Daily Archives: June 23, 2021

The lead item on the agenda for the June 21 Great Barrington Selectboard meeting was meant to be a public hearing on whether to issue a special permit to Kenneth Alpart of 250 Long Pond Road for the operation of up to 15 large events per year on his ridge-top property. In fact, as fed-up neighbors have recently pointed out to the town, Alpart has already been operating the property as a de facto party house. Indeed, by his own admission, 250 Long Pond has been a publicly advertised commercial event space for the past nine years.

In the latest twist of what turns out to be a 20-year saga, this past Saturday, through his attorney Susan Smith, Alpart unexpectedly withdrew his special permit application without prejudice, which means he retains the right to reapply. For his unhappy neighbors, whose complaint letters and calls to police brought the problem to the attention of the town, it is not clear whether this withdrawal means the events will stop, or if Alpart will simply continue to rent the property as he has. (Alpart has not yet responded to emailed questions about his intentions for the property.)

Renting the property as he had would seem to be in direct conflict with restrictions placed on the land back in 2001 in an agreement between the Berkshire Natural Resources Council (BNRC) and the then-owner, which specified no commercial recreational use of the property. It is also out of compliance with a letter sent to Alpart in June 2020 by the assistant building inspector for the town, which required him to cease the use of the property as a wedding/event venue. (See page 37 of this document)

Today, 250 Long Pond Road or, according to its websites homepage, 250 Long Pond Celebrations: Weddings, Family Gatherings, Special Events consists of 14,700 square feet of living space within a sprawling main house, guest house, and outbuilding added on in 2016 and originally slated for raising llamas. The barn now according to longpond250.com consists of a large open space that is perfect for social events, weddings, band performances and dance parties, corporate meetings, yoga and fitness classes, artist showings, and large dinner parties. (Comfortably seats up to 110 people). The special permit application specifies that the property has 46 parking spaces.

Before there was an event venue located at 250 Long Pond, there were 120 acres of expansive forest along a rocky ridgeline about a mile north of the Division Street intersection, owned by Mr. Kelton Burbank, a nature lover and benefactor of Berkshire Natural Resources Council. As explained by Narain Schroeder, director of land conservation for BNRC, the agency received the property as a gift from Burbanks estate, with the acreage coming into their possession with a conservation restriction that allowed for a single-family house on a Building Envelope of no more than six acres which, according to the restriction, may also include customarily associated outbuildings. BNRCs job was to uphold the restrictions placed on the entire parcel.

One of those unaware of the deals six-acre envelope stipulation was then-neighbor Andrew Humes, whose Long Pond Road property was below and just north of the 250 Long Pond site. Hed been buying up acreage around his house to protect it and was under the impression that the entire tract above him was similarly protected, by BNRC. When excavators showed up to clear cut a huge swath across the top of the ridgeline, he was, according to Schroeder, furious with us. His fury was documented at the time in a Berkshire Eagle story.

Humes fury did not abate during the development of the property. In fact, during construction in 2006 and 2007, Humes kept a homemade sign along the road indicating the massive building project above and pointing out that it was what BNRC considered conservation. Everyone assumed BNRC owned it, explained Schroeder. But they did not realize this envelope. (Humes recently sold his property and moved south.)

The envelope option was much more common 20 years ago than now, said Schroeder, and has fallen out of favor because the conditions under which they are managed are murky, complicated, prone to interpretation, and do not align with BNRCs core mission of protecting important land, views, and habitat. Today, BNRC prefers to use an exclusion option in land transfers so that the agency does not have to get into other peoples personal business and micro-manage developments.

The house at 250 Long Pond Road was never lived in. Once it was nearing completion, Alpart and his then-wife Jennifer Bonjean divorced, and in 2009 the house went on the market, where it has remained on and off ever since. The original asking price of $8,500,000 has been gradually reduced over the years to just under 7 million dollars. Apparently, the red hot real estate market is cooler toward 15,000-square-foot dwellings.

It was to offset the enormous costs of maintaining such a large property footprint that Alpert began hosting large groups and parties nine years ago. According to Alparts calculations, in a letter he recently wrote to a few of his closest neighbors, those costs are exorbitant (the various taxes and insurance alone are insurmountable). In the same letter he stated that some years it has been so tough weve been on the brink of foreclosure.

As listed in Alparts special permit application, he pays $80,000 per year in property taxes and more than $20,000 in insurance, along with maintenance, upkeep, and utilities. (The cost of heating a 15,000-square-foot commercial lodging would be about $27,000 annually.) Alpart is CEO of BT Trading, which, according to his LinkedIn profile, is a proprietary trading company predominantly focused on algorithmic strategies on major commodities and futures exchanges.

The 250 Long Pond Road website is password protected, but the property rents on Airbnb for $3,900 per night for a prospective week for 16 people in early June, 2022. This was the most expensive nightly option listed anywhere in New England, the Hudson Valley, and even Manhattan, the only exceptions being a handful of properties on Cape Cod and the Islands.

Alparts bio on his Great Barrington Airbnb listing is, apparently, intended for properties in New York. It ends with, We love this city and will share all our secret gems in this magical city.

One nearby neighbor says of 250 Long Ponds summer parties over the last five years, which take place, they say, about two weekends per month, Its been a nightmare scenario, so loud I cant hear the TV in my own house. I couldnt have a conversation. The house shakes. Even during COVID he was violating all the rules and had a wedding for 160 people when we couldnt have more than 25 people in our yards. This neighbor has called the police multiple times in previous years to register noise complaints, and says that after one such complaint, the music went down and fireworks started going off.

Another neighbor, a lawyer named Kevin Bolan, who owns property at 265 Long Pond where he intends to build a house, submitted a nine-page, single-spaced letter to the selectboard enumerating each of 250 Long Ponds legal and ethical violations, saving special opprobrium for Alparts self-serving statement about his irrelevant individual financial interest in needing to recoup his huge financial outlays by renting out his property.

Neighbor Denise Forbes, who lives below the property, on North Plain Road, agreed. Its not the towns job to bail out bad investments, she said.

Forbes ran a traditional B and B in town for seven years, and is also angry about the double standards for traditional hotels and places like 250 Long Pond. (Actually, if you Google 250 Long Pond the first result is a listing for Long Pond Hotel.) Ive rounded on them [the town] on the basis that this shows a very bad precedent that if you flout the bylaws, you can get away with it. I had to get permits and all that. They should be made to comply with the same rules as small boutique establishments.

Great Barrington Selectboard member Ed Abrahams, who wasnt aware of the problems at the property until the recent spate of complaint letters from neighbors, said, We dont have an Airbnb bylaw. We had started working on a registration, to find out how much of an issue it is. The town rejected the proposal. About a month ago I brought it up, saying it is time to take this up again.

Follow this link:

The conflict-ridden history of 250 Long Pond Road - theberkshireedge.com

June 6 marked the 77th anniversary of D-Day, a day in history that changed Europe and around the world forever. The brave men who charged that beach in northern France will never be forgotten. They were heroes and words cannot express my thanks to those brave soldiers. I thank all World War II vets around the world, the Greatest Generation.

This event may never be discussed in our classrooms anymore. Why? This is what the committee on creating the new social studies standards wants to leave out, along with many other important events in American history.

What is next? The committee will tell us we cannot teach about the Declaration of Independence, the Fourth of July or the Revolutionary War?

As a social studies teacher, I stand up and say, No way I will stop teaching about this great moment or any other great moment!

Those that fought and died for this country in WWII or any wars, and those who fought and bled to help make this country great, shall never be forgotten. The committee needs to realize we need to teach all history involving everyone that played a role, not leaving out some events and adding others only to push a political message.

All history should be taught and explain how all the people of the United States played a role in making this country great and who we are today. Stand with me that I and all teachers can continue to tell the great American story.

More here:

READER LETTER: What history will we lose? | Letters To The Editor | crowrivermedia.com - Crow River Media

For the first time in team history, the Orlando Magic will be selecting twice in the top eight. One of the picks will be made fifth overall. OrlandoMagic.com's Josh Cohen lists his top players in NBA history chosen fifth in the draft. Click through this slideshow for full rankings and analysis.

Note: The contents of this gallery have not been reviewed or endorsed by the Orlando Magic and do not reflect the opinions of the Magics Basketball Operations staff, partners or sponsors.

Honorable Mention: Trae Young, 2018

Young, just 22 years old, is in the midst of having one of the best playoff debuts in NBA history. Through the first two rounds, he is averaging 29.1 points and 10.4 assists. He and Luka Doncic were traded for one another on draft night in 2018. Obviously with this being only Youngs third NBA season, he doesnt yet have the accolades that the others on this list accumulated over the course of their careers.

Other former No. 5 overall picks deserving consideration on this list include Kevin Love, Larry Foust, DeMarcus Cousins, Walter Davis, Sidney Moncrief, Jeff Mullins, Steve Smith, DeAaron Fox, Sam Lacey, Purvis Short and Devin Harris.

CLICK HERE TO CONTINUE>>>

More:

Ranking NBAs Top 10 Fifth Overall Draft Picks in NBA History - OrlandoMagic.com

Marcus Mariota is obviously the best Oregon Ducks quarterback of all time. Hes the schools only Heisman Trophy winner, he put together an unmatched stat line over three seasons, and he delivered some of the most iconic performances in team history.

But how do the rest of the Oregon quarterbacks stack up in comparison to the GOAT? Ducks Wire recently took a shot at ranking the nine best quarterbacks in Oregon history, and its list opens the door for plenty of discussion.

Theres never a right or wrong way to rank players in lists like these; thats part of the fun. However, as subjective as this power ranking is, there are certainly players who have strong arguments to be ranked either higher or lower based on their resumes and bodies of work.

Kevin Cline

Mariota is the undisputed best quarterback in Oregon history.

The most glaring omission from Ducks Wires ranking is Darron Thomas. All the two-year starter did during his time in Eugene was lead the Ducks to a 23-3 record (he was inactive for one of Oregons victories in 2011), account for more than 70 touchdowns, and lead Oregon to its first Rose Bowl win since 1917. Thomas piloted one of the greatest offenses in the history of the sport, and although he wasnt the most notable superstar on the field, he certainly was a big part of the units success. Norm Van Brocklin and Norv Turner are NFL legends (and Van Brocklin was no slouch in college, either), but Thomas had more individual and team success than both of them in college. Shouldnt he be on the list, and quite frankly, rank highly on it?

Additionally, a case can be made for Dennis Dixon to be ranked as high as No. 2, or as low as No. 6, depending on ones criteria. On the one hand, Dixons best season in 2007 was so exceptional that he very well might have won the Heisman Trophy had he not gotten injured late in the year. That singular season was arguably more impressive than any of Joey Harringtons or Justin Herberts. But factoring in longevity and body of work, its hard to justify ranking Dixon ahead of Herbert, Harrington, or even Dan Fouts and Akili Smith. So, is he in the right spot at No. 4?

What is your reaction to this ranking of Oregon quarterbacks? What criteria would you use to create a list of your own, and how would your rankings be different?

Joshua WhittedMorgantown, West VirginiaTop Photo by Amazing Moments Photography

Excerpt from:

How Would YOU Rank the Best QBs in Oregon History? - FishDuck

A group supported by the Oregon Historical Society is marking a milestone in preserving LGBTQ+ history.

OREGON, USA A local group is celebrating 10 years of trailblazers who have helped uplift the LGBTQ+ community in the Pacific Northwest.

"It's important to tell all of the stories," said Robin Will, president of the Gay & Lesbian Archives of the Pacific Northwest (GLAPN). "That old saying that winners write history... If you get into the historical record where you can't be ignored, then you are a winner."

GLAPNworks to preserve an accurate account of local LGBTQ+ history.

"We were criminals by definition," Will said. "[If] you look at the record, you get the impression that no LGBTQ person ever did one damn thing that was worth noticing or writing down... We are in fact a persecuted minority."

"Back then you could be kicked out of a restaurant if the restaurant owner thought you were gay," said Susie Mary Shepherd, an advocate who has helped GLAPN archive LGBTQ stories. "You could certainly be fired... You could get kicked out of your home if you were renting and had a landlord who found out you were gay and didn't like it."

Shepherd is part of that history. She made headlines when she came out in the 70s, and her parents started an LGBTQ family advocacy group called Parents of Gays. That group later became PFLAG.

"We were trying to lobby the legislature for gay civil rights," Shepherd said.

Part of GLAPN's effort to preserve this history is compiling a Queer Heroes list every June.

Will said between 60-80 nominations come in each year. GLAPN selects 30, one for each day of Pride Month. In 2021, the list is on its 10th year.

"We were really writing history," Will said. "Wasn't really getting covered anywhere else, people in the community who might never have otherwise been mentioned... To finally be seen, be recognized, be acknowledged as a person of value."

The list honors people across the Pacific Northwest. Some have passed on, while others are still part of the movement.

"It completely caught me off guard," said Jamar Ruff, who was named a Queer Hero in 2020.

Ruff lives in Coos County and serves a number of community organizations, helping people with HIV and addiction and uplifting LGBTQ youth.

"It's still hard for folks who are coming out," Ruff said. "It's still hard for folks who just want to be themselves... So many people came before us so that we can do the things that we do today."

"People had to hide who they were," said Kristan Knapp, who started fighting for Oregon LGBTQ+ rights in the '70s.

She noted some of the biggest fights were against anti-LGBTQ ballot measures, spanning many years in the state.

Separate measures in 1992 and 2000, both called Measure 9, would have blocked schools and public institutions from "promoting," or essentially mentioning homosexuality.

"We had all been pretty marginalized and beaten down during that campaign," Knapp recalled.

KGW archive footage from 2000 shows the measure's sponsor, Lon Mabon, proudly proclaiming: "It's winnable, obviously."

The measure's wording lumped in homosexuality with pedophilia and other "abnormal and perverse" behaviors.

Shepherd had served as a teacher in Oregon, and knew this kind of law would mean others like her could be fired for being openly themselves.

"Was an absolutely horrific experience," Shepherd said.

Advocates ended up raising more than a million dollars, creating ad campaigns to discourage people from voting "yes" on Measure 9. They eventually defeated the measure.

"It does feel good that the work we did made a difference," Knapp said.

Washington and Oregon passed some laws in the 2000s to better protect LGBTQ+ people from such discrimination.

Shepherd noted some of her friends and fellow advocates passed away before they could see the progress made by their efforts.

"I get teared up," Shepherd said, holding back tears. "Every time I walk by a house or a business and I see a Pride flag hanging, I look up to heaven where Jerry and Larry are now and I say, 'hey Jerry and Larry, do you see this one?' It's a very important symbol of where we've come."

In a separate effort this year, TriMet has also memorialized local queer heroes for the first time on a Pride bus.

For GLAPN's president, it's meaningful to see such changes in attitudes and efforts to preserve LGBTQ+ history.

"I never really thought I'd see this happen," Will said.

"I was told early on in my career that this kind of research would end my career," Washington State University queer historian Peter Boag said.

Boag was named a Queer Hero in 2018.

As other states enact anti-LGBTQ laws in 2021, he noted this reminder: "Some things have changed, and unfortunately some things haven't."

Ultimately, the growing list of Queer Heroes serves as a reminder of history and of the path forward.

A common thread ties all on the list together.

"We are birthed from resilience," Ruff said. "We are birthed from overcoming."

More here:

Group honors queer heroes, rewriting Oregon and Washington history with truth - KGW.com

As the Biden administration and Republicans negotiate a possible infrastructure spending package, how to pay for it has been a key sticking point.

President Joe Biden and Democrats in Congress want to raise taxes on the rich, while some Republicans have been pushing for an increase in the gas tax which would be the first in 28 years. A bipartisan group of senators recently crafted a compromise bill that would pay for just under US$1 trillion in spending on rail, roads and bridges over five years in part by indexing the gas tax to inflation. Democrats call this regressive because it would raise taxes on working Americans.

As the director of energy studies at the University of Floridas Public Utility Research Center, Ive studied both taxes on energy and how the government spends money on infrastructure.

Throughout the gas taxs controversial history, leaders have frequently called upon this revenue source when serious infrastructure investment is needed.

This resilient levy is a major source of U.S. funding for roads and transit today. It originated during the Great Depression as a temporary penny-per-gallon gasoline tax. At the time, a gallon cost about 18 cents, or about $2.90 in 2021 dollars.

As he signed the Revenue Act of 1932 into law, President Herbert Hoover lauded the willingness of our people to accept this added burden in these times in order impregnably to establish the credit of the federal government.

The original gas tax, an emergency measure intended to bolster the budget and fund national defense spending, not to meet transportation needs, was slated to expire in 1933. Instead, persistent budget deficits throughout the New Deal and World War II kept it in force throughout Franklin D. Roosevelts administration over the objections of the oil, automotive and travel industries. It became a permanent 1.5-cent levy in 1941.

Multiple efforts to do away with the gas tax ever since have failed.

For example, Congress again scheduled the taxs repeal in 1951 when it increased it to 2 cents as a source of revenue related to the Korean War. Instead, lawmakers agreed to keep the tax on the books to help pay for one of President Dwight D. Eisenhowers top priorities, the national interstate highway system.

In 1956 the levy rose once more, to 3 cents, when Americans were paying about 30 cents for a gallon of gas. At the same time, the government established the Highway Trust Fund to use the gas tax revenue to pay for building and maintaining the new interstates.

The tax rose to 4 cents per gallon in 1959 and froze at that level for more than two decades.

Gas tax revenue stopped keeping up with the expenses it was supposed to cover in the early 1970s following a severe bout of inflation and OPECs oil embargo. U.S. gas prices soared from about 36 cents per gallon in 1972 to $1.31 in 1981.

Responding to what members of both major political parties saw as a transportation infrastructure crisis, Congress more than doubled the tax to 9 cents per gallon as part of the Surface Transportation Assistance Act of 1982. The same law split the Highway Trust Fund and its revenue stream into two parts: The first 8 cents would finance roadwork while the other penny would finance mass transit projects.

This hike may have struck drivers as a sharp increase, but public spending on transportation infrastructure would continue to fall as a percentage of all outlays.

In 1984, Congress increased spending on highways by funneling proceeds from fines and other penalties that businesses pay for safety violations, such as failing to label hazardous materials or forcing drivers to work too many hours in a row.

Congress boosted the tax twice more in the 1990s but primarily to reduce the then-ballooning federal deficit. Only half of a 5-cent increase in 1990 went to highways and transit, while a 4.3-cent lift three years later went entirely to lowering the deficit.

By 1997, the government had redirected all gas tax revenue reserved for deficit reduction to the Highway Trust Fund, where it still flows today.

Along the way, other federal fuel taxes arose, including a 24.4-cent-per-gallon diesel tax and taxes on methanol and compressed natural gas. And state fuel taxes, which in most cases began before the federal gas tax, range from as low as 8.95 cents per gallon in Alaska to as high as 57.6 cents per gallon in Pennsylvania.

Since 1993, when the federal gas tax was first parked at 18.4 cents, inflation and rising construction costs have eroded its effectiveness as a transportation-related revenue source. In addition, U.S. vehicles have grown more fuel-efficient overall which means Americans use less fuel for every mile they drive.

As a result, highway and transit spending has significantly outpaced the revenue collected from the gas tax and other sources. Since 2008, the government has transferred over $80 billion to the fund that it had to take from other sources.

But its still not enough. The American Society of Civil Engineers, which gives U.S. infrastructure a C-minus, is calling on the government and private sector to increase spending on roads and bridges by at least $2.5 trillion within a decade.

While its true the gas tax may be regressive because lower-income people pay the same rate as those who earn higher incomes, there are still advantages to this tax.

For one thing, it follows the user pays principle of providing government services. Under this principle, the people using the roads are held responsible for paying for their upkeep. As the number of motorists using electric vehicles increases, however, this may become less true over time.

Further, it would also create an incentive to at least marginally decrease the use of fossil fuels, accomplishing another goal of the administration.

Finally, the government could always subsidize the tax for the poor, perhaps through annual lump-sum payments, making it less regressive.

Clearly, U.S. infrastructure is in dire need of upgrading and investment. At the end of the day, Americans will pay for it one way or another whether in taxes or through costs of unsafe and inadequate infrastructure, including in lost lives. How the government pays for investment may matter less than that it finally does it.

This is an updated version of an article first published on Feb. 27, 2018. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Read the original here:

The gas taxs tortured history shows how hard it is to fund new infrastructure - PBS NewsHour

Weather forecasts now include a warning about ultraviolet levels and everyone knows they should apply sunscreen. However, this type of protection is a recent innovation.

Sunscreen was first used on a large scale during the second world war, when the US military experimented with substances to prevent sunburn. Red Vet Pet short for red veterinary petrolatum was included in life-raft survival kits for downed airmen. This is a form of petroleum jelly, previously used to treat cuts and burns. It was found to block ultraviolet light, but was oily and unpleasant to apply.

After the war, Benjamin Green, a pharmacist formerly of the US air force, mixed Red Vet Pet with coconut oil and cocoa butter to create a more pleasing texture. His market was leisure rather than survival, helping people to acquire a fashionable tan without getting burnt. Green sold his creation under the name Coppertone, and it became one of the first commercially successful sunscreens.

Since then, decades of research have produced increasingly effective protection. Sunscreen still contains organic substances to absorb UV, but may also include something to reflect it, such as fine particles of zinc oxide. Red Vet Pet had a sun protection factor (SPF) of two, meaning it doubled the time you could remain safely in the sun; modern sunscreens go up to SPF 100.

Excerpt from:

Weatherwatch: shining a light on the history of sunscreen - The Guardian

The U.S. Open heads to Brookline next year, site of arguably the most important championship in American golf history.

Francis Ouimet, then a 20-year-old amateur, won the 1913 U.S. Open at The Country Club at Brookline, defeating British legends Harry Vardon and Ted Ray in a playoff. The colossal upset marked the rise of the sport in the U.S.

This will be the fourth time that the Massachusetts venue will play host to the seasons third major. Heres a look at future U.S. Open sites and their U.S. Open history.

2022: The Country Club, Brookline, Mass., June 16-19

2023: The Los Angeles Country Club (North Course), Los Angeles, Calif., June 15-18

2024: Pinehurst No. 2, Pinehurst, N.C., June 13-16

2025: Oakmont Country Club, Oakmont, Pa., June 12-15

2026: Shinnecock Hills Golf Club, South Hampton, N.Y., June 18-21

2027: Pebble Beach Golf Links, Pebble Beach, Calif., June 17-20

See the original post:

Future U.S. Open venues and their U.S. Open history - Golf Channel