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

letters to the editor

Letter to the editor: ‘think big’ on school campus planning

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To the editor:

Let’s think big together on Tuesday, Oct. 3 at 8 a.m. or 7 p.m. in the Brooks Gym (Ballfield Road community campus).

Lincoln does best when Lincoln thinks big. We were reminded of this last Wednesday at the Bemis Lecture Series, when the Trustees of the Ogden Codman Trust spoke of the history of the Codman Estate, Codman Farm, the Mall at Lincoln Station, and Lincoln Woods.

Years prior to the disposition of the Codman estate, Lincoln had a dream and a plan for the land around the Codman house and beyond. The ideas were big-picture planning and would not necessarily be put in place all at the same time, but there was a grand plan. When the land became available for purchase, the town was ready to act. Public/private partnerships and collaboration with those responsible for managing the settlement of Dorothy Codman’s estate began to implement the plan, piece by piece. First Codman Farm, then Lincoln Woods and the mall, and then more land and fields around them were bought by either the town or the Rural Land Foundation (RLF).

It was a legacy project. Lincoln thought big, and we are all the beneficiaries. Now we are at a crossroads where we have another opportunity—and responsibility—to think big again.

We have major development challenges ahead. We have important open space that must be protected. We’re looking for ways to “revitalize” the mall and Lincoln Station. We will need more town-initiated affordable housing to prevent the kind of 350-unit development now going up in Weston, which could have dramatic negative impacts on schools and budgets. We need to provide services for our seniors to maintain stability in our age-diverse population. And, of pressing importance, we need to rebuild our aging schools.

The community campus, established in 1932 for recreational purposes and expanded to include schools and a town auditorium in 1947, is now offering an opportunity and a challenge to think big again. The town has endorsed rebuilding schools and creating a recreation/community center on this campus. In addition, the campus will continue to host early childhood and after-school programs. But how to make it all work, both in terms of space and budget?

That is where we all need to step up and take a hard, creative look. We need to think big. We need to accept that maybe everything will not and cannot be done at once, but it needs to be planned together. What kind of building(s) will best serve education for the next 25 years? What kind of buildings might be multi-purpose and share space? What kind of buildings would be the most energy-efficient and save money over the long term? What space and building locations work now, and which don’t?

While design professionals will guide the process, Lincoln has always done best when we put our heads together, listen to each other, ask “crazy” questions, think out of the box, and show no fear.

Let’s do just that. Let’s THINK BIG. Let’s take a big step to create another legacy project together on Tuesday, Oct. 3,

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.

Letter to the editor: everyone’s input needed at school project workshop

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To the editor:

What if you decided to redo your kitchen, hired a respected designer, and then asked a trusted neighbor to oversee the design and construction process? With a good professional and a tasteful neighbor, it might be fine, but would it really turn out the way you wanted?

We have a great design team, and we hope you consider the members of the School Building Committee to be “trusted neighbors.” At the same time, you are the “homeowners,” and we need your input and guidance in order to get this right. So please join us this Tuesday, Oct. 3 for one of the Community Workshop sessions. These workshops will focus on the layout of the Ballfield campus, and will generate critical information for both the school and community center study committees.

You might be thinking, “What do I know about campus layout?” We are all users of the campus, and we all have ideas and opinions about where the metaphorical appliances should go. Here’s how to get ready for the workshop:

If you’re a parent: What do you think works/doesn’t work in the school building and on the campus? What do you think about the layout of the school? Is the parking in the right places? How well do pickup and drop-off patterns work? What is it like to walk/bike/drive around campus? Are there enough playing fields? Where should the after school program and community facilities be?

If you’re a community member: What works/doesn’t work when you come to vote? Or for Town Meeting? Is there enough parking? Is it easy to access the roads and pathways? Which parts of the school, fields, and recreation spaces do you use?
New to town? Think you don’t know enough about this project to contribute? Bring your experiences from other towns and schools and help us consider different solutions!

For all: Get ready to ponder provocative questions: What is the best location for the building(s)? How many stories should the buildings be? What happens to the big trees? How do those decisions impact design, energy efficiency, and recreational options?
Bring an open mind and your questions to one of the community workshops:

Tuesday, Oct. 3
8–10 a.m. and 7–9 p.m. (same content, two sessions)
Brooks/Reed Gym

If you haven’t already subscribed to the Lincoln School Project website, please do so by going to www.lincolnsbc.org. Thank you!

Sincerely,

Kim Bodnar (School Building Committee member)
11 Fox Run Road

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: CCPPDC offers updates

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To the editor:

“Community Center Preliminary Planning and Design Committee”—with a name like that, we can’t help but succeed in our mission to bring a preliminary design to the town for consideration when discussing the current state of and future goals for the Ballfield Road campus. The townfolk spoke and the town representatives heard you: there should be collaboration between any and all committees striving to improve the nature and service of the Ballfield Road buildings.

But let’s start with introductions. Your CCPPDC members are Owen Beenhouwer, Sarah Chester, Doug Crosby, Jonathan Dwyer (for the Board of Selectmen), Steve Gladstone, Margit Griffith (vice chair, Parks and Recreation Commission), Eric Harris, Ellen Meyer Shorb (chair), Dilla Tingley, Town Administrator Tim Higgins, Director of Council on Aging Carolyn Bottum, and Director of Parks and Recreation Dan Pereira.

We have been tasked with providing the town with a community center design on the Ballfield Road campus in answer to the Lincoln community’s desire for a cohesive, cost-effective and community-spirited plan for Lincoln. We hope to provide enough information to help answer questions such as:

  • What is the realistic cost of a serviceable community center?
  • What does a community center do differently from other town spaces, and why is this important? (Much of this already addressed by prior studies, and we’re happy to review.)
  • Is it feasible and fiscally responsible to build the school and community center simultaneously or sequentially?
  • Can/should the same architect and/or construction company build both?
  • May the school and community center be built at the same time, or does the school need to keep current Hartwell buildings intact for alternate classrooms during the school build? Or are there other factors?

…and we hope to answer the questions you and we don’t know about yet!

The CCPPDC met a few times over the summer and has opened the request for quotes from architectural firms to work with us, reviewed their quotes, and is scheduling interviews. Our next step will be to choose a firm with which to work and to introduce them to you, the School Building Committee (SBC) and the architect they have chosen (if different)… which leads to a first response to the question “can we use the same architect?”

Well, yes and no. School buildings are very specialized structures and the architectural firms who design them tend to be quite focused on just that type of building. An architectural firm that promises they can do anything from a storage shed to a 20-story building probably isn’t the firm we’re hoping will design our next school building. Similarly, community centers tend to be a bit of a different creature and some firms make these designs their specialty. The SBC and CCPPDC have made it very clear to all parties that this is a collaborative effort by our two groups and we are requiring similar collaboration if the selected firms are different.

You will be hearing from the CCPPDC as we progress. You are always welcome to attend our open meetings and we hope to have a few community feedback events as plans develop. We will be at the SBC visioning meetings on October 3 and 17—will you? Once a month, a joint update will be provided by the SBC and CCPPDC, and you will likely see brief updates about one committee in the updates from the other. We’re also working on a CCPPDC page on the town website and hope to make more informative very soon.

Sincerely,

Margit Griffith on behalf of the CCPPD

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: protest military budget vote

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To the editor:

Eight U.S. Senators voted against the massive $700 billion bloated military budget that even exceeded what President Trump actually asked for by some $40 billion (which is enough to fund free college education for everyone who wants it in this country for the next ten years).

Our Senators, Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey, were not among the eight who voted against this unaudited, excessive military budget that exceeds the combined military budgets of most of the civilized world.

I called Markey’s and Warren’s offices to share my outrage at their vote. The youngsters who answer the phones do not know why the senators vote as they do. I await their comments on why they voted for it.

We are now facing a possible nuclear war as well as lethal global climate change, all of which is being almost completely ignored by people in DC. We need our “leaders” to show some courage and take a stand against this excess.

If you are as outraged as I am at their vote, please call and tell them. The youngsters who answered the phone did mention that the offices were receiving many calls about the vote. Go to Senator Warren’s and Senator Markey’s  websites and click on “contact” for their telephone numbers.

Sincerely,

Jean Palmer
247 Tower 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: DPW proposal generates important questions

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To the editor:

I was heartened to read the story (“Residents wary of planned study on relocation of DPW,” August 14, 2017) about the July 31 Board of Selectmen meeting where several Lincoln residents voiced strong objections to the proposal within the South Lincoln Planning and Implementation Committee (SLPIC) to relocate the DPW facility to the undeveloped 37-acre parcel on Mill Street that houses the transfer station.

I spoke in opposition to the proposal, noting that the 37-acre Mill Street parcel is an environmentally sensitive site. Although some have referred to the parcel as the “transfer station site,” the transfer station actually takes up a very small portion of the parcel. The vast majority of the 37 acres are in a natural state and could easily be mistaken for Lincoln conservation land. The area is residential. Moreover, the Mill Street parcel sits well within the Cambridge Reservoir watershed.

Almost all of the many residents living near the Mill Street parcel are on well water. The activities of the DPW facility, fueling and maintenance of heavy equipment and storage of hazardous waste, would impose a risk to the water sources of homeowners in the vicinity of the parcel if the DPW were to be relocated there. In addition, the DPW activities would impose a risk of contamination to an important source of Cambridge’s water.

As a town, we owe a duty to our own residents to avoid subjecting any group of them to a substantial risk of harm through the actions of our elected officials. In addition, we owe a duty to the people of Cambridge to protect their water sources from contamination by pollutants.

Although I spoke of the Mill Street area at the meeting, the point I urged on the Board of Selectmen applies with equal force to every community in the town. The DPW facility has proven itself to be environmentally harmful. I asked the selectmen to adopt a resolution either prohibiting or strongly discouraging the relocation of the DPW to any area within the town that is substantially more environmentally sensitive than its current location. I happen to be aware of the sensitivity of the Mill Street parcel, but there may be other areas under consideration by SLPIC that are also sensitive (e.g., because of similar well water dependency). So far, SLPIC has not revealed any other alternative sites under consideration.

There are many other issues noted by North Lincoln residents who attended the Board of Selectmen meeting (a video recording can be found here).

One such issue is the enormous price tag of the proposal. Weston recently constructed a new DPW facility at a cost of $15 million. The remediation costs (at the current site) alone would run into the millions, and cannot be estimated precisely until the current facility is destroyed and remediation requirements fully evaluated. The overall expense would contribute to an inordinate tax burden and could crowd out other projects such as the new school building or the community center.

The enormous relocation costs (to any area) might be acceptable if all town residents would benefit greatly from adopting the proposal. However, the goal of the relocation proposal is inconsistent with the town’s history of development—as a zero-sum scheme, it would disadvantage one part of town to offer a phantom benefit to another part. In addition, the proposal would result in the taxpayer subsidization of a private commercial developer. Why should Lincoln residents incur a burden of tens of millions of dollars to subsidize a private developer?

I hope town residents will urge SLPIC to present a careful and thorough examination of the costs and benefits of the relocation proposal before asking the town to give $9,800 to a consulting firm to study the feasibility of relocation. The current request for funds from SLPIC—a vague, one-page letter that appears to assume that the selectmen are all on board—is completely silent on the potential taxpayer costs of the proposal, the potential for environmental harm, and even a justification for the ultimate goal. Why spend scarce public resources studying the feasibility of a proposal that has not been adequately justified and most likely would be harmful to the town if implemented?

Sincerely,

Keith Hylton
5 Oakdale Lane

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: support Bob Massie for governor

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To the editor:

Bob Massie is running for governor of Massachusetts. Recently I drove to Concord to meet him at an event sponsored by the Concord Democratic Committee. Massie is an inspiring speaker; he is approachable but most important he listens. His responses to the many questions were thoughtful, informed and convincing.

When Massie was asked about his stance on single-payer health care, I was moved by his unique personal story. As a child, he was unable to walk from the age of 4 until his family moved to France when he was 12. There he was able to benefit from the excellent universal health care easily available to all. He says health care is a right.

Local Lincoln green activist Wen Stephenson, author of What We’re Fighting for Now Is Each Other: Dispatches from the Front Lines of Climate Justice, sums up Massie’s “compassion and activism” in a recent article in The Nation:

“Massie taught for years at Harvard Divinity School; wrote the definitive, prize-winning history of the anti-apartheid movement… won the Democratic nomination for Massachusetts lieutenant governor in 1994 (when Democrat Mark Roosevelt lost the governor’s race to Republican Bill Weld); led Ceres, the international alliance of businesses, investors, and environmental organizations; created two influential sustainability organizations, the Global Reporting Initiative and the Ceres Investor Network on Climate Risk; and… became president of the New Economics Institute, leading its re-launch as the New Economy Coalition, a driving force in the movement to replace exploitive and extractive global capitalism with just and sustainable local economies. For the past two years, he led the Sustainable Solutions Lab at UMass–Boston, with an emphasis on climate justice in low-income communities.”

Gov. Charlie Baker has yet to fulfill even one of his campaign promises and has so far demonstrated that he does not have the long-term vision the Commonwealth urgently needs. Bob Massie’s political and managerial experience and his ability to bring people together from all points of view convinced me he’s the governor this state needs, now.

Massie has already visited 60+ towns in the Commonwealth and aims to visit all. When he comes to Lincoln, I hope you will meet up with him to share your ideas and ask questions.

Sincerely,

Jean Palmer
247 Tower 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: Lincolnites fired up at Dem convention

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To the editor:

On Saturday, June 3, more than 3,000 Democratic Party delegates gathered at the DCU Convention Center in Worcester for the Massachusetts Democratic Party 2017 Platform Convention. Representing Lincoln were Sharon Antia, Graham Atkin, Gary Davis, Andrew Glass, Jennifer Glass, Sarah Cannon Holden, John MacLachlan, Peter Pease and me (Barbara Slayter). Andrew, Jennifer and John were newcomers to the process—motivated, as we all are, by the need to “move forward and fight back” in the context of an alarming array of harmful policies and disturbing decisions on the part of the Trump administration.

We departed from Lincoln at 7 a.m. to be in time for the pre-plenary breakfasts and an opportunity to hear key speakers, but the long breakfast lines and logistics were daunting. Instead, we roamed the corridors; chatted with the supporters of various candidates and causes; acquired signs, bumper stickers, and pins from our favorites; and encountered old friends some long-time political participants and others engaging with the process for the first time.

Lincolnites at the Democratic platform convention were (front row, left to right): Graham Atkin, Barbara Slayter, Peter Pease, and John MacLachlan, and (back row, left to right) Andrew Glass, Jennifer Glass, Sarah Cannon Holden and Sharon Antia. Not pictured in Gary Davis, who took the photo.

It turns out that this was the largest state Democratic convention ever. No surprise here, given grassroots activism among Democrats that has emerged since the 2016 election. Of the participants, approximately 1,500 were first-time delegates. Prominent among them were the 700 members (many of them Millennials) of “Our Revolution Massachusetts,” an organization that has its origins in the pro-Sanders movement. This group has been intent on pushing the platform into a more progressive stance. Indeed, the platform is one of the most progressive ever with planks that includes, among other things, free public higher education, sanctuary, an end to for-profit prisons, climate justice, student loan debt forgiveness, establishment of independent commissions to fix gerrymandering, and even an Election Day holiday.

Lincoln delegates were glad to have an opportunity to hear from the three still relatively unknown Democratic contenders for governor in 2018: Setti Warren, mayor of Newton; Jay Gonzales, former budget chief under Duval Patrick; and Robert Massie, entrepreneur and environmentalist. We agreed that they would have a tough road competing against Charlie Baker, a popular governor, but they did force us to think about a key question: “What kind of commonwealth do we want to be and how do we get there?”

Barbara Slayter and Gary Davis in front of the Third Middlesex sign at the convention.

All of us responded enthusiastically to the trio of keynote speakers: Moira Healey, Ed Markey, and Elizabeth Warren. Their stirring exhortations were part of the “firing up” process. And indeed it worked! Healey: “We don’t give in to bullies.” Markey: “We don’t back down in this fight against the Trump administration. He is creating a divided country 140 characters at a time, heading the nation into an epic battle, and sliding toward a constitutional crisis.” Warren: “Trump may be dividing the country but he is uniting the Democratic Party as never before.”

From Stan Rosenberg, President of the Massachusetts State Senate, came the stirring challenge: “You are the revolution, you are the change. We need change and we need it now.” No doubt most delegates left the DCU ready to enter a “resistance summer” and to resist, organize and mobilize. If somewhat weary after five hours of speeches (and a sixth dealing with amendments), Lincoln’s delegates were among them. In fact, you may soon see Elizabeth Warren’s “Nevertheless, She Persisted” bumper stickers around town. They were acquired by some members of the Lincoln delegation and will be a visible reminder of the tenacity needed for addressing the challenges ahead.

Sincerely,

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.

Letter to the editor: beef with Bank of America

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To the editor:

I found out today that Bank of America in Lincoln charges $8 for someone to cash a check drawn on a business account there if the person cashing the check does not also have an account at Bank of America. $8 is a hefty fee if someone, for example, did an odd job and received a check for $30. If a worker comes once a week and makes $30 weekly, they are really only making $22.

A while back, I moved my account to Cambridge Trust in Lincoln because it is a local Massachusetts bank. Cambridge Trust no longer has a branch in Lincoln, so I go to the branch in Weston, but I am willing to do that because Cambridge Trust cares about service and listens to its customers. I also don’t use Bank of America because it funds the Dakota Access Pipeline. I’ve added this $8 fee to my list of reasons for not using Bank of America.

I humbly urge people who bank at Bank of America to pay cash, or use a personal check, to anyone who provides services if that worker does not have an account at Bank of America.

Sincerely,

Jean Palmer
247 Tower 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: Town Meeting funding preserves a piece of Lincoln history

letterTo the editor:

The residents of Lincoln approved a Community Preservation grant at the 2017 Annual Town Meeting to restore an important Lincoln sampler to its finest glory and prepare it for public display at Town Offices, including framing it with museum-quality UV filtering glass or acrylic. This is truly a beautiful piece of art, made by young Sophia Adams during her youth on Lincoln’s historic Battle Road in 1826.

The town of Lincoln has had the good fortune to have this beautiful 19th-century sampler donated to it by Cynthia Williams. She recently decided to move from Lincoln to be near her children, but she felt the sampler was created in Lincoln, and it should remain in Lincoln. It was wrought by her late husband’s great-grandmother, Sophia Adams, at 13 years of age. When she made it, this young teenager lived in Lincoln on Route 2A, the Battle Road. Then popularly known as Foster’s farm, her home was very close to the Paul Revere capture site. It had once been part of the property owned by William Smith, captain of the Lincoln Minute Men, who fought the British on April 19, 1775.

A sampler is a piece of embroidery worked in various stitches, commonly created by girls and young ladies as a specimen of skill and a testament to perseverance. Many samplers are family registers, recording births, marriages and deaths in a person’s life.

This sampler was a family register of Joseph Adams, created in 1826 by his daughter Sophia. Douglas Stinson, a local appraiser of antiques, estimated its value to be $10,000. At 31.5 inches x 21.5 inches, it is particularly significant because it is quite large compared to other samplers of its time. The textile curator at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston recommended a reputable restoration conservator to assess this complex, fragile and significant piece.

The Sophia Adams sampler (click to enlarge).

The stitching was embroidered onto a particularly fine plain weave fabric and has a plain weave cotton backing. The yarn used was plied and unplied silk, and the stitching includes cross, satin, split stem and French knot stitches. Due to the fineness of the backing—unlike the coarser linen backing used on many samplers—this exquisite work would have been especially challenging for the 13-year-old to stitch. The register records the birth, four marriages and death of Joseph Adams, born March 10, 1759, to John and Abigail Adams of Milton, Mass. He was a distant cousin of President John Adams.

The sampler gives us an interesting insight into Joseph’s life. It lists his first marriage to Betsey Davis and each of the five children that marriage produced. Betsey died at age 34, less than two weeks after her youngest son’s birth. Ben was born August 7, 1799, and Betsey died on August 18. Having five young children to raise, Joseph married Rebecca Patch just over two years later. This was short-lived as Rebecca died within nine months. The sampler records that he then married Mehitable Hildreth, who bore him three children, the youngest being Sophia, who created the sampler. Mehitable died when Sophia was six.

Joseph married for the last time in 1821. He wed Lincoln widow Lydia Winship, née Wheeler, who may have taught Sophia to sew. Lydia owned the Foster property, which had been left to her on the death of her first husband, Benjamin Winship, in 1819. Winship had originally purchased this land from widow Catherine Louisa Smith, whose husband Captain William Smith was a younger brother of Abigail Adams, wife of the second President. Benjamin and Lydia Winship had only one daughter, also named Lydia, who died at age 16. All three of them have their final resting place at Meeting House Burial Ground behind Bemis Hall.

Joseph Adams moved to Lincoln with his family when he married Lydia Winship. Interestingly, Lydia wrote an agreement—with her husband’s consent—that the land would not become Joseph’s, as was tradition, but it remained in Lydia’s name. Just before Lydia Adams’s death in 1825, she leased the property to her dear friend Susan Brooks with conditions, engaging her friend to lease it back to her husband Joseph, “to hold to him the said Adams for and during the term of his natural life provided the said Joseph does not again get married.” Lydia provided that if Joseph remarried, he would lose the option to lease the property.

This agreement was very unusual during a period when a wife’s holdings normally become the husband’s property to control. Perhaps this was due to a lesson learned from the previous owner of the land, Catherine Louisa (Salmon) Smith. Catherine Louisa had received the land from her stepfather, but upon her marriage to William Smith, it became the property of her husband. William Smith had financial difficulties, so the farm was mortgaged to Catherine Louisa’s father-in-law a number of times, but he eventually returned it to her and her children. There were two houses on the Smith property: one where the Smiths lived, which is still standing across from the end of Bedford Road; the other was a rental that became the Foster-Winship-Adams residence where Sophia worked on her sampler. While her home is no longer standing, the site is now part of Minute Man National Historical Park.

Sophia’s father was a housewright by trade, more commonly known today as a builder, and he likely built some of Lincoln’s early houses during his years living here. In 1827, for $500, he sold his right to lease the 90-acre farm. Joseph died in Concord in 1830, leaving notes in hand (cash assets) to the value of $2,133.73 and $178.18 worth in furnishings and tools. Sophia herself later married and had two sons and a daughter.

Lincoln is very fortunate to now have Sophia’s sampler as a permanent reminder of our community’s historic roots and of the fabric of families who once called Lincoln home.

Sincerely,

Valerie Fox, Deputy Town Clerk
250 South 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: help with bat house project

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Dear fellow Lincoln citizens,

My name is Nicholas Soukup, and I am a senior member of Lincoln Boy Scout Troop 127. I am working on an Eagle Project to benefit the Lincoln community. For this venture, I am proposing the construction of bat houses to increase the bat population here in Lincoln, with the added benefit of decreasing the number of mosquitos.

To undertake this project, I will build 7-8 bat houses and place them in strategic spots (elevated, sunny and near water) around Lincoln. Boy Scout guidelines require Scouts to present the project to the town and request donations to be put toward the purchase of materials. If you are interested in contributing, please send donations to Chris Bursaw (Lincoln’s troop leader) at 136 Tower Road, Lincoln, MA 01773. Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Nicholas Soukup
6 Woodcock Lane

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.