diff --git a/pom.xml b/pom.xml
index f50e636..1629cc1 100644
--- a/pom.xml
+++ b/pom.xml
@@ -33,6 +33,11 @@
             <artifactId>slf4j-simple</artifactId>
             <version>1.7.5</version>
         </dependency>
+        <dependency>
+            <groupId>org.slf4j</groupId>
+            <artifactId>log4j-over-slf4j</artifactId>
+            <version>1.7.5</version>
+        </dependency>
         <dependency>
             <groupId>com.google.code.gson</groupId>
             <artifactId>gson</artifactId>
@@ -79,6 +84,18 @@
 										<exclude>*.properties</exclude>
 									</excludes>
 								</filter>
+				                <filter>
+				                   <artifact>org.slf4j:*</artifact>
+				                   <includes>
+				                       <include>**</include>
+				                   </includes>
+				                </filter>
+				                <filter>
+				                   <artifact>commons-logging:commons-logging</artifact>
+				                   <includes>
+				                       <include>**</include>
+				                   </includes>
+				                </filter>
 							</filters>
 							<transformers>
 								<transformer
diff --git a/src/main/java/com/bwssystems/HABridge/HABridge.java b/src/main/java/com/bwssystems/HABridge/HABridge.java
index 2d98606..db4ed6b 100644
--- a/src/main/java/com/bwssystems/HABridge/HABridge.java
+++ b/src/main/java/com/bwssystems/HABridge/HABridge.java
@@ -37,7 +37,6 @@ public class HABridge {
         HueMulator theHueMulator;
         UpnpSettingsResource theSettingResponder;
         UpnpListener theUpnpListener;
-        VeraInfo theVera;
         InetAddress address;
         String addressString;
         BridgeSettings bridgeSettings;
@@ -65,8 +64,6 @@ public class HABridge {
         // sparkjava config directive to set html static file location for Jetty
         staticFileLocation("/public");
         log.info("Starting setup....");
-        theVera = new VeraInfo(bridgeSettings.getVeraAddress());
-        theVera.getSdata();
         // setup the class to handle the resource setup rest api
         theResources = new DeviceResource(bridgeSettings);
         // setup the class to handle the hue emulator rest api