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Mayor Fiorentini's Monthly Newsletter

Meet the “Green Machine” Our Newest Weapon in the War on Grime.

Clean streets have been a priority for this administration since I took office. Clean streets are an essential economic development tool, and keeping a city clean is an important service that you pay for. Clean streets always have to be a partnership between the city and its citizens— we can not do it alone.

We need people to keep their own streets and sidewalks clean and to help us by picking up an item or two in their neighborhoods.
But city government also has a crucial role to play. Two years ago, we purchased our first new street sweeper in many years, using water department money to do so.

Last year, when I was in Washington for Congressman Meehan’s annual constituent day, I noticed that Washington, D.C. had smaller, more versatile machines to handle sidewalks and to vacuum the debris left in the gutters. These smaller machines work in conjunction with the larger, more traditional street sweepers that clean the streets.

This year, we were able to persuade the state to allow us to use some of the state road money (called Chapter 90 money) to purchase one of those new, smaller machines— they are a combination street sweeper and street vacuum.

This year, at the Earth Day cleanup, we were able to showcase our new sidewalk vacuum, trade named “The Green Machine,” for the first time. (Green machine is shown here with members of the Downtown Association. Janet Donovan is behind the wheel.)

Up until now, we have been frustrated in keeping our downtown parking garage clean. Traditional street sweepers were too big to fit into it. Volunteers and prisoners do a great job, but this garage needs regular, scheduled maintenance. We do not have the manpower to sweep it by hand.

This new sweeper/vacuum will help there and in parks throughout the city. The new sweeper has an attached vacuum that allows the operator to pick up litter that is too big to sweep.

We also intend to use the green machine to help us clean parks, sidewalks, and some of the other areas of town that our more traditional, larger equipment can not handle.

We are still shorthanded, so this one machine is not going to perform miracles, but we hope it helps in the effort to keep your neighborhoods clean on a tight budget.

Keeping your city cleaner remains a priority. Here are some of the things we’ve done:

New street sweeper;
New vacuum sweeper;
City-wide cleanup;
Brought back prisoners to clean;
Started code compliance team to sweep neighborhoods;
Instituted trash tickets to enforce code laws— $800 in tickets given this year;
Citizens can post requests for cleaning on the Internet;
Re-instituted tree planting program for first time in decades.

Take a moment to answer the questionnaire at the end of this newsletter and tell us how we are doing and what we can do to keep your city cleaner.

Hundreds Join to Keep Haverhill Beautiful

Martha and I were pleased to join with hundreds of other volunteers at our third annual, city-wide cleanup day. We were joined by volunteers from Team Haverhill, the Boy Scouts, the Girl Scouts (shown here), and hundreds of citizens who were willing to pitch in and help. Thank you to all those who assisted!

Helping at the Library

As I prepare for this year’s budget, I took some time to work the front lines of various offices. Working on the front lines gives me the opportunity to meet and speak with our customers, and see how hardworking our employees are.

I spent an hour on Friday at the public library helping at the checkout counter. As you can see from the stack of books, the folks at the library are busy all the time— waiting on customers, stacking books and providing good service. Every single one of the customers I spoke with at the library said they were thrilled with the library and with the service they receive there.

The public library is one of the gems of our community, and this administration is committed to keeping it open.

How can we keep the city looking cleaner? Take a moment to respond:

* How would you rate the overall cleanliness of the city right now?

( ) clean ( ) mixed ( ) not clean

* How would you rate the streets in the neighborhood you live in?

( ) streets are clean ( ) streets are dirty and not swept

How would you rate the downtown area? ( ) clean ( ) mixed, not bad but needs work

( ) not clean

Jim Fiorentini is the mayor of Haverhill and was just elected to his second term. Mayor Fiorentini is a Democrat. No public money was used to produce or distribute his newsletter. You can E-mail Mayor Fiorentini at: jimfior02@aol.com

 *Send your questions comments to ValleyPatriot@aol.com
The May, 2006 Edition of the Valley Patriot
The Valley Patriot is a Monthly Publication.
All Contents (C) 2006, Valley Patriot, Inc.
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Lawrence, Dracut, Tewksbury and Lowell.

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Prior Columns by Mayor Fiorentini