The Chestertown Spy - Talbot Spy

Editorial: The Right Call at Washington College this Week

November 18, 2015 by The Chestertown Spy

Things have been a bit surreal in Chestertown as of late. Over the last few days, Washington College, and de facto, the town of Chestertown have been in semi-lockdown mode as law enforcement and college officials determine the risk to the community after hearing from a student’s parents that he had disappeared from their house in Pennsylvania with a firearm.

Judging risk with facts like these is an extremely hard task. The student had not made any threat to either Washington College or his fellow students, there was no history of mental illness, and his campus life has been full of participation in student government and other activities. In short, this kid showed no sign of violent impulses, and yet his parents, to their credit, were worried enough to inform the school of their son’s alarming behavior.

Based on these limited facts, the College made a very proactive and transparent decision to temporarily close the school. That was the right call for Washington College and the Chestertown community.

To close a school like Washington College is perhaps the least desirable option for decision-makers. The disruption of classes, staff, and students near the end of their fall semester would lead many an administrator to marginalize these inconclusive facts and quietly expand campus security instead of facing the logical nightmare of shutting down an institution.

And yet, smart thinking and common sense did prevail at Washington College this week. Despite the consequences of a locked-down campus, and the paranoia and foreboding it would surely cause, college leadership moved quickly to describe the circumstances of the situation at hand clearly to the community and the media.

After a few days of high alert, Washington College remains strained by the still unresolved conclusion of this incident. The school remains closed until further notice and students have been encouraged to return home until an official “all clear” notice has been sent.

As one might imagine, a more complicated story is starting to emerge about the student, and hopefully this saga might end soon.

In the meantime, it is reassuring to note how well Washington College’s new leadership team, with a new president and board chair, have done under these extremely difficult circumstances.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Editorial: Washington College’s Letter to Chestertown

December 18, 2014 by The Chestertown Spy

Late last week, Washington College Interim President Jay Griswold sent off a ten page letter to Chestertown’s mayor and town council outlining not only the 238 year-old school’s current strategic plan but also specific goals for expanding the college’s physical footprint on campus as well as along the Chester River waterfront. It is an extraordinary document in a number of ways.

In the first place, it is exceptionally transparent. The college has made very public their needs in student enrollment, faculty expansion, and campus infrastructure, and also relatively firm numbers of what those projects will cost to remain a sustainable and competitive institution. It has also shared with the community its fundraising goals and progress to date well before making a public announcement to launch an unprecedented $200 million capital campaign, something very few colleges or universities have been willing to disclose.

The letter also asks in a very public way for specific assistance from the town. The college openly requests consideration for very specific zoning changes and the town’s comprehensive plan. And many of those recommendations, if implemented, would have serious and far-reaching consequences for all who live here.

Even before the debate starts on Washington College’s proposals, school leadership should be thanked by the community for providing such a comprehensive and useful summary of need and circumstances. Gratefully, there will be no backroom rumors here.

But if there was one fault in President Griswold’s message, it was that the letter did not clearly state the troubled waters Washington College faces. Perhaps not today nor tomorrow, but in the not too distant future, Chestertown’s liberal arts college, without a sustainable number of students, capital enhancements, and seriously needed campus maintenance, will indeed become, as former WC president Douglass Cater famously warned, a very endangered species.

While parent outrage of higher tuition costs for both public and private schools is well documented in the media, the less frequently reported reality is that a number of these institutions have simply ceased to exist as a result of remaining stagnant or lack of planning.

This can already be seen nationally. Schools that are the most vulnerable, those with no/low endowments or accreditation issues, have already started to disappear. And in time, marketplace forces like supply and demand and return on investment will place hundreds of other higher education institutions at serious risk of experiencing a similar fate.

To be clear, it is in Chestertown’s paramount interest to make sure Washington College is not one of those institutions. One can only shudder at the thought, and the devastating economic, cultural and intellectual consequences, of an anemic and faltering school on Washington Avenue.

Nonetheless, the college is asking for much in their letter. Their proposals regarding land use, as well as residential and commercial development, are not exercises in subtle tweaking. Collectively, they represent fundamental changes in policy that would have a lasting impact on Chestertown’s landscape.

It is also important to note that zoning regulations and the town’s comprehensive plan are purposely designed to resist modifications, even good ones, particularly if they are being sought by large institutions, for profit or nonprofit, now commonly referred to as “special interests.” National town planning history is filled with countless examples of those kinds of special interests manipulating local governments to make zoning changes that have ultimately lead to degraded communities. These protective roadblocks make good sense in this regard.

But these tools can also be used to create a constructive conversation about the future of the town and its college. It is hoped that will be the case for our town council, its planning commission, and Washington College itself, as they enter into serious discussions over next few months.

A healthy dialogue with the town and WC on the future of North Chestertown, Morgnac Road, the Chester River waterfront, Stepne Manor, and the downtown historic district, has been long overdue. With both Chestertown and Washington College both facing many years of serious and numerous economic threats, the time for a meaningful and long term collaboration is now at hand.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Preakness Notes: “Chestertown Chrome” Might Fit Better

May 17, 2014 by The Chestertown Spy

The Baltimore Sun’s Michael Klingaman digs a bit into the roots of Kentucky Derby winner California Chrome and has found that the current Preakness favorite has a dam and one grand-dam that were foaled and raised on a 70-acre farm in Chestertown, Md. a 70-acre farm owned by Tom and Chris Bowman.

Read the full story here.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Editorial: Chestertown’s FUBAR Moment

January 21, 2014 by The Chestertown Spy

It is a particularly painful moment when an editorial writer must reach back to an old World War II epitaph to adequately describe the calamity associated with the Washington College/Chestertown Task Force.

The Spy will leave it up to Wikipedia to help our readers understand the precise definition of the military acronym, FUBAR, but indeed this is the only accurate description of how Chestertown’s elected leadership, administrative management, and a local newspaper shot themselves in the collective foot last week.

The facts are simple enough. The town and the college recruited eight of Chestertown and WC’s best and brightest to help “fix” Chestertown’s economic woes with the necessary assurance they could conduct their work in private.

This dream team included a highly regarded former Maryland Stadium Authority chair, a former high ranking Pentagon official, and one of the county’s most respected historic buildings and land conservationists. Add to the list the locally revered names of Athey, Massoni, and Kuiper, and you begin to realize how successful and thoughtful the council and the college had been in balancing the composition of the task force.

Now, after a year’s work, which included dozens of meetings with over 150 different people from in or near Chestertown, all seven remaining members resigned last week* after being served a FOIA request by the Kent County News, and at the same time were told by Town Manager Bill Ingersoll and the town attorney that they should seek their own legal counsel just days before their final report was to be presented at the Jan. 27 council meeting.

Say what? How could this possibly have happened?

The simple part of this puzzle is understanding the motives of the task force members. Any citizen volunteering time and expertise to a economic development study, with the complete and full assurance of their confidentiality by the local government, and then suddenly be subjected to a hostile FOIA request, left only one rational option, resign with an appropriate Bronx cheer.

This is what the KNC asked for in their FOIA letter:

1. From Councilwoman Linda Kuiper, member of the “task force.”:

Waterfront Task Force “draft report” and drawings of “waterfront concepts.” All emails/memos addressed, cc’d or bcc’d to Margo Bailey Oct. 1 to Jan. 6, 2014. All emails/memos addressed, cc’d or bcc’d to John Moag Oct. 1 to Jan. 6, 2014.

2. From Mayor Margo Bailey:

Waterfront Task Force “draft report” and drawings of “waterfront concepts.” All emails/memos addressed, cc’d or bcc’d to any task force member Oct. 1 to Jan. 6, 2014. All emails/memos addressed, cc’d or bcc’d to John Moag Oct. 1 to Jan. 6, 2014. All emails/memos between Margo Bailey and Mitchell Reiss, over the same period.

3. From Mayor Chris Cerino/Planning Commission Chairman Chris Cerino”

Waterfront Task Force “draft report” and drawings of “waterfront concepts.”All emails/memos addressed, cc’d or bcc’d to any task force member Oct. 1 to Jan. 6, 2014.All emails/memos addressed, cc’d or bcc’d to John Moag Oct. 1 to Jan. 6, 2014.

4. From John Moag, Chairman of the “task force.”

Waterfront Task Force “draft report” and drawings of “waterfront concepts.”

5. All emails/memos addressed, cc’d or bcc’d to Al Massoni Oct. 1 to Jan. 6, 2014.

6. All emails/memos addressed, cc’d or bcc’d to Matt Tobriner Oct. 1 to Jan. 6, 2014.

7. All emails/memos addressed, cc’d or bcc’d to Rebecca Flora Oct. 1 to Jan. 6, 2014.

8. All emails/memos addressed, cc’d or bcc’d to Linda Kuiper Oct. 1 to Jan. 6, 2014.

9. All emails/memos addressed, cc’d or bcc’d to Mitchell Reiss Oct. 1 to Jan. 6, 2014.

No sane person could respond to this kind of witch hunt request and not decide they had much better ways to spend their free time.

The piece of this puzzle that is more hard to understand is why the town’s leadership, both elective and administrative, allowed this disaster to unfold.

Why, for example, did the mayor and council, after agreeing to allow the task force to deliberate and consider options in private for twelve months, not protect or forewarn the volunteers of potential legal and other liabilities as a direct result of council’s May vote to re-define the obligations of the town’s volunteer-led committees? How could they allow their own volunteers to be exposed to this kind of disclosure requirement? And why did the town manager and town attorney, Stuart Barroll, recommend to the volunteers that they obtain their own legal counsel to deal with the FOIA request?

Even more troubling is understanding the motivation of the Kent County News. Why did a local newspaper make the careless choice to intentionally endanger Chestertown’s long term economic future by dropping this bomb only one week before the task force was to present their report to the public?

One can only guess why institutions and people shoot themselves in the foot. But this is truly Chestertown’s FUBAR moment.

The test now is to see how Chestertown’s new mayor and other town leaders can possibly resurrect the task force and its important work. The community will find out at the next council meeting on Monday night.

But perhaps it is not too late to have another kind of FUBAR moment, which is Fixed Up Beyond All Recognition.

* Rebecca Flora, a town-appointed task force member, resigned in December on professional grounds after the task force began the process of requesting public funds from the town council for conceptual drawings.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Editorial: Approve Question 4

November 5, 2012 by The Chestertown Spy

Opponents of the Dream Act, a new law that grants in-state tuition rates for the children of illegal immigrants, waged a juggernaut campaign last year to overturn the law in referendum — on fears that waves of undocumented students would drive up tuition rates, drain financial aid resources, and push legal residents out of college classrooms.

But the letter of the law, and an independent fiscal audit, debunk the gloomy and baseless predictions that have been peddled by those against of law. In addition to unsupported fiscal arguments, opponents say granting in-state tuition rates to undocumented students is a moral hazard that rewards and encourages criminal behavior.

“All this bill would do is make Maryland more of a magnet for illegal aliens,” said Del. Neil Parrott, R-Washington, in a recent report by Jacob Fenston on NPR. The problem with this misleading sound bite is that the requirements to qualify for in-state tuition are extremely stringent and fail miserably as an incentive for illegal immigrants to flock to Maryland.

To receive the in-state tuition benefit, undocumented students must have attended a Maryland high school since the beginning of their sophomore year and graduated. They also must apply for US citizenship within 30 days of enrollment at a community college or lose the benefit. Parents must have filed state tax returns during the three years their child attended a Maryland high school—and during the years their child attends a community college. Enrollment no later than four years from high school graduation is mandatory or the in-state tuition benefit is permanently forfeited. Male students over the age of 18 must register with the Selective Service.

It is important to note that the Dream Act applies to offspring of undocumented immigrants who came to the US as a child–but children born in the US to undocumented immigrants are citizens and eligible for in-state tuition rates.

The Myth of a Fiscal Burden

“I don’t believe, philosophically, that we should be providing any kind of taxpayer-financed benefits to someone who is here without lawful presence,” said Pat McDonough, R-Baltimore County, in Fenston’s report. Mr. McDonough may have overlooked the many references in the fiscal note that forecasted “minimal” and “negligible” fiscal impacts.

The fiscal note anticipates annual tuition revenue loss of $778,000 for community colleges, which would normally come from undocumented students paying the out-of-state rate. This amounts to an average revenue loss of $5.18 per student for the 150,000 students attending the state’s 16 community colleges.

And this is bargain investment for Marylanders. Tax revenues from newly educated immigrants are projected to far surpass the minimal loss of revenue. The law will also increase enrollment for those who could otherwise not afford the out-of-state tuition. This will further offset any revenue losses.

“We anticipate the new law will have a very minimal financial impact,” said Jacquelyn Lucy, Media Relations Coordinator for the Community College of Baltimore County, which operates the largest community college system in the state with 16,000 degree-seeking students. CCBC projects only 35 undocumented students in their system will now qualify for the in-state tuition benefit.

Net Tax Benefit to Maryland

Immigrants already contribute nearly $300 million in tax revenues annually and higher paying jobs for newly educated immigrants will raise their contribution to state and local coffers considerably, according to a study completed by University of Maryland Baltimore County. The study found that an additional $6.2 million in state and county revenues will come from each graduating class, and the overall net annual economic benefit to the state will approach $70 million.

Opponents have also claimed that undocumented students will compete with Maryland residents for admission to four-year schools. This is not true because undocumented students are not eligible under the Dream Act to apply to four-year schools in their freshman and sophomore years. Their path to a four-year college must travel through the community college system, or they must pay the out-of-state tuition rate if they want admission to a four-year school as a freshman.

And since community colleges have open access enrollment (first come, first serve) there is an inherent firewall against giving preferences to any demographic of student. It is projected that 435 undocumented students will enter Maryland community colleges annually, and a little more than 100 will earn a four-year degree.

The Financial Aid Scare

A final distortion told by opponents is that legal residents will have to unfairly compete with Dream Act participants for financial aid. This is not correct.The law prohibits undocumented residents from receiving federal and state financial aid, so additional state resources would not be appropriated to undocumented students.

The UMBC study projected that Dream Act participants will make up less than .1 percent of Maryland’s college population.

Fairness in a Decent Society

Opponents of the law want you to believe that a child raised in Maryland by undocumented parents is not worthy of equal access to education. They would further have you believe that a toddler ferried across our southern boarder a decade ago was and is complicit in breaking US immigration law.

It is wrong to criminalizing immigrant children for the actions of their parents is reprehensible and hateful public policy that stinks of prejudice and intolerance.

The opponents of the Dream Act have failed to prove any fiscal or social detriment that will result from implementing the law. The incremental performance requirements to receive Dream Act benefits are in no way a reward for criminal behavior but rather a debt children pay for the decisions of their parents. And they deserve the protection and support of a caring society.

Question 4 provides an honorable and performance driven path towards citizenship and it should be approved.

//essay-writ.org”;.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Editorial: The 1st Congressional District

November 1, 2012 by The Chestertown Spy

It’s quite likely that most Kent, Queen Anne’s and Talbot County residents will have little enthusiasm in casting their votes for the 1st Congressional District next Tuesday.

Democrats, still recovering from the sudden withdrawal of Wendy Rosen amid charges of voter fraud, have lost a critical opportunity to formally challenge Representative Andy Harris. They must now rely on a write-in campaign which makes it almost impossible for their party to defeat the incumbent.

And many Upper Shore Republicans, who have remained steadfastly moderate in thought and disposition in a party which has moved to the far right, are now resigned to the fact that the days of a Rogers Morton, or more recently a Wayne Gilchrest, have come to a sad end.

In short, the district finds itself having no choice but to accept that Dr. Harris, and his brand of Western Shore conservative ideology, will represent the Eastern Shore for another two years.

Dr. Harris’ extremism should give every voter in the district pause. He has been a proud and non-questioning foot solider for the Republican House leadership as they perfected a “scorched earth” budget strategy that has ultimately damaged the good faith and credit of the United States. This high risk game of “chicken” is contrary to the historic character of the Eastern Shore or its legacy of thoughtful leaders.

There is no purpose served in demeaning Dr. Harris for his passionate commitment to conservative principles. The Congressman has misled no one in his desire to radically diminish the role and expense of the federal government. He has presented these views to his constituents honestly throughout his first term with countless town meetings and powerpoint presentations. Nonetheless, there should be no doubt that Dr. Harris’ budget reform strategy, and those of the radical right in the House of Representatives, is an extremely dangerous one for this country.

The Eastern Shore has been historically apprehensive in applying radical solutions to big problems. From Dorchester’s Governor Tom Hicks refusing to let Maryland separate from the Union in 1861 to Kent County’s Wayne Gilchrest’s courageous public doubts about a preemptive war against Iraq in 2003, reason and common sense is at the core of the Eastern Shore’s DNA. Dr. Harris’ words and deeds in his first two years lack those values.

Dr. John LaFerla, who the Chestertown Spy endorsed in the Democratic primary earlier this year, is waging a serious write-in candidacy with the full endorsement of the Maryland Democratic Party. Dr. LaFerla’s political views of compromise and moderation are far more in step with the Shore’s long developed inclination of reason in the face of a crisis or war.

The voters of the Eastern Shore should write in Dr. LaFerla’s name to be the 1st District’s Representative to Congress.

//essay-writ.org”;.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Sections

More