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Date: 6/21/2023
CHICOPEE — While still in its infancy, the race for mayor is already proving to be contentious.
In announcing her decision to run for mayor, Ward 3 City Councilor Delmarina López took the opportunity to make pointed allegations at Mayor John Vieau and his management of the city and its schools.
For his part, Vieau, who has yet to officially announce his intent to run for reelection, defended his record and the work of his administration.
Vieau shared, “I didn’t want this to be reactionary to an announcement, but facts are facts. We’re entitled to run but we’re not entitled to our own facts.”
López claimed that Vieau has defunded the schools and the district is on its way to receivership.
Vieau, who also serves as chair of the School Committee, responded to the receivership claim by saying, “It’s just not true,” a position supported by the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.
DESE Communications Director Jacqueline Reis said, “Neither Chicopee nor any of its schools are currently in receivership, nor are they currently under consideration for receivership. Per statute (chap. 69, sec 1J), schools must be designated underperforming before being designated chronically underperforming. Currently, there are no schools in underperforming status in Chicopee, so they are not under consideration for chronically underperforming status (receivership).”
When approached about the statement from DESE, López said, “It’s no secret that our schools are not performing as well as they used to. Our MCAS scores are down and our students and teachers are not getting the support they need and deserve. If this continues, our schools will end up in danger of receivership.”
Reminder Publishing reviewed available data from DESE and found that in 2021, 31% of students in grades 3-8 met or exceeded expectations for English language arts. In 2022, 27% of students fell in this category for ELA. Conversely, 25% of students in grades 3-8 met or exceeded expecations in math in 2022, compared to 19% the year before. However, in 2019, 42% of students in grades 3-8 were meeting or exceeding expectations in both ELA and math. There was no testing in 2020 as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
Among 10th grade students, 45% earned meeting or exceeding expectation marks for ELA in 2022, compared to 44% in 2021. Thirty-seven percent met or exceeded expectations in math in 2022, also beating the 2021 figure of 31%. However, 47% of 10th graders met or exceeded expectations in ELA and 42% were in this category in math in 2019.
The data suggests the drop in scores from before the coronavirus pandemic to the students’ eventual return to school in 2021 and 2022 could be a statewide trend from which districts are still attempting to rally.
Students meeting or exceeding expectations across the state made up 42% of ELA test-takers in grades 3-8 in 2022, compared to 52% in 2019. In math, 39% met or exceeded expectations in those grades, compared to 46% in 2019. At the high school level, 58% of students statewide met or exceeded expectations in ELA, compared to 61% in 2019. In Math, 50% were meeting or exceeding expectations in 2022, while 59% met those benchmarks in 2019.
The DESE report card for Chicopee also displays student progress. “Student growth measures the amount of academic progress a student made over the year, based on MCAS,” according to the report, comparing student performance on the test to other students with similar scores. Reported on a scale of 1-99 with an average growth score between 40 and 60 representing “typical progress,” Chicopee Public Schools had a score of 46.6 in 2022 and the state stood at 49.8.
Vieau claimed, “The schools are actually doing very well. One of our schools was heading into what they call ‘turnaround’ and it’s on the uptick. The principal there has done a tremendous job and all of our schools are heading in the right direction.”
When asked about the turnaround program, interim Superintendent Alvin Morton told Reminder Publishing that based on the Massachusetts state accountability system, a school or district can be placed in “turnaround” if they have an accountability percentile in the lowest 10%. “Typically, receivership is initiated when a school and/or district is in the 5% and significant improvement targets are not met,” he said.
To complete the turnaround, Morton said that schools and/or districts must show continued progress and reach above the 10%.
During the 2022-23 school year, Chicopee High School was involved in “turnaround” efforts under the oversight of the Chicopee Public Schools Office of Instruction and Accountability with support from the Massachusetts DESE Statewide System of Support. According to DESE’s 2022 accountability report for the district, Chicopee High School was in the 7th percentile.
Vieau also took umbrage with López’s claims that he cut funding for schools.
When asked to clarify her initial statement, López doubled down and said, “Mayor Vieau has defunded schools. He was aware of the discrepancies surrounding per capita spending as it was brought up during budgetary discussions last year.”
Vieau, however, said the schools right now have received more funding than they’ve ever received in the history of the department. “They have $11 million in their rollover account which is unheard of,” he shared.
Reminder Publishing attempted to receive more information from the district on its per capita spending and confirm Vieau’s figure regarding the rollover account, but did not receive a response from the school department to these inquiries as of press time.
Partial information available through the state’s district profiles reflects that the department’s per pupil expenditure average was $15,786.92 in 2020 and $17,014.78 in 2021. In 2021, that figure placed them locally just above the Quaboag Regional School District and the Hampden-Wilbraham Regional School District and slightly below Hadley schools and the Southwick-Tolland-Granville Regional School District.
Further addressing school funding, Vieau went on to say that they are investing in the school’s air quality and have started the exploratory for the new Barry Elementary School which was approved by the Massachusetts School Building Authority. “It’s our worst elementary school — it’s functionally [obsolete], it has built in tiers with a gym on the fifth floor with no elevator and a lot of asbestos,” Vieau said.
He expressed his gratitude to the MSBA and is “proud” to receive up to 80% reimbursement from the state to build and replace Barry Elementary School.
Vieau noted that the schools are in “excellent financial shape” moving into the new budget, along with money still left from Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief funds.
“There’s certainly no defunding going on in our schools,” he reiterated, later adding, “We have a fantastic school district and I know that we’re investing in it.”
Reminder Publishing reported during the fiscal year 2023 budget discussion that Vieau pointed to ESSER funding as part of his reasoning for declining to include the city’s $1.25 million annual allotment to the school budget instituted by former Mayor Richard Kos. López advocated for the continuation of the allotment, as did City Councilors Derek Dobosz, Mary-Elizabeth Pniak-Costello and Joel McAuliffe, but ultimately López joined the rest of the council in unanimously approving the budget.
López also alleged that crime is on the rise and has not been addressed. She also shared that there have been many recent vehicle-related fatalities.
“Regarding crime and public safety, it is no secret that crime has increased in our community,” López said. “Also, we are neglecting traffic safety concerns. The mayor and his administration have not taken immediate actions to mediate the increase in pedestrian fatalities due to motor vehicle accidents on our roads. Myself, and other councilors, have been met with resistance from the mayor on our proposals to increase pedestrian safety.”
According to available MassDOT data, 762 total crashes have occurred in 2023 so far, including 17 pedestrian-related incidents. 2022 saw 1,805 crashes with 27 involving pedestrians, compared to 1,733 and 20, respectively, in 2021. 2019 represented the highest recent number of total crashes and those involving pedestrians with 2,062 crashes and 42 pedestrian incidents. Those numbers decreased in 2020 to 1,579 and 30, respectively.
In 2023, four fatal crashes have a occurred in Chicopee, including one involving a pedestrian. In 2022, there were 12 fatal injury crashes, five of those fatalities being pedestrians. This was an increase from 2021, when there were eight fatal crashes, and one was a pedestrian. Chicopee expereienced five fatal crashes in 2020, and in 2019, there were eight fatal crashes, including two that killed pedestrians.
Vieau said that since being elected and throughout his 2019 campaign, he has focused on public safety. “I want to make sure people that live here feel safe,” he shared.
He explained that Chicopee residents are concerned about speeding, distracted driving and pedestrian/vehicle accidents, because there have been fatalities. To address this, Vieau said upgrades are currently being made including enhancing certain crosswalks and narrowing the crossing distance by putting in refuge islands and rectangular rapid flashing beacons, to name a few.
Vieau said the Police Department is out there in “full force” and the traffic bureau is passing out citations to those who speed. In May, over 700 tickets were given out and a record was set in 2022 with over 6,000, he shared. Reminder Publishing attempted to confim these figures with the Police Department but did not receive a response as of press time.
“The goal is to slow people down, let people know that they cannot be impaired when you drive, whether it be alcohol or marijuana,” Vieau said.
He noted that the city did a public service announcement with the police chief to get the message out as well as a safety campaign to see where the high-volume pedestrian accesses are and will be enhancing them with better lighting, painting crosswalks and more.
Reminder Publishing also attempted to vet López’s claim that crime was increasing by obtaining crime statistics from the Police Department’s records department and the chief but did not receive a response. With that said, according to data from the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting, the number of violent crimes reported in 2021 (267) were at their lowest levels since 2018 (242). 2019 represented the highest total of reported violent crime (340) in the period from 2011-2021. That number dropped to 294 in 2020. The three reported homicides in 2021 represented the most in that same time period, tying with 2017.
Property crime, according to the FBI’s statistics, has steadily dropped from 2011-2021. Its peak during this period was 1,680 reported crimes in 2012 and it reached its lowest point over that span in 2021 with 1,009. The total number of these crimes had dropped to 1,107 in 2018 before an uptick to 1,320 in 2019, but the trend resumed its positive trajectory in 2020 with 1,148 reported property crimes.
Currently, the Chicopee Police Department has close to 100 officers, with seven in the academy, according to Vieau. Vieau said the department’s goal is to have somewhere over 110 and have been looking for lateral transfers within the Police Department.
Reminder Publishing sought to verify the personnel figures, but Police Chief Patrick Major did not respond as of press time.
Recently, a second unit of C3 community policing was implemented. Vieau shared that the city is “really excited” about the relationships the police officers have been building through the C3 program and school resource officers.
“We want to make sure that people feel safe and if you don’t feel safe when you put your head down on your pillow and go to bed at night, then you’re not [going to] want to live in Chicopee … No matter how great the schools are, the services or whatever it may be — our great electric bill — you’re not [going to] want to live here,” Vieau said.
He shared that he is “proud” of what the Police Department has accomplished and takes a lot of pride in public safety.
Vieau said he has tried to be transparent since taking office and took aim at López’s assertions, calling them “irresponsible.”
“It’s heartbreaking when you’re mayor and you work so hard every day on the image of the city and try to portray and build upon and earn public trust and do the right thing and have someone just go out there with irresponsible rhetoric and comments that our schools are headed to receivership and crime is on the rise,” he said.
Overall, he said, “I’m really excited about where we’re headed as a city.”
Managing Editor Chris Maza contributed to this report.