blighted housing and crack the whip on out-of-town landlords and slumlords, O'Brien said the trend is clear.
Without a change, he said, "We will be New Britain. We will be Meriden. We will be East Hartford."
"The city cannot just sit here and hope it goes away," O'Brien said.
School Superintendent Philip Streifer said that rising numbers of poor children make it tough on educators, too.
He said he was shocked to see how many of the incoming kindergarten students in Bristol last fall didn’t know the kinds of basic facts, from colors to letters, that they should have learned beforehand.
“These kids are unprepared to learn,” he said, adding that perhaps a third of the incoming youngsters didn’t have the backgrounds they should.
Starting off “so far behind” their peers in more affluent communities and families, it’s tough for them to catch up, officials said.
He said that poverty is also the main reason that 40 percent of the students in an average elementary school class in Bristol move during each school year, half of them out of the town and half to another school district.
That puts a burden on both teachers and students because of the loss of continuity.
*******
Copyright 2008. All rights reserved.
Contact Steve Collins at scollins@bristolpress.com
In just the past four months, 5 percent more elementary school children in Bristol have successfully applied for free or reduced-price school lunches because their families don't have much money.
Susan Moreau, the assistant school superintendent, said that applications are coming in daily. Many of them are the result, she said, of mothers or fathers getting laid off in the slowing economy.
In all, officials said, 37 percent of the city's elementary school students are getting discounted or free lunches.
To Tom O'Brien, a Board of Education member, the numbers are alarming.
O'Brien said that studies show that once the poverty rate hits 40 percent in a community, it's almost impossible to slow the slide. He said that "it almost always jumps to 60 percent within five or six years" after reaching that tippoing point, the result of the spiraling impact of rising taxes to cope with the cost and a middle class fleeing for greener pastures.
The community should be "very, very concerned" that poverty keeps going up, O'Brien said. "This is a very scary thing," he said.
Unless city leaders find a way to attack blighted housing and crack the whip on out-of-town landlords and slumlords, O'Brien said the trend is clear.
Without a change, he said, "We will be New Britain. We will be Meriden. We will be East Hartford."
"The city cannot just sit here and hope it goes away," O'Brien said.
School Superintendent Philip Streifer said that rising numbers of poor children make it tough on educators, too.
He said he was shocked to see how many of the incoming kindergarten students in Bristol last fall didn’t know the kinds of basic facts, from colors to letters, that they should have learned beforehand.
“These kids are unprepared to learn,” he said, adding that perhaps a third of the incoming youngsters didn’t have the backgrounds they should.
Starting off “so far behind” their peers in more affluent communities and families, it’s tough for them to catch up, officials said.
He said that poverty is also the main reason that 40 percent of the students in an average elementary school class in Bristol move during each school year, half of them out of the town and half to another school district.
That puts a burden on both teachers and students because of the loss of continuity.
*******
Copyright 2008. All rights reserved.
Contact Steve Collins at scollins@bristolpress.com
January 15, 2008
City workforce rising while city population stagnates
Though the city’s population has remained about the same for the past decade, the number of city workers has gone up 8 percent since 1998.
But virtually the entire growth in the number of employees has come from the Board of Education, which employs 117 more people than it did a decade ago.
Other areas of city government that have seen significant growth are the Police Department and the library.
Overall, the city employed the equivalent of 1,561 full-time workers during the fiscal year that ended in the summer of 1998.
It now has the equivalent of 1,681 full-time employees on staff, according to a year-end fiscal report prepared by the comptroller’s office. The numbers were compiled by the city’s personnel office.
The biggest drop came in the Public Works Department, which had 160 workers a decade ago and gets by with 136 of them today.
The reason for the drop is mostly the shift from three-person garbage truck crews to automated pickups that require only a single driver to operate the mechanical arm that picks up rubbish barrels.
The Park Department has also seen its numbers dwindle, from 24 to 20, which amounts to a 17 percent reduction in its staff.
The Fire Department has had between 91 and 93 employees during the past decade. Most recently, it had 92.
The Water Department saw its workforce dwindle from 38 a decade ago to 35 today.
The library got along with 24 or 25 workers every year until 2006 when it added three people. It added another three in 2007.
The increase is related to the expansion of the Main Library on High Street, which added more space and created the opportunity to add new specialists, a move that city leaders supported.
The Police Department’s increase from 122 to 147 is only the beginning of its planned effort to bolster its ranks even further, adding two officers a year to the rolls for at least three more years. It hopes to keep beefing up for years to come.
School officials have added staff over the years to deal with rising numbers of students, but also to deliver more specialized help to struggling students who might otherwise be left behind.
Because the report counts full-time equivalents, there are actually more people employed than the numbers indicate. Two half-time staffers, for instance, would count only as one.
It's hard to say exactly what Bristol's population has done over the same decade, but between 1990 and 2000, it actually suffered a small decline, for the first time in its history.
It's probably up less than 2 percent since 1997, but we won't know for sure until the results of the 2010 Census come in.
*******
Copyright 2008. All rights reserved.
Contact Steve Collins at scollins@bristolpress.com
But virtually the entire growth in the number of employees has come from the Board of Education, which employs 117 more people than it did a decade ago.
Other areas of city government that have seen significant growth are the Police Department and the library.
Overall, the city employed the equivalent of 1,561 full-time workers during the fiscal year that ended in the summer of 1998.
It now has the equivalent of 1,681 full-time employees on staff, according to a year-end fiscal report prepared by the comptroller’s office. The numbers were compiled by the city’s personnel office.
The biggest drop came in the Public Works Department, which had 160 workers a decade ago and gets by with 136 of them today.
The reason for the drop is mostly the shift from three-person garbage truck crews to automated pickups that require only a single driver to operate the mechanical arm that picks up rubbish barrels.
The Park Department has also seen its numbers dwindle, from 24 to 20, which amounts to a 17 percent reduction in its staff.
The Fire Department has had between 91 and 93 employees during the past decade. Most recently, it had 92.
The Water Department saw its workforce dwindle from 38 a decade ago to 35 today.
The library got along with 24 or 25 workers every year until 2006 when it added three people. It added another three in 2007.
The increase is related to the expansion of the Main Library on High Street, which added more space and created the opportunity to add new specialists, a move that city leaders supported.
The Police Department’s increase from 122 to 147 is only the beginning of its planned effort to bolster its ranks even further, adding two officers a year to the rolls for at least three more years. It hopes to keep beefing up for years to come.
School officials have added staff over the years to deal with rising numbers of students, but also to deliver more specialized help to struggling students who might otherwise be left behind.
Because the report counts full-time equivalents, there are actually more people employed than the numbers indicate. Two half-time staffers, for instance, would count only as one.
It's hard to say exactly what Bristol's population has done over the same decade, but between 1990 and 2000, it actually suffered a small decline, for the first time in its history.
It's probably up less than 2 percent since 1997, but we won't know for sure until the results of the 2010 Census come in.
*******
Copyright 2008. All rights reserved.
Contact Steve Collins at scollins@bristolpress.com
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