Update on Local Comment

Sorry about this, but I read the BCCT online and sometimes do not get to all of the items. Eventually, the BCCT will no longer have these items available, so I like to keep a copy available for future use.

Here are two letters to the editor that were recently published. Kevin Leather from January 29, and William S. Umek from February 3.

Whatever the source, farm-out option is a bad idea

The discussion surrounding the ill-conceived scheme to farm out Morrisville High School students to other districts is simply a product of what school board member Gloria Heater described to me as “brainstorming.”

I was willing to allow for that when she asked why the renovated high school needed air conditioning, expecting that only the administrators needed it, and not the students. I also found the remark she made about selling M.R. Reiter, Grandview, and the A Field to have been rather confusing.

Now I see ... if there are no high school students, why do we need the A field?

She was fond of saying that the school was built for 2,000 students and we're not using it fully, which explains why all of the Stop the School candidates avoided this specific question during the campaign. Over the summer, school board member Marlys Mihok sent me a series of e-mails where she completely denied this farm-out-the-kids scheme. She assured us that board member Bill Farrell, who was apparently the original source of the discussion, was misquoted. But when directly asked to report if it was true, she remained silent.

I did not buy a home in Morrisville only to see my children bused ridiculous distances to a school where they will be outcasts.

I admit that removing high school students from the mix is certainly a novel way to raise the test scores in 11th grade.

Brainstorming is a wonderful tool. It exposes bad ideas rather quickly

I did not vote for any of the Stop the School candidates. However, this is my school board whether I like it or not, and I do not like this.

Kevin Leather
Morrisville

Closing school will set town on irreversible decline

So, the Morrisville school board decides not to build a new high school that would 1) attract home buyers who would invest in the community, and, 2) be an incentive for current residents, who have pride in their community and would support a new facility, from moving to a more desirable community.

The Morrisville school board instead plans to shutter its existing high school and scatter its children around the county, thereby continuing the downward spiral of what is but will no longer be a nice place to live and raise a family.

Who moves to a town where they outsource their kids to be educated?

If it costs $10,000 per child to send them to another school and my current taxes are $4,000 per year, where does the other $6,000 come from? My guess would be taxes. So, couldn't we build a new school and just pay the taxes for it instead of paying the same if not more taxes to ship our kids out?
Click Here!

The majority of Morrisville residents voted for a school board whose only solution to the existing schools issues is to close it. Was this group hired to close the very business they are running? People are typically hired to help businesses prosper, not close!

What kind of leaders are these?

Once the high school is closed it will NEVER re-open and Morrisville will be on a decline from which it will not recover. Closing the school is not the right choice and I am sure it was not what the community wanted when they voted this new school board in.

William S. Umek
Morrisville