A blow to the campus’s heart

Upon reading the headline in Feb. 9’s Valley News “VTC, others to cut libraries” by VTDigger’s Jeralyn Darling (Page A2), I had to wonder if this was perhaps a premature April Fools’ Day headline. Surely any institution of higher learning would never eliminate or, as the article states, ‘repurpose’ its libraries?

Charles W. Eliot, longtime president of Harvard University, once wrote that “the library is the heart of the university.” Having personally spent over 30 years supporting the collection and technical service needs of academic libraries throughout the world, I can heartily confirm that this sentiment remains universally true today.

There is no more important building on the college campus than the library. The library holds, among its many assets of learning, physical books, primary sources, access to databases, space for student collaboration but also a dedicated and professionally trained library staff that passionately supports the research needs of students, faculty and researchers alike. Librarians and support staff are entrusted with ensuring access to information and facilitating the educational mission of the academic institution for which they serve.

Quite simply, a ‘digital-only’ library where students are left to rely on their own keyword searches across multiple databases and Google-like web platforms (assuming, too, that students will experience no internet connectivity issues) is no substitute for the knowledge and research skills of a professional librarian.

According to incoming Vermont State University president Dr. Parwinder Grewal, the decision to repurpose libraries on five campuses is one of two major “transformation decisions” impacting the Vermont State University system. While the growth, and ease of accessibility, to digitized resources is to be applauded the question remains why can’t this offering be a part of a truly holistic digital/print content offering centered around existing physical library resources and the professional staff that supports them?

Eliminating physical libraries which, as Charles Eliot reminded us, represent “the heart of the university” strikes this reader as a draconian approach that fails Vermont State University’s students, faculty and patrons.

Mark Kendall

Grantham

How many deaths?

The lines from a 1962 Bob Dylan song is going through my head: “How many deaths will it take till he knows / That too many people have died?” Monday, Feb. 13, three Michigan State students were killed; five were wounded and are in critical condition. In December 2021 a shooting at a Michigan school took the lives of four people. Tuesday, Feb. 14, was the fifth anniversary of the Parkland High School shooting in Florida where 17 people were killed. In none of these situations did “a good guy with a gun” save anyone.

According to Dylan’s song, the answer to the question, “is blowin’ in the wind.” I disagree. The answer lies with us as reasonable adults, as parents and as voters. We get to decide that the safety of our children is more important than the outdated words of the Second Amendment. We can decide that public safety holds more weight than the right to own a firearm. It is time for universal background checks, red flag laws, a waiting period to buy a firearm, requirements to prevent children from accessing firearms in a home. Other than with police, firearms do not belong on school grounds and at polling places. And it is high time to outlaw assault weapons.

As a society, we made a cultural shift around smoking and requiring seat belts. You can’t bring a newborn baby home from a hospital with showing an approved child safety car seat. Fifty years ago, when my child was born, this was not the case. If our children are our priority, we can accomplish a similar cultural shift around firearms.

Please follow the actions of your state legislature and make your voice heard. Let us make our children a priority over firearms.

Dena B. Romero

Hanover

A use for downed wood

The heavy snowfall prior to Christmas resulted in so many downed trees and limbs. I wonder if there is a process for making those downed limbs available for firewood for those in need of fuel for this winter or next winter after curing.

This seems like one way to make lemonade with lemons. I would love to hear from those that would know to use this windfall.

Lin Brown

Lyme

Lyme Road dorm project will create chaos

A frightening prospect awaits the many thousands of young people and adults who travel on, work, go to school, and make their homes along the Lyme Road corridor.

An influential Hanover town board, the Zoning Board of Adjustment, is considering whether to approve the construction of a dormitory complex designed to house 400 college undergraduates (known as the North Campus of Dartmouth College) that will be sited across the Lyme Road from the Coop roundabout.

If the project gets the go-ahead, its construction will create chaos in the community for years. Far worse will be the aftermath.

That campus, when built, will vastly expand the footprint of Dartmouth College, and, inevitably, unleash a wave of college-sanctioned construction along the corridor and deep into the adjoining land.

The ensuing academic sprawl will stymie traffic; create generational conflict (and danger) over the use of public pathways; intrude on life, work, and education for young people; negatively impact taxes and property values; and forever denigrate a quiet, residential part of Hanover.

What a travesty: for Dartmouth College to gobble up open land, destroy a neighborhood, and interfere with learning and livelihoods — when ample space for virtually unlimited building exists under the college’s nose and within its current footprint.

Steven C. Swett

Hanover

Dartmouth-Dresden land swap

I would like to suggest that Dartmouth College and the Dresden School District revisit the idea of a property swap involving Dartmouth land on Route 10 where the proposed dormitories would be built and Dresden land on Lebanon Street where the high school is located.

It was suggested once before and the advantages to both parties remain. Instead of building dormitories a considerable distance from the college, the college could build on land in town next to campus where students could walk to classes and events. Dresden would get land on which to build an energy-efficient high school with an educational philosophy for the 21st century. By locating the school where dorms are proposed, the district would get all of its Hanover schools in close proximity to one another to benefit busing, parent drop-offs, maintenance, staffing, and students’ opportunities to take high school courses. Hopefully there would be plenty of space to consolidate athletic fields, to provide adequate parking, and to provide safer traffic flow than currently exists on Lebanon Street. Being located next to the fire and police departments would be an added advantage.

There are other advantages and some disadvantages, but the possible swap should be discussed before any final decisions are made on land on Route 10. Opportunities like this do not happen often. Dartmouth and Dresden should talk to each other.

Bill Murphy

Hanover High School teacher

‘Tax bomb’ already dropped on Lebanon homeowners

After reading recent front page articles about the “tax bomb” looming over Norwich (“With school tax bomb looming in Norwich, Dresden district scrambles for solutions,” Jan. 29), and about the need to re-evaluate revaluations in Vermont (“Facing a crisis, Vermont House panel considers transforming property value reappraisals,” Feb. 4), what about the “tax bomb” already dropped on homeowners throughout Lebanon?

While generally sparing commercial properties, such as Walmart and Home Depot, the city raised residential property values by approximately 20%, or more, last fall. My $75,000 increase was more than it cost my wife and I to build our house on Poverty Lane in 1984. The actual tax bills, sent at the end of November, were increased in similar fashion.

In the late hours of Dec. 14, the night before 2022 tax bills were due, the city council finalized the 2023 budget by adding another $88,000. The budget was posted on the city website on Jan. 25. On page 16, in bold print, it reads: “The 2023 City Budget is $97,616,240 compared to $70,758,950 for 2022, an increase of $26,857,290, or 37.96%.” A letter to the city manager, and one to the mayor and city councilors, inquiring about these increases, got no response.

In the new budget, the line item for the three-person city manager’s office went up 16% ($205,000) to $1,489,480. So he should have no trouble paying his property tax bill.

Like many retired Lebanon homeowners, my major income source is Social Security. This “tax bomb,” along with a recently doubled monthly electric bill, completely obliterated the recent 8.7% boost in Social Security.

The “state-mandated” assessments, based on a “skyrocketing” housing market, were done by an out-of-state company, Government Vision Solutions, whose assessors most likely used computer algorithms and never set foot in Lebanon.

A skyrocketing home value does me no good whatsoever, whereas a 20% higher tax assessment/tax bill is very painful. To favor out-of-state, multimillion-dollar conglomerates over local longtime homeowners, based on a temporarily out-of-whack real estate market, does not seem correct. The commercial construction that has been permitted in Lebanon over the decades was supposed to help the residential tax rate, not make it worse.

Maybe we need listers, or a new city manager, or a new city council. Clearly, what we have in place now is not working for Lebanon homeowners.

Dick Nelson

Lebanon

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