The Lincoln Squirrel – News, features and photos from Lincoln, Mass.

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Planning Board candidate #2: Margaret Olson

ballotEditor’s note: This is the second of three articles on candidates for the Lincoln Planning Board, which has three candidates running for two seats. Yesterday, we featured Steve Gladstone, and on Saturday we will feature Jennifer Morris Gundy. Next week we will have an article about Board of Selectman candidate James Craig, who is running unopposed for the seat of Noah Eckhouse, who is stepping down. The town election is Monday, March 28.

Margaret Olson

To the editor:

I am writing to ask for your support in the upcoming election for Planning Board. I have lived in town since 1998, served on both the ZBA and for the past three years on the Planning Board. The work of the planning board is very important to the long-term health of the town in terms of both preserving and continuing the land stewardship values that make Lincoln so special and the health of our small commercial area at Lincoln Station.

Here is a brief overview of the major issues that the Planning Board will be facing over the next few years:

  • Regulation: Site plan review (SPR) has been the primary tool by which the town has sought to preserve the characteristics of our neighborhoods and road scape. As more and more houses have come under site plan review, we have been learning what its strengths and weaknesses are. As currently implemented, SPR takes up inordinate amounts of staff time and of course imposes a burden on homeowners seeking to make modifications to their properties. The board has worked over the past two years to streamline this process—to make it faster and more efficient while preserving the goals embodied in the regulation. We have more work to do here.
  • Commuter train: The commuter rail is an important amenity for residents working in Cambridge and Boston. As the commute by car into Boston and Cambridge continues to become longer and more difficult, the commuter rail will become even more essential. Currently, Lincoln is listed on the Metropolitan Area Planning Council site as an example of an “undeveloped station” (see page 31-32). As the MBTA pushes to reduce costs and compress schedules, Lincoln is vulnerable to reduced schedules. This will not only impact residents, but has already had a negative impact on the ability of the businesses in the Lincoln Station area to attract and retain employees. We need to find a way to keep or increase ridership in a manner that has a positive impact on the town and provides sufficient MBTA parking.
  • South Lincoln/Lincoln Station: For many residents, Donelan’s and the other Lincoln Station businesses are critical to the community; they are convenient and local. The economic changes of the last 20 years have not been kind to small local business areas. With a mix of attention to the train station and some creative planning we can keep Lincoln Station healthy and vibrant, but it will require considerable planning.
  • Complete streets: “Complete streets” is a term used to describe a street that is friendly to pedestrians, bicyclists and cars. On too many Lincoln roads, walking is not safe, and it’s particularly not safe at rush hour. We’ve gone to great lengths to preserve the rural feel of our roadsides, but too often we are enjoying that only from a car window. “Complete Streets” is a state initiative from which the Planning Board may be able to secure funding to help the town apply multiple strategies (not necessarily sidewalks or roadside paths).

Please continue make Lincoln a great and special place to live. I ask for your support and vote on March 28th.

Sincerely,

Margaret Olson
17 Boyce Farm Rd.
781-392-4403
margaret@margaretolson.com (mobile)

Planning Board candidate #1: Steve Gladstone

ballotEditor’s note: This is the first of three articles on candidates for the Lincoln Planning Board, which has three candidates running for two seats. Tomorrow will feature incumbent Margaret Olson and Saturday will feature Jennifer Morris Gundy. Next week we will have an article about Board of Selectman candidate James Craig, who is running unopposed for the seat of Noah Eckhouse, who is stepping down. The town election is Monday, March 28.

Steve Gladstone

To the editor:

I would like to announce my candidacy for one of the vacant seats on Lincoln’s Planning Board.

Having joined the Lincoln community nine years ago, my wife Susan and I are still relative newcomers to a town whose founding families still enrich our community.  It has been a real pleasure to become ever more closely involved with townsfolk, governance, and of course the landscape.

Soon after our arrival, I was in a position to serve on the Facilities Coordinating Committee. Identifying usage patterns, availability, capabilities and limitations of our core meeting spaces led to deeper engagement in the town’s management and social processes. Most recently I was selected as one of the three at-large members of the Community Center Study Committee.

Professionally, I have applied two science master’s degrees as Director of Research Operations at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) for 22 years, where I was part of the management team responsible for an interdisciplinary academic/clinical research enterprise with a $325 million budget. As a director in BIDMC’s Office of Science and Technology, I was intimately involved in budgeting, strategic planning, space allocation, and implementation of diverse critical functions. I am now part of the management team at a pharmaceutical startup in Cambridge.

Lincoln enjoys a distinct rural character unique among towns so near Boston. It is a fundamental aspect of our special town spirit, one that deserves to be maintained, to “Keep Lincoln, Lincoln.” We must and will change as times change.  This mindfully managed evolution is one of my core values. The Planning Board and Town should and must be open to new ideas and concepts as they blend with this guiding principle.

Volunteers are the backbone of Lincoln’s community spirit. It is exciting to continue my involvement in Town affairs by offering my candidacy for the Planning Board.  It is my hope that this note gives the voters of Lincoln some familiarity with me personally, and with my professional background.  Please call or email me with your thoughts, questions, or concerns—or join me for coffee at the Whistle Stop.  And please DO vote, DO volunteer and DO get involved in this exceptional town!

Sincerely,

Steve Gladstone
67 Winter St.
steve.gladstone@gmail.com

Kasich winners clustered around Lincoln

donkey-and-elephantMany of the 16 Massachusetts towns that went for John Kasich in the March 1 Republican primary are mostly in the Lincoln area but also include Amherst, Brookline, Cambridge and Wenham as well as Egremont and Mount Washington on the state’s western border, according to a map published by the Boston Globe on March 2.

Donald Trump won the Massachusetts Republican primary with 49.3 percent of the vote, followed by Kasich (18 percent), Rubio (17.8 percent), Cruz (9.6 percent) and Carson (2.6 percent).

On the Democratic side, the Globe reported that Hillary Clinton captured a large swath of towns in the Boston suburbs as well as some on the south shore, western Massachusetts and Cape Cod. Statewide, she won 50.1 percent of the Democratic vote vs. 48.7 percent for Sanders.

Lincoln goes for Kasich, Clinton in presidential primary

Here are the unofficial returns from the March 1 presidential primary in Lincoln.

Republican primary
Precinct 1 Precinct 2 Total votes Total %
Kasich 158 84 242 36%
Rubio 114 66 180 27%
Trump 93 81 174 26%
Cruz 20 19 39 6%
Carson 6 10 16 2%
Bush 7 1 8 1%
Christie 1 0 1 —
Fiorina 1 0 1 —
Gilmore 1 0 1 —
Santorum 1 0 1 —
No preference,
blank, write-in		 4 3 7 1%
Totals: 406 264 670
Democratic primary
Precinct 1 Precinct 2 Total votes Total %
Clinton 748 388 1,136 60%
Sanders 470 287 757 40%
O’Malley 2 1 3 —
No preference,
blank, write-in		 1 1 2 —
Totals: 1,221 677 1,898
Ballots cast by party:
Democrat 1,898 74%
Republican 670 26%
Lincoln's voting precincts (click to enlarge)

Lincoln’s voting precincts (click to enlarge)

Letter to the editor: Sanders is on the ‘right side’ of questions

letter

To the editor:

In the lively and much appreciated discussion in the Squirrel on the Democratic candidates, I have seen people I respect supporting Hillary Clinton. While it would be historic to elect a woman president, I am concerned more about the rest of the history that will some day be written about the next four or eight years.

As a country, we are approaching turning points in several critical areas. Will we continue policies that generate income inequality and financial instability? Will we keep on pouring resources into being the world’s top cop? Will we come to grips with how we treat “those people,” be they black Americans or brown immigrants? Will we throw people out of the lifeboat of our heath care and safety net systems in order to keep them financially afloat?

From my perspective, Mr. Sanders is on the right side on all of these questions. He would take on the banks and question corporate-oriented trade agreements. He would show restraint in sending our troops into the world’s hot spots. He has been dedicated to civil rights his entire adult life. He would pursue rational, tested policies to assure effective and efficient health care.

Ms. Clinton, not so much. She is cozy with Wall Street, which is indebted to her husband for helping repeal the Glass-Steagall Act. Mr. Clinton also brought us corporate-friendly free trade with NAFTA, and Ms. Clinton was for the pending TPP trade agreement until grassroots opposition caused her to pause. As a senator, Ms. Clinton voted to invade Iraq, and as Secretary of State convinced President Obama to intervene in Libya. Despite her apparent popularity with African-Americans, her record on civil rights is checkered. On health and welfare issues, she speaks Washington-speak and favors policies that are yielding a slow-motion train wreck.

Pragmatic folks say the hill facing Mr. Sanders is just too steep. Well, as they say, a journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step. Or, perhaps more apropos to our locale, every revolution starts with a single shot. We did that once.  I’m for doing it again.

Sincerely,

Gary Taylor
2 Beaver Pond Rd.

Letters to the editor must be signed with the writer’s name and street address and sent via email to lincolnsquirrelnews@gmail.com. Letters will be edited for punctuation, spelling, style, etc., and will be published at the discretion of the editor. Letters containing personal attacks, errors of fact or other inappropriate material will not be published.

Letter to the editor: Minuteman withdrawal ‘outrageously short-sighted’

letter

(Editor’s note: Antia is Lincoln’s representative on the Minuteman School Committee.)

To the editor:

I want to thank the 200 or so people that took the time to come to the Special Town Meeting last Tuesday evening. This was a huge commitment and possibly an imposition, but know that is was appreciated.

That does not necessarily mean I am happy with the results (see “Lincoln withdraws from Minuteman school district,” Feb. 27, 2016). Those of us who were at the meeting know I am concerned the children of Lincoln will soon be shut out of vocational/technical education. With virtually all the newly built voc/tech schools over capacity and enrollment rising at the other local vocational schools, we are going to be hard-pressed to find a seat for our children.

Most of us have heard Barack Obama tout the benefits of vocational/technical education, and some of us heard that in addition to the $45 million that Minuteman will receive from the MSBA for their new school, Gov. Baker has committed a $500,000 grant to the school which will be used to help launch the new advanced manufacturing and metal fabrication program.

This school is going to be a high school showcase for Massachusetts, right here in Lincoln. And in an effort to save approximately $33,000 a year, we voted to withdraw from the school district. I understand $33,000 is a lot of money. I also understand it is 0.09% of Lincoln’s proposed FY17 $35,126,576 budget. I am not alone in finding this to be outrageously short-sighted.

Sincerely,

Sharon Antia
165 S. Great Rd.

Letters to the editor must be signed with the writer’s name and street address and sent via email to lincolnsquirrelnews@gmail.com. Letters will be edited for punctuation, spelling, style, etc., and will be published at the discretion of the editor. Letters containing personal attacks, errors of fact or other inappropriate material will not be published.

Letter to the editor: gender, résumé not central to candidate support

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To the editor,

With all due respect for those who share a passion for and commitment to electoral politics, I must express my disappointment with any who would assume my support for any candidate would be dictated by gender or even a lengthy résumé (see comment to the February 24 letter to the editor). My support and enthusiasm is reserved for those that I believe to hold true to a north star, both in word and deed, and a candidate of unimpeachable character, regardless of race, color, creed, sexual orientation or gender.

A number of years ago, many of us rallied behind a candidate with little or no political experience on the national stage. But that candidate’s life choices reflected core values of a person dedicated to social and economic justice. The fact that this candidate might be the first president who was a person of color was also exciting, but not the determining factor for my support. That candidate was inspirational and aspirational and offered a vision of transformation that won my heart. That candidate, lacking experience and a lengthy résumé, was Barack Obama.

Now, we need to elect a candidate with a similar vision, and the capacity to excite and engage a new generation of voters who will help us elect a more collaborative Congress.

I find unimpeachable character, wisdom to see the catastrophic folly of the Iraq War, and the inspirational vision of Barack Obama in Bernie Sanders.

Sincerely,

Sara Mattes
71 Conant Rd.

Letters to the editor must be signed with the writer’s name and street address and sent via email to lincolnsquirrelnews@gmail.com. Letters will be edited for punctuation, spelling, style, etc., and will be published at the discretion of the editor. Letters containing personal attacks, errors of fact or other inappropriate material will not be published.

Corrections to budget article

correction-smThe February 23 Lincoln Squirrel article originally headlined “Town Meeting warrant includes 3.1% hike for general budget” cited an incorrect figure for the current fiscal year 2016 budget, which is $34,940,266 and not $33,530,580 (the latter is actually the FY 2015 figure). The proposed budget for FY 2017 is $35,126,576, which represents a one-year increase of 0.5 percent, not 3.1 percent. The February 23 article has been updated and retitled “Town Meeting warrant includes modest budget hike” to reflect this correction.

The financial section and warrant for the March 2016 Annual Town Meeting are available here.

Letter to the editor: vote for Hillary Clinton on Tuesday

letter

To the editor:

This has been a remarkable campaign season. Let us celebrate the energy that flows from frustration with our governance in Washington and demands change. Let us also unite behind the candidate who can best preserve the progress we have made on health care, employment, civil rights, climate change, education, protecting consumers, foreign policy, diplomacy, Social Security, Medicare, women’s rights, equal pay, immigration and reducing the deficit.

There is so much more to be done, and Hillary Clinton is the one to do it. She understands the details of government process and possibility better than any of the candidates. She knows how to achieve positive change in a very difficult environment, and has the skill, sensitivity and strength to get it done.

The stakes could not be higher. The consequences of fear, destructive anger and division are palpable and deeply disturbing, at home and abroad. We are so fortunate to have such an experienced and thoughtful leader ready to be our President in these difficult times.

Please join us in supporting Hillary Clinton next Tuesday, March 1.

Sincerely,

Peter Pease, 40 Huckleberry Hill
Gary Davis, 20R Indian Camp Lane
Peter Georgiou, 126 Lexington Rd.
Jennifer and Andrew Glass, 11 Stonehedge
Sarah and Larry Holden, Weston Rd.
Avram Kalisky, 140 Lincoln Rd.
Rosemary and Jack Kerrebrock, 29 Boyce Farm Rd.
Ilana Newell, 75 Todd Pond Rd.
Al Schmertzler, 142 Chestnut Circle
Brigid and Gerald Sheehan, Giles Rd.
Barbara Slayter, 7 Trapelo Rd.

Letters to the editor must be signed with the writer’s name and street address and sent via email to lincolnsquirrelnews@gmail.com. Letters will be edited for punctuation, spelling, style, etc., and will be published at the discretion of the editor. Letters containing personal attacks, errors of fact or other inappropriate material will not be published.