Attend meetings in Cambridge from Sept. 1-8 about Central Square city property, Lesley plan
These are just some of the municipal meetings and civic events for the coming week. More are on the City Calendar and in the city’s Open Meetings Portal.
A rendering of a part of Lesley University’s planned South Campus in West Cambridge. (Image: Lesley University Campus Plan)
Regular School Committee meeting
School Committee, 6 p.m. Tuesday. There’s no agenda posted yet for this meeting “for the purpose of discussing any and all business that may properly come before the committee,” but there are several issues popping that may be included: a charge from the Cambridge Education Association that contract negotiations are bogged down due to committee stubbornness and “language that would significantly increase the superintendent’s decision-making power” over that of faculty; complaints that the creation of elementary school schedules lacked transparency and educator input; and lunchtimes that are getting shorter or already suffer from food lines so long and slow that students don’t have time to eat. The committee meets in the Dr. Henrietta S. Attles Meeting Room at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, 459 Broadway, Mid-Cambridge. Televised and watchable by Zoom videoconferencing.
Central Square City Lots Study
Central Square Advisory Committee, 6 to 8 p.m. Wednesday. An inventory of city-owned property showed so much of it in and around Central Square – a baker’s dozen of unused, overused and empty lots and buildings – that a separate Central Square Municipal Property Needs Assessment and Planning Study has been done. Five of the sites are parking lots where city councillors have called repeatedly for affordable housing to be built. A community engagement stage on figuring out uses is underway; all work on the city-owned property project is to be done in December. The committee meets on the second floor of the City Hall Annex, 344 Broadway, Mid-Cambridge. Watchable by Zoom videoconferencing.
A Common toilet; a Lesley plan
Historical Commission, 6 p.m. Thursday. The city plans to install a public toilet on Waterhouse Street, which defines the northern border of Cambridge Common; Lesley University asks to put two temporary construction trailers at 99 Brattle St., at its South Campus – which, in classic Cambridge style, is in West Cambridge – in preparation for work outlined in a plan to unite a school with three centers; and there’s the return of a plan for East Cambridge in which a developer would take down the little offices at 231 Third St. (built in 1916) and a single-family home at 235 Third St. (built in 1886) to put up a five-story building of 19 homes. Watchable by Zoom videoconferencing.
this vantage point of lesley university’s plan above slices off the bigger issues– that of a significant historic house on the edge of the basketball court which also butts up against the national landmark Longfellow House, known for outdoor programming and the peace of their historic garden. the noise of pick-up games, whooping and hollering- shoe-horned into the middle of limited open space is short-sighted. The campus is also incredibly important from a historical aspect. The university KNEW that when it was purchased. The proposed campus is too small for what they want to do. ALSO- under that parking lot is the potential location of the slave cabins associated with the Longfellow House. Are we to lose those for a parking lot with storm run-off underneath? Lesley is on its way to ruin a significant nationally important site.
does anyone know the sticking points of the school contract?
I heard the teachers want less teaching time, and different evaluations but I’m not sure thats right or what those would even entail?
@q99: The CEA Facebook page has a post on their points of contention with the school committee: https://www.facebook.com/CambridgeEducationAssociation/posts/pfbid02Cq3xnAG93Qm1jhs6co7EtoMqQd4zDmUTUxXaxe83NAwV7YuN68bWiqY8V6XzotrBl#
I feel like the union is not doing a great job communicating their position. I’d like to see more effective outreach from them so I can understand the issues.
There was an email to the Cambridge Families mailing list about the elementary schedule changes (login required for link, sorry): https://groups.io/g/CambridgeFamilies/message/43134
That had a link to this document explaining the issues: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1q5Yp4HfHuYW-ycaVgrNmujQ9yIPME39RB96VRw-UZ-4/edit
My child is starting kindergarten in CPS this fall, and I’m concerned that there’s no contract in place, that the school committee doesn’t seem to be even offering to meet in the middle, and that the schedule doesn’t seem to have anywhere near enough recess and lunchtime.
There was also an IMO inappropriate email from the school district warning me that I might see teachers demonstrating outside the school before or after instructional hours, and laying out the school committee’s negotiating position without a word about the union’s position: https://www.parentsquare.com/feeds/22433355
Time to show up early with my Communication Workers of America shirt on and join the picket line with my kids.