As I mentioned in my previous post, we have moved our office to Central Square in Cambridge. It’s definitely a colorful area. No matter what time I arrive at the office there are always people standing in front of the Can Tab Lounge waiting to get well before their day of work. Yesterday, after walking somebody who came to meet with us to the door, I spent five minutes listening to somebody explain to the sky that god is a piece of a poo (he used a different word) in Spanish. Amusement aside, there are a lot of really good companies located within walking distance of Central Square and with the huge selection of places to eat I am pretty certain I’ll run out of contacts long before I run out of restaurants. I’m also very pleased at the affordability. All the food places are within my meager startup budget!

However, this post isn’t about Central Square, it’s about Cambridge in general. Andrew, got himself an apartment and decided to get a Cambridge resident parking permit. To qualify for this permit he must provide all the usual paperwork: updated vehicle registration, proof of residency, processing fee, and so on. Well, take a look at the proof of residency requirements: http://www.cambridgema.gov/Traffic/ResidencyProof.cfm they accept a utility bill with the resident’s name on it, which is pretty standard. They also accept two letters, dated within the last 30 days with Andrew’s name on it. This means that to prove to Cambridge that one is a resident one simply goes the post office, buys two stamped envelopes, write their name and address on them, and sends them to one’s self.

So, process for getting a Cambridge sticker:

1. call the RMV and change your addres
2. mail two envelopes to yourself
3. present this along with your $8 and accept your permit

At no point in this process is one required to do anything which actually requires moving to Cambridge. This seems very broken to me.

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