To the Editor:
Heather Bellow is correct [in Edge article about the proposed closure of the Monterey School]. This is not a new issue. The fights that occur between school districts and the towns that have created them are ongoing across America. Towns create districts for a variety of reasons. Water districts, fire districts but most often at the end of the 20th century, school districts across America, were created to absorb the baby boomers.
Towns banded together to pay for the cost of these “creatures” — not the kids — the District. I kid you not, the legal term for a District in a court of law is “creature.” It is an entity created for one purpose — water, fire, or education — and as such is a subservient “creature” to the towns it serves.
A town, on the other hand, has the responsibility to weigh and consider all of the needs of its citizens — everything, including education and how it is delivered ultimately rests in their hands. But because of the hefty percentage of taxes involved, these “creatures” can sometimes become a Frankenstein – a monster threatening the rights of the Town to whom it is supposed to report, not dictate. Districts, under the law, are subservient to Towns.
It is up to the Towns to re-establish that legal premise and assert its rights to determine the course of education in their respective Towns. This is their legal right and recourse, whether you agree with them or not. Think Patrick Henry here.
However, I have a feeling this is not about the questionable legal status of our District attempting to dictate policy to Monterey, and certainly not a question of education. But sadly again we see the question of money that has dogged our District for years and that we had hoped had been put to rest.
Susan Bachelder
Egremont
