I was a bit surprised by Deborah Skauen-Hinchliffe’s letter last week expressing “disgust” at Marie Sobarvarro’s exercise of her First Amendment rights to petition our elected officials. Having worked with Deborah when I served on the Alternative Finance Committee a few years back, her position seemed strange, given her concerns about our structural deficit and desire to reduce the tax burden on our seniors and farmers. Her claim that Marie’s communications with Rep. Eldridge were somehow wrong is either misplaced or a misunderstanding. Marie should be applauded for expressing her individual views about Harvard, as should any candidate running for a local office. There is nothing in our history, our law, or our Constitution that asks our town officials to forfeit their First Amendment rights when they take public office.
Marie recognized the importance of informing our legislators about the impact of inequitable and inadequate state education funding under Chapter 70 in Harvard. Marie is not alone. George McKenna, Virgina Justicz, Tim Clark, Ron Ricci, and Stu Sklar (and likely others) have visited with or contacted government officials to express their views. Our structural deficit is largely due to this inequity, and Ch. 70 needs to be fixed if we want to make overrides history.
It’s not a coincidence that the headline last week was the addition of about $250,000 in additional state aid for Harvard to help ameliorate our structural deficit. The message is getting through. While on average the Ch. 70 formula seeks to allocate money to communities based on what they can afford to pay and what they need, in many cases it works unfairly and forces communities like Harvard to tax their seniors and farmers at unaffordable rates. For this reason, we are asking our legislators: Why should a senior on a fixed income in Harvard pay more in property taxes than a senior of like means in Acton or Boxborough? Why does Acton-Boxborough school district receive $2,300 per student when Harvard receives $1,400 per student, representing a difference of $1 million in state aid for Harvard?
When any of us expresses our individual views on this subject, they are by definition views about Harvard. Let’s bring down the volume, bridge our differences, and seek solutions for, rather than arguments about, our challenges.
Bruce A. Leicher
Warren Avenue
