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Date: 5/19/2016
LONGMEADOW – The June 14 Town Election will feature no contested races for key positions in town government, including two seats on the Select Board and School Committee, respectively.
Incumbent Selectman Mark Gold and newcomer William Low are running for three-year terms on the Select Board. Incumbent and first term Selectman Alex Grant chose not to run for reelection.
Low told Reminder Publications he believes the town is facing some serious issues in the near future such as reaching the tax levy ceiling.
“I will be looking for ways to raise revenue without taxing homeowners to death,” he explained. “The town needs a new Senior Center, or major renovations to the existing one. The [Department of Public Works (DPW)] facility needed to be renovated or moved 30 years ago. In the next five to 10 years there will be consolidation of some schools. With all these things on the horizon plans need to made [as soon as possible] or the town will face these capital projects very close to each other.”
He added the existing DPW complex is located in a flood zone and the area is too small for a modern facility.
“It’s my opinion that the best site for a new facility won’t necessarily be the one the majority of people in town want, therein lies the dilemma,” Low said. “Like a lot of people I wish it could stay where it is, but that appears to be very difficult to do.”
Low said he hopes to help streamline meetings and discussions on policy issues.
“I’m not interested in long discussions just for the sake of hearing myself speak,” he noted. “I will seek to identify issues, vet them, [and] then make decisions. I have no interest in recommending policies, or warrants for Town Meetings that have no purpose other than to over burden the residence of Longmeadow with useless regulations. Finally, as a lifelong resident, I will make recommendations that I think the citizens of the town want and help with long range planning in order to preserve the character of Longmeadow.”
Gold said he’s running for reelection because he believes there’s still important work to be done in town, which he could contribute to. He’s running for his third term as selectman.
He added one of the biggest needs for the town is to find new non-tax revenues.
“It’s things like putting in a solar field for potentially, if we do move the DPW, we can put it where the old DPW was,” Gold said.
He said he supports the DPW complex project, but at a site other than Wolf Swamp Fields.
“There are other sites in town that would be preferable; that would be less impactful on the town, specifically,” Gold explained.
He said he believes the town needs to spend money on improving the Adult Center, but is not sure whether paying for a new center would be a fiscal project that the town would rally behind.
“I’d like to think that there’s less expensive ways of providing the services we need,” Gold said. “We spent millions of dollars from the last five years on our current Adult Center.”
The issue of the town approaching the tax cap of $25 per $1,000 of assessed values is also something Gold said he would work to find solutions on.
“I believe that the approach that we ought to take ought to be to seek a home rule petition through the state legislature to see if we can get relief,” he explained.
The two candidates for School Committee are newcomer Stephanie Jasmin and Jessica Hutchins, who are both seeking three-year terms. Incumbent School Committee members Janet Robinson and Kimberly King chose not to run for reelection.
Hutchins said she’s running for the committee because she is passionate about education in Longmeadow and would be a strong advocate for the children in the community.
“I believe that my personal and professional experience are valuable as we make the transition to a new superintendent,” she noted. “This experience includes: a three-year term on [the] School Committee, seven years on the Blueberry Hill School Council, a professional background in education and child advocacy and a parent with three children in grades kindergarten, five and seven.”
Hutchins said she believes full-day kindergarten is no longer a luxury, but a necessity.
“I think a lot of people are surprised to know that kindergarten has changed a lot, even over the past decade,” she explained. “The original model for [kindergarten] was a transition year for young children to become acclimated to the structure and expectations of the public school setting. This is a significant developmental transition for young children. Play was an important part of this process.”
She continued, “The social-emotional component to kindergarten has been hammered by demands of the curriculum – these children are now also expected to be reading and writing by first grade. There is simply no way to accommodate all of these expectations in a half-day program anymore.”
Hutchins also addressed long-term planning issues in the town related to constructing new or renovated facilities.
“I think we would benefit from having a single building committee in town,” she noted. “We have to start looking at these large, long-term financial commitments as a whole, not in isolation. When we have separate committees for the DPW and senior center, and none for the middle schools, its not only inefficient, its creates a divisiveness – everyone in their own corner.”
Although Jasmin is a newcomer to town government, she has been involved with Longmeadow politics via local citizen action groups such as Residents for Equality in Kindergarten Education, which she is the founder of, in the past.
Jasmin said she hopes to bring her knowledge of education policy and research to the table if elected to the committee. She has a background in child mental health and development.
“A lot of my work with children surrounding issues of child development and mental health involve the education system,” she noted. “I have been involved with education in that way for years.”
She said she helped launch the Special Education Alliance of Longmeadow (SEAL) last spring, which she is the co-president of. The organization focuses on special education in town.
Jasmin is also a long-time advocate for funding free full-day kindergarten. She said she was very happy to see the School Committee fund the program in its fiscal year 2017 budget.
“I think it was something that needed to happen … It’s a benefit for everyone in Longmeadow, not just families with children going into kindergarten,” she explained. “It’s something that benefits everybody because it is a huge positive for the town.”
Incumbent Planning Board member Walter Gunn is the only candidate running for one five-year term on the board and no residents took out nomination papers for a five-year term on the Housing Authority.
Gunn did not respond to a request for comment as of press time.
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