Letters

Published on July 17, 2009

Mixed-up facts

To the Bulletin: Bernard Baruch said, "Every man has a right to his opinion, but no man has a right to be wrong in his facts."

Mr. Eddings' letter, "Mixed-up priorities," was full of mistakes and I was surprised that this letter came from a member of Town Meeting. The fact is all the budgets had to face dramatic decreases in services and many difficult choices were made. And while we don't all agree on those choices, what Mr. Eddings presents as facts are so unrelated it's not comparing apples to oranges, it's more akin to comparing apples and sea horses.

Some clarifications need to be made in regard to the figures that Mr. Eddings lists. The $170,000 for consultation and fees is money owed for an ongoing process that helps the Planning Department manage our infrastructure. Because it's ongoing and not a new program, we could not just stop paying what we owe. The $95,000 for restoration of Civil War tablets and the Writers Walk signs were all from the Community Preservation Act budget and could not be used legally for any of the services mentioned in the letter. The $140,000 for the police cruisers is a planned item, needed because they run 24/7, 365 days a year and have more than 120,000 miles on them when replaced, and the $28,790 spent for utilities helps maintain the equipment used for dispatching our emergency personnel. The $23,000 increase for the superintendent lies with the School Committee, not Town Meeting. If Town Meeting had voted to decrease the budget for the schools by $23,000, it would not have been taken from the superintendent's salary because of his contract.

So, after looking at the facts we see that all of the money that Mr. Eddings said could have been spent on other items, in fact could not be moved because of money owed, legal limitations or making sure our emergency personnel have working equipment. I believe that both Mr. Eddings and our friends at Amherst Center care for the children, poor and elderly in Amherst, and implying otherwise would be wrong. One fact, Mr. Eddings did not dispute with our friends from Amherst Center agree is the need for more revenue. We all would like to support more services in a responsible way but unless we get some more predictable money, Town Meeting will continue to make hard choices.

Robert Phillips
Amherst

An obituary add

To the Bulletin: I want to add to the obituary of Tacie C. Mann who died July 6 at age 90, which states that she was a school psychologist in the Amherst area for many years. Mrs. Mann was the school psychologist for the schools in Union 28, which includes Leverett and Shutesbury, and she was a pioneer in developing services for children with learning disabilities in the Leverett school several years before the special education legislation was enacted for Massachusetts in 1972.

When she began her job, she had just received her master's degree in psychology at the university, several decades after she first began teaching in a one-room schoolhouse in Vermont. She thus had knowledge of the latest research, and when our son had puzzling difficulties in learning to read, and write, she knew the tests to use to evaluate his problem, and helped us through the thicket of theories about what might help. She found a tutor, and they both experimented pragmatically with what seemed to work. Even his classmates cheered when the symbols went up for how many books he had read.

She discovered a summer school being run for the first time by Charles Drake, who would later found the Landmark Schools. The tutor continued when he went into Amherst Regional Junior High, for they were only just beginning to think about the new state requirements for special education. Our son was always confident in what he could do because he had never been called a problem, and I was confident in advocating with teachers, because I had always known cooperation.

The tutor, Jane Bodine, went on to spend 30 years developing and teaching in the Leverett school SPED program. For decades after, when I met Tacie she was interested in hearing about our son, and in discussing the latest developments in the laws about special education, as well as her many trips to every part of the world.

I am sorry it has been several years since I talked to her.

Georgana M. Foster
Northampton