Hundreds of millions are on the line for Norwich schools. Why don't people seem to care?
I've been fortunate in my 70 trips around the sun to have encountered some remarkably talented people whose patience in trying to teach me has occasionally overcome my inability to learn.
One of the precepts they've drilled into me is true of human nature everywhere and anywhere but most especially right here in the Rose of New England: People prefer problems that are familiar to solutions that are not.
In recent weeks, we’ve had opportunities to try to exert control over events we've talked about for decades. But talk is cheap.
We had the next installment of the soap opera, "As Route 82 Turns. Or Doesn’t," sponsored, as always, by local collision insurance companies and auto body shops. Experts from the Connecticut Department of Transportation offered slides and statistics to support their plan to construct (sooner and later) six roundabouts within a dramatically reconfigured Route 82, and relegating the sobriquet, "Crash Alley," to the dustbin of history.
A considerable (though nowhere near what I'd have hoped to see) number of residents, drivers and business owners shared their reactions, which sounded at times like "can you do something without doing anything?" I'm wondering if there might have been a more positive reaction if the roundabouts had been vertical like Hot Wheels Racing Loops instead of horizontal. I fear we may now never know.
Meanwhile, on the last Tuesday in June, was a public forum for a $381 million proposed school construction project (Norwich taxpayers' share would be $149 million) that reimagines and reengineers how public education will be delivered to our children for decades to come. Two things: yes, you read the dollars correctly, and almost no one attended the meeting.
There have been efforts over the last 25 years to invest in our schools, but this project is a big swing for the fences where, previously, we've tried to bunt our way around decaying buildings, inadequate facilities and obsolete technology supporting outdated curriculum with a lick and a promise, telling ourselves, "When times get better, we'll see what we can do." You'd think two years of COVID and its consequences might have added urgency to the process.
Norwich schoolsA $149 million plan would close all seven Norwich elementary schools, build four new ones
It doesn’t matter if you have children in our schools, you have a part in this. We all do. For our schools, our children, our teachers, and our city, the time is now for a serious discussion about the limits of making do as opposed to what we could and should do next.
Put this Monday evening at 6 p.m. on your calendar now because the City Council will hold a public workshop to discuss the scale, scope and costs with the architectural firm Drummey Rosane Anderson Inc. (DRA), upon whose master plan the school construction project is based (you can view a presentation given to the Board of Education last month at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ByuR0PZB5Jg&t=11s&ab_channel=NorwichPublicSchools). If you can't be in council chambers, then watch it on the city's website, or on Comcast's Government Access Channels (either Channel 182 or 1084). There are important decisions to be made and you’ll need every bit of information.
Every decision has a price and a cost. And when you decide to NOT decide, don’t kid yourself; that decision also has a price and a cost. We need to open our eyes and see what we need to do and then put our money where our mouths are.
Bill Kenny, of Norwich, writes a weekly column about Norwich issues. His blog, Tilting at Windmills, can be accessed at https://tiltingatwindmills-dweeb.blogspot.com/.
This article originally appeared on The Bulletin: Norwich school building construction plan should include your input
