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Message |
    
jfw
Citizen
Username: Jfw
Post Number: 32
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Thursday, September 4, 2003 - 1:25 pm: | 
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this issue started a couple of weeks ago when i discovered four raccoons had taken up residence in my garage. i called the south orange animal control officer, dick ash, who told me that because my garage was detached and not a part of my house, state law prohibited him from setting a trap for it. it would instead be up to me to get my own trap, and once i caught one, he would come and pick it up.
putting aside for a moment the idiocy of that law (which puts untrained homeowners in the position of having to trap and handle potentially rabid wildlife), i dutifully went to home despot and picked up a havahart trap. i set it and waited.
i suspected that the critters only used my garage as a flophouse during rainy weather, and i didn't catch anything for the first couple weeks. however, on tuesday, i saw that we had indeed captured one.
when i got home that evening, i called and left a message for mr. ash, who according to his message only checks his voicemail until 3:30 pm. i left another early wednesday morning, and finally around 11:00 a young lady called me back to inform me that NOT ONLY WAS MR. ASH ON VACATION
UNTIL SEPTEMBER 15, HIS BACKUP WOULD BE UNAVAILABLE UNTIL SEPTEMBER 8. when asked what i should do in the interim, she suggested that i LET IT GO AND NOT SET MY TRAP AGAIN UNTIL THE 8TH!!!!
i asked if there was anyone at the county or state level who could intervene, and of course there wasn't.
so i did the only thing i could: i put the trap in the trunk of the car, drove it well out of town (since i understand they are capable of finding their way home from great distances), and let the raccoon go.
so what i want to know is this ... WHERE EXACTLY IS THE UNGODLY SUM I PAY IN TAXES EVERY YEAR GOING???? once again, the village has let us down with its shoddy management and "not-my-problem" mentality. the people that are supposed to be protecting us from these garage-invading, disease-spreading vermin are nowhere to be found when we need them.
i don't debate mr. ash's right to take a vacation, but before anyone in the private sector takes a couple weeks off, he (or his supervisor) makes sure there's someone around to handle his job responsibilities in the interim. why doesn't the same common-sense approach apply to the
people in our government, who we pay so much to do so little?
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Allan J Rosen
Citizen
Username: Allanrosen
Post Number: 4
Registered: 4-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, September 4, 2003 - 4:13 pm: |
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jfw: The answer you were given is completely unacceptable. Even now, or if it happens again, call 973-378-7715 x 2 John Gross's extension (Village Administrator), and he should arrange to take care of the problem. |
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