This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Community Corner

New Recycling Boxes Reduces Privacy & Ups Our Taxes

I am very disturbed by the recent news re the new recycling boxes which the town of Hamden has recently purchased (about 60,000 of them)--two boxes per house/household, with each containing a computer chip, containing the home's address, and the chip will monitor what we put into these boxes.  "Big Brother" is watching you! I surmise each "smart box" costs at least $25. or more.  Multiply $25. by the 60,000 households, and you get an astronomical cost to the town--but ultimately to us--in even higher property taxes, which we can't afford. I'm upset that the town did not bring this massive purchase to a town-wide referendum--and publicize it well, for residents to decide whether we feel it's ok to have our trash so closely monitored--compromising our privacy and security. Also, chip monitoring gives us a message that we residents can't be trusted to recycle, implying that we're dishonest, which many feel is an insult to our integrity. I feel that our town, on the brink of financial collapse, should not have spent the many hundreds of thousands of dollars for these boxes. The money should have instead been used to pay off our massive debts which may force us into insolvency (which happened to Waterbury). We residents, always footing ever increasing property taxes, were completely left in the dark about it--until we're told it's now a "done deal"--when the Mayor knew we can now do nothing to stop it. In fact, it was publicized only about two weeks before the deadline of November 15, for us to comply with the new regulation. While the town "fathers" are so occupied with "going green"--how about allowing us to keep some of our own "green"--our precious dollar bills, growing scarcer each day. Keep this in mind, when you vote on November 5. 

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?