I’ve had the great fortune of teaching at Newton South for 23 years. Here in Newton, educators are committed to doing best for our students. However, teaching and learning have only gotten more challenging over the years — our students today have more opportunities, and more obstacles, than ever before.…
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I am writing to express a point of view, which may be widely held but which I have not yet seen voiced, perhaps because those who have it may feel isolated. I care about our education, teachers, schools and infrastructure. I also know that this all takes money. I have…
I’ve seen some override misinformation on social media, so I’d like to encourage everyone to learn as much as they can and fact-check so we can make the best decision for Newton on March 14. Question #1 will let us avoid drastic cuts in teaching positions in our schools, giving…
Newton Mayor Fuller says if the property tax override is not passed, then students will suffer because teaching positions will be cut. This feels a lot like extortion being used against the parents of Newton. The mayor has spent money on pet projects such as the unusable “Hello Newtonville” study…
The Newtonville Area Council (NAC) has produced a 3D model that purports to illustrate what would be allowed by right in the first draft of the Village Center Zoning Proposal. The Building Professionals Zoning Working Group analyzed the NAC presentation. We found a number of inaccuracies and unrealistic assumptions. The…
The city of Newton has been criticized for its excessive spending. A few years ago I did my own analysis to try and quantify Newton’s spending versus a reasonable baseline. The baseline I chose was the Federal Reserve Bank [FRB] yearly inflation rate. It is a good measure of the yearly increase in the…
Up-zoning Newton’s village centers will dramatically impact the future of our Garden City. Residents need visualizations of the up-zoning ZAP plans to ask the City Council to approve in May. The Planning & Development Department has not provided this basic information to the community, instead spending time and resources on…
Getting significant additional funding to help restore the city’s loss of street trees is a major reason that I will vote “Yes” for Newton’s override on March 14. At the beginning of the 1980s, Newton had 39,000 street trees. After years of losing trees that were not replaced, the city…
People often wonder what areas in Newton should be considered as locations for transit-oriented development. To look at this question, I researched how people get to work now based on where they live. (The Census Bureau collects data on means of transportation to work broken down by census block groups.)…
I support the proposed three overrides as essential to maintaining Newton’s capital infrastructure. Newton is an exceptional city but if one scratches the surface, many problems become apparent. I’ve chaired the Property Board for the United Parish of Auburndale (UPA) during its recent major capital improvement campaign. My first job…