Most of us cheat
Given the opportunity (and the need, sometimes) most people will cheat to get ahead and very often we find that on job applications where education and work experience are inflated or simply not true. The sad part about this is that usually, those are the people who get ahead in life.
As a child in school, I remember cheating on exams, particularly in English tests. Thanks to Juan Novás López who was smarter for tipping me the answers to multiple-choice questions which I surreptitiously signaled to him, I was able to pass that subject in 7th grade.
After that, the guilt was overwhelming because my family went to church every Sunday and taking communion was out of the question without going for confession.
In the end, taking one course at a time, after 24 years I received my bachelor’s degree at 50 years of age. I wonder if I should have cheated, as well.
The Goya boycott
When the call for boycotting Goya was mentioned, the first thing that came to mind was the French wine boycott of 1995 and then again later in 2003. As a result of the boycotts, people in this country started choosing American wines and their preference grew. Their quality improved to the point of winning international competitions – even against their French counterparts.
It was expected to be a similar situation for Goya this time but almost immediately, the opposite was true. Not only the community (Latinos included) rejected the idea; they mentioned the quality of their products, the thousands of people they employ and their contributions of millions of dollars every year to people in need. In Florida, many Walmart and Publix stores were out of stock on all Goya foods the day after Alexandria Ocasio Cortes announced the boycott.
In his always questionable wisdom, the President of the Lawrence City Council Kendrys Vasquez jumped on that bandwagon supporting the Goya boycott. He was flooded with comments on Facebook and very few agreed with him, but the best one of all was placed in English and Spanish by Obed Matul:
“So you, a Latino councilor in a city that is 70% or more Latino, want your followers, to boycott a Latino company (@goya) who has given value to our Latino roots? But you voted to increase property taxes knowing full well that our Latino community would be the most affected. I think you need to get your priorities straight and forget about who Goya praises and start focusing on helping the Latino community that elected you in the first place.”
An example of some of the comments was this one from Yokasta Batista, “If we don’t respect the opinions of others, then we will become a communist country. The owner of Goya is in his right to support whomever he wants.”
Jose Alfonso Garcia said it best, “I understand Kendrys thinks like that because he is a Democrat, and that’s the stupid way they believe the election can be won. But he is also the president of our City Council. Anything he says publicly is in the name of our community. That kind of behavior is unacceptable. What about my First Amendment rights? Today is Goya, tomorrow any bodega whose owner supports President Trump. Shame on him!”
Kendrys believes he is important and that he must chime in on everything without giving a second thought to the consequences it might bring. Perhaps he thinks that his constituents are as dense as he is.
Back to the bollards
Last week I wrote a piece about the new stainless steel pillars around City Hall on Common St. and Essex St. and James O’Donoghue quickly responded with an opinion that I now share.
He said, “Having worked in architecture and urban planning I am critiquing the bollards that the City of Lawrence selected. Whoever selected them will not be happy to read my criticism,” and he added this photograph from the City of Sedalia in Missouri.
“The stainless steel bollards do not fit with the historic character of our downtown, he said. The picture demonstrates some that are more fitting. “With the current economic outlook, the city should have opted for cheap wooden sawhorses until we are on more stable ground financially.”
The article last week mentioned that Ana Levy was the only City Councilor who responded to my email looking for information regarding council approval for this expenditure – I did not send it to all city councilors. I then heard from my Councilor Dave Abdoo because he sent me two emails that I didn’t receive, containing a complete explanation of that work. It would have been great to give you the whole story last week.
Councilor Abdoo said, “The primary intent of these new replacement bollards is to provide a safety barrier for pedestrians from motorists creating these safe pedestrian courtyards, amongst the city and state buildings as well as the commercial. Secondarily, these barriers are intended to protect the city-owned sewer infrastructure. I learned that these bollards are intended to prevent large trucks (delivery trucks, trash trucks, etc.) from driving on these pedestrian-friendly areas, thus protecting the City’s sewer system that lies beneath that pavement. Mr. Brian Peña tells me that there had been 3 distinct repairs on this sewer infrastructure over the last year.”
I remember writing years ago about the damage caused by trucks and even city employees’ cars parking next to City Hall, which is prohibited according to documents in the Historical Commission and the Lawrence History Center. I was pleased to learn that finally, the administration is doing something about it.
To my surprise, I had no idea that the city sewer runs under those bricks. “It is presumed that these recent catch basin repairs were as a result of the weight of these larger commercial vehicles. A vehicle weight on the surface damages the bricks that hold the catch basins together below the surface. These recent catch basin repair jobs cost the city several thousand dollars, but it could have been worse. The potential damage could have been to the sewer pipe itself, with a potential cost to repair that would have been/or would be astronomical,” Councilor Abdoo explained.
To my question about having to be approved by the City Council, Dave explained that, “The funding source of this restorative infrastructure work, and for replacement bollard materials, is from the FY’20 DPW operating budget. The work is funded by a combination of Streets Maintenance & Facilities Maintenance funds, as these ‘courtyards’ are located in an area designated as part of the City Hall Facility, and these bollards provide separation between the facility (City Hall) and Common & Essex Streets,” he added.
I have not been able to talk to anyone in the Historical Commission to see if they had any input on selecting the bollards since that is part of the historical area of Lawrence. It’s doubtful because this administration never consults with them or takes their recommendations into consideration.
