Let’s come together as a community and renovate the Sunapee Central Elementary School. Please vote yes on Article 3.
This is about safety; it has always been about the safety of our elementary students. Please, let us come together as a community, focus on the facts, invest in safety and renovate the elementary school. The proposed renovation will address a lengthy list of noncompliance with life safety and ADA standards as well as educational space needs and environment shortcomings and constraints. This proposal brings forward a solution very similar to the plan and cost of the project last year that missed passing by 42 votes. This is a practical, thoughtful, financially prudent plan that will meet the safety needs of elementary students for years to come, while providing more flexible and modern learning spaces. The renovated school will stand as a symbol of community pride, an investment in our future.
I am thankful that through difficult conversations about budgets, safe K-12 learning spaces, mask mandates, and student wellness and mental health through COVID-19, almost every exchange has remained remarkably civil and understanding. While everyone is tired and weary from COVID-19 impacts on our lives, even the most ardent differences in opinions and experiences have been shared respectfully in Sunapee. That gives many of us hope. While other communities are struggling to even get through board meetings, the leaders, employees and boards in Sunapee have done their best to deliver. Our citizens have been engaged, responsive, patient and respectful.
We have something very special here in Sunapee with our schools and town. Let’s come together as a community and vote yes on Article 3 on March 8.
Please go to ABetterSCES.org to learn more. Thank you for your support of our schools and town.
Jesse Tyler
Sunapee
Jesse Tyler is a member of the Sunapee School Board
As I was reading the commentaries on high school guidance to further our education (“Gumption can be the great equalizer,” Feb. 3, and “Tapping potential,” Feb. 11), a memory came to mind from my days in high school in the early ’70s. As a few of us (guys) were sitting at a table in the lunchroom, our guidance counselor walked by and we asked him when and where we should take the SATs. He replied, “You guys aren’t going to college anyway — no need to take them.” When he left, we felt diminished and didn’t pursue it any further. Some guidance! I sometimes wonder what my life would have been like if he’d replied differently.
Mark Fields
Grantham
As I sit here listening to several of my favorite winter audio recordings, I am in a bit of a state of mourning. The Valley News article “The Occom Pond Party is over,” Feb. 9, and a January photo with a caption about Storrs Hill delaying its skiing season opening (“Here comes the groom,” Jan. 12) are just two examples that highlight the loss of snow in our area. From what I see, snow is a large part of the Upper Valley identity as a winter playground for its residents and those living in areas to the south. I have heard the argument that economic vitality and environmental protection are often cultural adversaries, but in our area some of the economic vitality stems from that protected environment. I have not seen an analysis of the economic benefits stemming from the two winter venues cited above, but I am sure that the economic benefits outweighed the costs, or at least they used to. Less quantifiable, but equally as important, are the social, physical and mental health benefits to those who participate in these, and similar, winter activities.
Yes, there are still many places to go to access winter fun, but you have to drive long distances (generating more greenhouse gases [GHG]), pay large trail fees and usually contend with large crowds. Increasingly these places are making snow (further aggravating the GHG problem) which is icier than natural snow, resulting in more, and more serious, injuries.
Please do whatever you can to reduce your own GHG footprint. If you like winter, maybe consider undertaking some steps to try to keep it alive here by reducing your GHG emissions. Start with weatherizing your home to be more energy efficient, reducing the amount you drive and fly, buying local, buying less and contacting your representatives to tell them you support energy efficiency and alternative energy generation initiatives. Additionally, consider starting, or expanding, your support of local sustainability and recreational organizations.
For those of you that can’t stand snow, you should give it a try. You don’t know what you are missing.
Bart Guetti
West Lebanon
Hey Valley News, your bias is showing again! A Biden Cabinet official is forced to resign due to bullying and demeaning others in the workplace, and not only does it fail to make the front page, but also the first section of your paper? You can’t tell me that if this happened to President Trump it wouldn’t be on the front page! Shame on you!
Jim Newcomb
North Haverhill