Category Archives: Letters

A Letter From The Editor: An Important Update

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To Our Readers:

I wanted to update you on what has been happening to LymeLine for the past few days. 

The site experienced a major catastrophe earlier this week and ultimately, it turned out the only way to recover was to build a new site. As many of you will know, this normally takes weeks and often months but my remarkable IT Director (aka my husband) has worked round the clock to create a functioning site. Huge thanks to him.

It is, however, still very much a work in progress but it is, at least, here and working. We will continue to improve its design and increase the content on a daily basis. I felt we could not wait until the site was perfect since the election and school building referendum are just around the corner.

We will add back all the categories in due course and also the Community Calendar. The site was thankfully backed-up effectively but we have lost a handful of the most recent articles, which included a Letter to the Editor about the School Building Referendum. I have re-created most of the articles already and re-published the letter. We will be contacting readers, who had previously commented on the letter, inviting them to resubmit their comments as we are unable to do that on their behalf.

Due to these unexpected issues, we are going to postpone publication of the election candidate bios and their responses to our questions until next Wednesday, Nov. 2.

Thank you to all the kind readers, who contacted us to see if things were OK. I appreciate all the messages, especially the one from someone, who hoped we had not ceased publication, and said simply, “I would really miss LymeLine.”

Please bear with us as we work through this and hopefully end up with a both improved and also mobile-responsive site. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Sincerely,

Olwen Logan

Letter to the Editor: Too Many ‘Wants’ in Proposed Building Plan, Vote ‘Emphatically No’

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To the Editor:

As a prior member of the 2000 project Building Committee and having spent 20+ years designing and administering school projects in Connecticut, I can’t vote for this referendum.

First, we spent $36 million on the four schools in 2000. Now add $57 million and we will have spent a total of $93 million on four buildings … or $23,250,000 on each building … or approximately $1 million a year per building for 22 years!

Something is wrong with this picture. I’m not sure how this “snowball” got started but I think it’s rolled downhill too fast!

It’s obvious enrollment was not the impetus … perhaps HVAC was. And the fact that a lot of the HVAC work is not reimbursable is beside the point. 

To jump to “Renovate as New” only greatly expands the project scope/cost … the increased reimbursement does not justify the scope expansion.

If HVAC is what’s truly needed, let’s do that work … state participation or not. I’ve looked for a list of eligible/ineligible items with associated dollars but cannot find it. 

I could go on and on with questions regarding the proposal but I feel there are way too many “wants” rather than “needs.”

I implore all to vote emphatically No to this referendum.

Sincerely,

Charlie Meek,
Old Lyme.

Letter to the Editor: Lyme-Old Lyme Schools BOE Apparently Did Not Care What Residents Thought About Armed Guards, Will They Behave Same on Proposed $57.6 Million Building Plan? Will Residents Speak Up?

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To the Editor:

The Reticent Residents of this town have nothing to say about paying $57,555,000 for the planning, design, demolition, construction, and renovation of our public schools.

Let me break the silence. That is a hell of a lot of money.

We have 1362 children attending our schools. That comes out to about $42,000 per student, OK?

Yet the people in our community, as with the issue of arming security officers in these same schools, remain mostly silent.

I don’t get it.

I certainly didn’t understand why, if someone has a child in these schools, they didn’t feel it was important to offer an opinion on putting guns into the schools. There is no evidence that arming guards protects students and school personnel. Most people who took time to offer an opinion spoke against the idea, yet, it was ramrodded through. I have yet to see how much that will cost, what training these guards will undertake, what rules will govern their use of weapons, or what kind of guns we will be buying.

Do parents feel that our schools are falling apart?

I know there will be a hearing this week but, is there any point? Has the Board already decided to go ahead? It has only set aside 30 minutes [Wednesday, Sept. 7] to discuss the issue. (That works out to dealing with $1.918,500 per minute.) What effect will the Board’s disrespect for the opinions of people who spoke against arming guards have on this and future proposals?

Sincerely,

Charlotte Scot,
Old Lyme.

Letter to the Editor: Armed Guards in Lyme-Old Lyme Schools — More Questions

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To the Editor:

Does anyone, parents or voters, know yet how much more in taxes they will be forced to pay for the salaries and insurance coverage of armed guards in Region 18 schools? Region 18, OUR schools.

If this is public knowledge, I cannot find anything.

Nor can I find any information on whether the armed guards will also be present during after-school activities, including sports practices or games. Perhaps I missed something? I would think the liability insurance will be very high, since these guards are employees of Region 18 and due to the real risk of the guards accidentally shooting a parent, teacher, visitor or God forbid, a student.

I, for one, am unwilling to pay taxes for such a dangerous and ineffective initiative. Data, not “feelings” or political beliefs inform my opinion.

Superintendent Ian Neviaser rushed this through, with the help of the Region 18 Board of Education (BOE), despite parent opposition. Of note, there are no armed guards in the community he resides in, and where his own children attended school.

Demand answers from him and the BOE, and our selectmen and woman, Tim Griswold, Matt Ward and Martha Shoemaker. All can be contacted via email at first initial, last name ( no space) @oldlyme-ct.gov.

Sincerely,

Betsy Groth,
Old Lyme.
Pediatric Nurse Practitioner and child advocate 
Member GAGV ( CT Against Gun Violence)
Retired faculty, Yale School of Nursing

Letter to the Editor: Armed Security Guards in Lyme-Old Lyme Schools are Not the Solution to Gun Violence

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To the Editor:

This past Wednesday, the Board of Education voted 7-2 to place armed guards at District 18 schools. Though many board members expressed reservations, including to NBC News, it passed.

I am submitting this letter as a child advocate and as a pediatric nurse practitioner withe certification and expertise in pediatric mental health. I am a parent and a community member. I have many friends and family in the teaching profession. I make my decisions based on data, not emotions. At the same time, it is impossible not to be emotional about children blown to unrecognizable bits. As a former pediatric critical care nurse, I have taken care of young gun violence victims, but have not been forced to bear witness to a massacre, as first responders have been.

I think after the tragic massacre in Uvalde, our immediate reaction is “do something, anything.” That something should not be armed guards at school. There is zero evidence that armed guards make schools safer, and plenty of evidence that they do NOT. The recent mass murderer in Buffalo was not deterred by an armed guard. This is anecdotal, but typical.

Placing armed guards in District 18 schools would be expensive and in no way is a solution to mass murders in school or elsewhere, and it would be a daily reminder to children that they are not safe. No one will be safe anywhere until gun laws are passed to ban assault weapons, enforce waiting periods and background checks.

Further, teenagers do not have developed frontal cortexes. This is the part of the brain responsible for judgement. They cannot control their impulses. They have no business owning lethal weapons.
Parents, teachers and school administrators who really want to protect children should relentlessly advocate for these changes.

Armed school guards are not even a bandaid, much less a solution.

My letter with this information as well as links to studies was submitted to the BOE before Wednesday’s meeting. It was not even mentioned in the discussion that night.

Sincerely,

Betsy Groth,
APRN (active); Faculty Yale School of Nursing (Retired); Member, CT Against Gun Violence,
Old Lyme.