Highland Hills Police

LET THE CLEANUP BEGIN: Greater Taunton damage, outages day after storm

On Monday, most of Rehoboth and Dighton was in a blackout, with traffic lights off, most businesses closed and telephone lines for town services down.

“The serious problems now is being days without electricity,” said Rehoboth Fire Chief Robert Pray. “People are losing everything they have in their refrigerators and freezers. And (those using) well water can't flush toilets or anything as well. It’s a tough situation but we are trying to help everyone out.”

Unlike those with municipal water service, many in the rural towns use well water that requires electricity to pump.

Pray said that water for bathroom use, pets and livestock is now available in water tanks at each of the three Rehoboth Fire Department stations, as long as residents bring containers. Pray said they were awaiting a shipment of bottled water from the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency and would be distributing that at the stations as soon as possible.

Addressing power outages

A total of 4,852 out of 4,909 National Grid electricity customers in Rehoboth were without power on Monday, while 1,928 of 2,463 of the company’s customers in Dighton were blacked out. A National Grid spokesperson said no timeline is available for the repairs, but that the restoration work for most customers is expected to last through this coming weekend.

Rehoboth’s town office phone lines were down all day, while the town’s fire and police phone lines were restored in the afternoon. Pray added that 14 roads were closed in Rehoboth on Monday due to debris and fallen trees blocking the way.

Property damage

In Taunton and towns like Raynham and Berkley, problems were more isolated, and mostly involved trees falling and crashing in the road, into homes and onto power lines.

Eagle Rock artist's paintings ignite collector and police interest ...

Eagle Rock plein artist Alex Schaefer is accustomed to having passersby take a peak at this canvas as he paints outdoors. But last month the visitors included a pair of LAPD officers who showed up as Schaefer stood on a Van Nuys sidewalk with easel and brushes painting a depiction of the local  Chase bank branch (bottom picture) in flames. The painting is part of  Schaefer’s series of burning bank branches – including the Chase branch in Los Feliz, pictured at top -  that serves as his artistic representation of the nation’s banking crises. But someone feared that Schaefer’s artistic pursuit  might be a form of terrorism, prompting a call to the LAPD.   Schaefer describes the incident on his blog :

A story in Sunday’s L.A. Times said two LAPD detectives later showed up at Schaefer’s  Eagle Rock home and asked him: “Do you hate banks? Do you plan to do that to the bank?”  The painter once again repeated his story.  Instead of landing him in more trouble, those bank paintings and publicity have generated several offers for Schaefer’s Van Nuys oil painting,  which is titled  “Chase Burning.”  Schaefer has now put the painting up for auction on eBay, with a starting bid of $920.

Is there nothing more dangerous than artistic metaphor? It is tragic/funny that a guy who is out front of the bank PAINTING an interpretation of our nationa’s financial situation going up in flames is suspected of terrorism. If this guy truly wanted to set afire a bank would he really take the time to advertise with oil paints out front for all passersby to see? Please. We truly are a nation of hysterics, paranoids and snoops. Oh yeah, judging by the photos, Schaefer has training and talent. I hope he scores a good price for the painting and further leverages the publicity to get a proper gallery show. Good luck!

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