There has been a lot of concern over airplane noise over the city when they reroute the planes. Alderman At Large Mary Jo Rossetti has been one of the aldermen who has been taking on this cause and trying to get some relief. There is currently a survey being conducted by MS Walker, Doctoral Candidate Dept. of Environmental Health, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. The survey was primarily set up for the city of Boston, but Somerville has been added to it. It might serve to assist the city’s argument with Massport about the impact of the air traffic. Rossetti is asking all those who are reading this to go online an take the survey: www.noiseandthecity.org/english . This Thursday night at the Board of Alderman meeting (on local access TV) Alderman Rossetti has asked for time to present an update on the city’s position.

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There’s still time to enter our contest. We are asking anyone here in the Ville who would like to write a poem on the Christmas holiday and what it means to them to send it in to us. Deadline is Friday, December 18. You can email it to news@thesomervilletimes.com, mail it or drop it off at 699 Broadway, Somerville 02144. Poems will be selected by The Times staff and the three top winners will have their poem published in time for Christmas. The best one submitted will receive a $100 gift certificate for the Mt. Vernon Restaurant, a $50 Mt. Vernon certificate for second choice and a $25 Mt. Vernon gift certificate for third place. Submit your poem to be published by The Somerville Times in time for the holiday.

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Happy Birthdays this week to some of our Villens and friends as well as friends of The Times: Happy birthday to Ray Zonghetti, who has been actively involved in the business community now for many years. Also, to a very good friend of ours, Bill Murphy, of Colony RE, a lifelong Winter Hill resident and nice guy. Happy birthday to Stacy Hersey Buckley of the Ville, another life long resident who is also a great person. Happy birthday to Irene Bremis, the lady of Real Estate here in the city. Irene is a professional and a nice person. She knows Real Estate. Finally, a happy birthday to little Samantha Carriger, celebrating her third birthday this week. She’s a doll. It’s hard to believe it’s been three years already. To all the others out there celebrating this week, we hope you have a great day for yourselves.

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There’s a new website in town. Check it out at www.somervillema.com. The Somerville Times is on the site. Also check out www.medfordma.com.

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We hear through the City Hall grapevine that in the new year the administration will be looking for new personnel. More than one or two will be giving their notices, if they haven’t already.

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Those who might be interested in obtaining certification for firearms should look up the Lawrence Rod & Gun Club. They offer an extensive program at the end of which you receive certification for Massachusetts/NRA Certified Firearm Safety Classes. They run a class once a month, which is limited to 10 people and we hear that this is the place to go to learn safety when handling guns. Email gunclub@earthlink.net for more information and or go to their website at www.lawrencerodandgunclub.org and read up about the course.

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Rumor has it that more than one or two city officials and department heads might be leaving the administration in the next few weeks. We’re thinking that the new mayor of Revere might be looking over the list of potential people he could get in his administration. We hear that Omar, from the mayor’s office, is one such person who is going to be leaving. Who else?

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Winter Hill Better Block is coming. We’re holding a Winter Hill Better Block festival on December 12 from 4:00–8:00 p.m. and December 13 from 12:00–4:00 p,m. The Winter Hill Better Block will be centered in the area between the new Winter Hill Brewing Company (328 Broadway) and the vacant area behind the post office as well as along some areas of Marshall Street. Team Better Block works with cities, developers, and stakeholders to create quick, inexpensive, high-impact changes that improve and revitalize underused properties and highlight the potential for creating great places. The goal for this Winter Hill Better Block project is to test out short-term ideas for Winter Hill. While much of the ongoing neighborhood planning work is medium and long-term focus, there are many things we can do in the short-term, like this Better Block project, to help test out ideas quickly and help spur longer-term change.

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The Somerville Times will be taking the week off between holidays. The last paper of the year will be Wednesday, December 23 (Christmas week) and will return Wednesday, January 6, 2016. It’s always a slow week for news and this gives our hard working staff a week off to enjoy with their family and friends. If anyone has any questions you can call the paper at 617- 666-4010.

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Word of the Week: Arrogant. Dictionary Definition: Arrogant is an adjective for describing people who are too proud and look down on others, like supermodels who think their good looks give them a right to do whatever they want. Arrogant derives from Latin arrogare “to claim,” and the idea is that someone is claiming credit or advantages that they are not entitled to. Our definition, they so arrogant they think no one will catch on to what they are doing. Sound familiar?

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While attending a finance committee hearing on Assembly Square, we couldn’t believe our ears when Attorney Ilene McGettigan spoke. She works for the city in the Office of Strategic Planning and Community Development. FYI, her title is General Counsel. Well, anyway, she went before the committee on fiance and spoke about taking the streets at Assembly Square back from Federal Realty. She said the following to the committee: “In the spirit of fairness we should take back the streets.” Didn’t the city authorize a 25 million bond a few years back to pay for the infrastructure down there? First, Federal Realty sells off the land to MGH, a nonprofit, to build (no taxes to the city) and now we should in all fairness just receive back the streets down there. Question: who does Ms. McGettigan work for? Federal Realty or the city?

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Interesting tidbit: talking to a few city officials this past week, it was pointed out that Mass. General Hospital bought the land and is building a beautiful building that is soon to open. It was further pointed out that Federal Realty sold the land to MGH, so that Federal Realty maybe wouldn’t have to pay taxes on it? We know that MGH is a nonprofit and they won’t now be paying taxes either on the property. So the taxable land at Assembly gets smaller and smaller?

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There are still about 150 permits pending in the Citizen Serve chain of so-called progress, so we hear. We also heard they get bottled up in the Planning Department.

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The Tufts University Department of Music presents a concert featuring Kiniwe, Tufts African Music Ensemble, in the Distler Performance Hall at the Perry and Marty Granoff Music Center on Friday, December 11, 2015 at 8:00 p.m. Under the direction of Attah Poku, Tufts’ African music ensemble presents a program of traditional music and dance from Ghana, featuring items of his own Ashanti heritage. Kiniwe will also feature the Ahenema Cultural Troupe, artists of Ashanti birth now based in New York City, and the Agbekor Drum and Dance Society, a Boston-based group founded in 1979 by Prof. David Locke.  The Granoff Music Center is located at 20 Talbot Avenue on Tufts’ Medford/Somerville campus. Admission is free. For more information, please visit as.tufts.edu/music/musiccenter. Phone: 617.627.3679.