For years I have documented the waste and abuse that takes place in the city of Warwick. I have posted dozens of video’s showing DPW trucks and employees driving around doing no work, fire department employees violating the city policies, shopping on the clock, coffee shop runs several times a day, and even an employee using a ladder truck to take his dog to the grooming parlor. Fire department employees leaving trucks unattended and running at grocery stores in direct violation of the DEM diesel idling act. I have videos of fire personnel at my marina attending a dock party during the day with a rescue truck and the special hazard truck and numerous other examples of waste including a DPW worker stealing loam from the city yard and using city equipment to groom a neighbor’s yard. School department maintenance personnel routinely taking an hour coffee break when the contract allows for 15 minutes. Several of these instances were also covered and filmed undercover by Eyewitness News reporter Walt Buteau.

With each incident that made the media, the Warwick Mayors (Avedesian, Solomon, and Picozzi) all publicly stated that personnel had been reprimanded. Yet, years later, the same behavior continues daily with no change in behavior and no sanctions put in place. I have argued for years that the city vehicles need to have GPS installed so that not only does this behavior end and there is accountability, but also GPS tracking combined with work orders clearly dramatically increases efficiency and saves taxpayer dollars.

Former school committee chairperson Karen Bachus vehemently opposed GPS in school department vehicles after the subject was docketed after the school department maintenance supervisor was arrested after stealing over $100,000 in merchandise from the schools. Bachus argued that GPS violates the workers right to privacy. That public comment alone exemplifies her complete stupidity as the Supreme Court of the United States has consistently upheld the premise that municipal employees have no expectation of privacy while engaged in the performance of their duties.

I have made numerous arguments in front of the city council about installing GPS after workers were filmed not only by me, but also by the local media, driving around, not working, leaving the confines of the city, and even engaging in theft. We even had a city worker arrested for shoplifting at Home Depot while on the clock with a city vehicle. That worker was subsequently arrested again by the Warwick Police for stealing thousands of dollars of product from the city yard. Believe it or not, he is still employed by the city to this day.
With each argument that I have made pertaining to the need to install GPS, the city council and the mayors have refused to take action.

Now, however, the stupidity of the city council and the mayor becomes so ridiculous that it simply deserves public humiliation.

During the last council meeting the Parks and Recreation department came before the finance committee asking for $33,000 for marine electronics on the two quahog skiffs that are used as the Harbormaster boats. They have requested the purchase of 48 mile radar systems, with integrated GPS and high resolution fish finders, for boats that are tasked to assist and control speed inside the Warwick Harbors. To dramatically expand this stupidity, they have also asked for the purchase of night vision with thermal imaging capabilities. This equipment to be installed in 2 boats that for 5-6 months during the year, work 20 hours per week. The vast majority of the time is spent at the top of Warwick Cove and Apponaug Cove controlling speed of jet skiers.

During the meeting the administration made an argument that “in the case of a missing person the night vision would be helpful during a search”. The problem is that the city charter specifically spells out the duties and jurisdiction of the harbormaster and they are not qualified to perform such tasks. Those activities are tasked to the Warwick Fire Department and US Coast Guard. The harbormaster’s job is traffic assistance in the navigation channels in the confines of the city.

In particular, which the dopes on the city council don’t seem to understand, is the simple formula for “radar line of sight distance”. These boats, no matter how much money you spend on electronics, the radar will only see about 3.6 miles PERIOD! The request for this equipment is an outrageous waste of money yet the administration boasts that the purchase is coming from APRA money so it really is free. I contacted several harbormaster departments in Rhode Island including Newport, The Yachting Capital of the World, and asked if they had this type of equipment on their boats and the response was laughter.

These people who have no marine experience, argue to have this equipment installed in these boats, yet they ignore the need for GPS installation on vehicles that the operators have consistently been actively engaged in wasteful behavior costing the taxpayers millions of dollars. The only way that this can be summed up is pure stupidity. I can assure you that on February 28th, the uneducated city council will vote to install this equipment on these two skiffs. This purchase is much like buying a Ferrari and only driving it in a parking lot. The capabilities of the product will never be utilized, much like the brains of the administration of Warwick.