The Editor's Notepod, Wed., Apr. 15, 2009

Meriden: Board of Education is being consistent and clear about the budget, or so it appears to me.

Wallingford: the pollutant violation at the Covanta trash to energy plant. An 8 percent violation, reading 31.2 nanograms instead of 30 nanograms, seems fairly minor. On the one hand, the number of violations over 20 years is low; on the other, the stuff isn’t necessarily measured every day. Should it be? Can it be? What slightly amazes me is that the emissions are controllable at all, seeing that people dump all sorts of things they shouldn’t into their garbage, and that separating it is not really practicable.

State: Connecticut is considering a ban on a plastic hardening additive called BPA; some scientists and activists believe the chemical, released into food, has estrogen-like effects. Yet both the FDA and its European counterpart believe the chemical is safe. Efforts are afoot to ban BPA just as similar efforts to ban a plastic softening chemicals (phthalates) are in progress.

Meriden: The discussion of placing Friends of Falcon in charge of the field during evening events is getting down to cases. Ultimately, if the Friends do the work on a volunteer basis, someone else will not be doing the work for pay, in this case usually overtime. For those employees, that’s a substantial difference, and subject to negotiation. It is hard to save money without breaking eggs, to mix a metaphor.

Meriden: The Wuterich case cannot, per ruling, go forward against a Member of Congress. I also feel that Congressman Murtha overstepped a lot of rules in making statements which virtually identified individual servicemen. But the immunity of members while in the course of duties has a constitutional point. The question, and maybe one for the Supremes, is the location of that point.