By Dalia Diaz
The Coronavirus epidemic is creating anxiety all over the country and the City of Lawrence is particularly nervous in view of the inaction and silence from our city officials. The lack of information in any community can have worse results produced by the abundance of data in the media creating fear among us.
Members of the Lawrence School Committee attempted to set up a meeting with the School Superintendent Cynthia Paris and the Alliance for Education, only to be scolded by Mayor Dan Rivera.
In a strongly-worded email, Rivera put them in their place. “Under receivership the Superintendent of schools and the Commissioner of Education are the ones that set the dates and meeting times of the school committee,” wrote the mayor.
And Danny continued, “This call for ‘Special Meeting’ ignores the reality of receivership and is an action that only brings conflict and an unnecessary distraction to an already difficult and fragile order. It is also a signal to the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education that we do not understand the how receivership works.”
Danny, as a good dictator that he has become, is trying to pull the wool over their eyes saying the receivership is omnipotent. He is well aware that receivership does not control when the school committee meets; the receivership controls the board, not the other way around.
For many years he has been controlling public opinion with his lies and this time he is facing a group of representatives of the people who are willing to do their job and defend this community. At this point, they are only asking to inform the public about what the rest of the country perceives as dangerous and no one wants to talk about it.
Human Resources Director for the Lawrence Public Schools Anne Marie Stronach said that DESE needs to approve the meetings and that school department cited concerns about an open meeting law violation. It’s difficult to understand how it could be a violation since this Committee does not have decision-making or voting powers.
“That’s why I’m so upset that the mayor and the school department refused to meet with the school committee,” said Marianela Rivera, former member of the school committee. “It’s important that parents, students, and community members are prepared with how we should be handling this outbreak. This is an example as to how oppressive this receivership law is and I feel like it’s a violation of my civil rights. This is gearing up to be a major class action lawsuit if the state continues to impede our elected officials’ ability to represent us. It’s taxation without representation.”
After the November Elections, there was hope for again having a valiant school committee considering the people who were elected – some running a sticker campaign. They are asking questions and want to be heard.
On Thursday, March 5, three members of the Lawrence School Committee, Joshua Alba, Kassandra Infante and Jonathan Guzmán went ahead and held a community meeting at the Public Library to talk about several issues concerning parents, not just the COVID-19 epidemic. It was not a meeting of the school committee and they were careful not to include a fourth member. Although it was not widely advertised, a few parents attended in the hope these representatives may bring their concerns to the administration.
Among them, Lenin Roa explained how he drives his three children each day to three different schools in the morning and picks them up in the afternoon because he doesn’t trust the system.
The school committee members are encouraged to continue holding these public meetings for the community to have a way to vent while bringing their complaints to the administration.
