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

Council on Aging activities for January

bemisFrom drawing to pastel painting with Juliet
January 4 at 10 a.m. (first class)
Express your most vibrant self with the brilliant colors of pastels in a new class with Juliet Rago. She will begin with a short introduction to drawing for those who feel they need it. The class will meet from 10 a.m. to noon on January 4, 11, and 25, and February 8, 15, 22, and 29 at Bemis Hall. No experience necessary. All materials will be furnished. Please sign up by calling the COA at 781-259-8811. Limit of six people. The fee is $40.

Tai chi: new year, new you
January 4 and ongoing
Beginners may now sign up for the COA’s winter tai chi classes which will run 12 weeks from the week of January 4 until the week of March 21 on Mondays from 2-3 p.m., Wednesdays from 1-2 p.m., and Thursdays from 9:15-10:15 a.m. at Bemis Hall. You may take one or two classes per week at a cost of $60 for one and $80 for two. You will learn qi gong warm-up, six moves from tai chi form, and how to integrate tai chi principles into daily life. Sign up by calling the COA at 781-259-8811. [Read more…] about Council on Aging activities for January

Letter to the editor: pushback on leaf-blower letter

letter

To the editor:

Michael Coppock has recently written a letter to the editor (Lincoln Squirrel, Dec. 20, 2015) that ascribes rather dark intentions to the Lincoln Leaf Blower Committee. He says that it’s clear to him that this presages our introducing legislation at the next town meeting. In fact, the opposite is true—we decided last spring that rather than initiate a call for a partial ban (no usage during the summer months), we would go the way of education and hope that when people learned about the major issues associated with leaf blower use, they would confine their use to major leaf cleanups rather than the weekly use of clearing walks and pathways of grass clippings during the season when leaves are firmly attached to trees.

Yes, the Board of Health limited its findings to the town center. But the fact is, most Lincolnites visit the town center regularly, and there are a number of residents who actually live within the business district. Furthermore, we hear from people outside of the business district who have serious health concerns about both the noise and the airborne particulate matter.

In a recent meeting of our group, we also attempted to address the challenging issue of how to proceed with studying this problem in a way that maximizes civility and cooperation—not easy. We encourage members of the community to please share with us your concerns and ideas on how to proceed in a way that most embraces the goal of a collaborative solution.

This is an ongoing process. We fully appreciate that not everyone in town shares our concerns or agrees with our perspective. (In fact, the committee itself is not in lockstep on this issue.) Our hope is to pursue this conversation in an open and community spirited way. Mr. Coppock’s angry and adversarial tone contributes little to help create that kind of climate.

Our website is www.lincolnleaves.org. Comments, suggestions or questions can be sent to quietlincoln@gmail.com.

Sincerely,

Robin Wilkerson
Member, Lincoln Leaf Blower Committee

Letters to the editor must be signed with the writer’s name and street address and sent via email to lincolnsquirrelnews@gmail.com. Letters must be about a Lincoln-specific topic, 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: regrets over failed school vote in 2012

letter

(Editor’s note: This letter refers to Lincoln not being invited into the state funding pipeline for a school project—see the Lincoln Squirrel, Dec. 21, 2015.)

To the editor:

It is the right season, so maybe we can do a variation of It’s a Wonderful Life in which we went back and saw the errors of our way and voted yes to the original school project proposal a few years ago (well, we did vote yes, but not by a supermajority). We would be just now completing the new Lincoln School project while enjoying state funds to subsidize it as well as reaping the benefits of lower construction costs and minimal interest rates. Also, our hard-working civic volunteers would now be fully focusing on the community center and Minuteman High School projects instead of now revisiting the Lincoln School project.

Unfortunately, I don’t think wings will be coming to our guardian angel anytime soon.

To the responsible groups: yes, please continue the fight for the new school. Our youngest residents need and deserve it! As for me, I will start preparing for the higher taxes that I will most likely have to pay now that the project will be much more expensive.

Sincerely,

Louis Zipes
South Great 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 must be about a Lincoln-specific topic, 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: tree work has “denuded” environment

"Before and after" shots of a tree at Lincoln Woods (click to enlarge). Photos: Claire Mount.

“Before and after” shots of a tree at Lincoln Woods (click to enlarge). Photos: Claire Mount.

Editor’s note: This letter is in response to the tree-cutting described in this Lincoln Squirrel article.

To the editor:

I was told by one person who was doing the actual cutting down of the trees at Lincoln Woods that they had to be removed because they were
installing solar panels on the roofs.  That made sense, but removing all those trees was necessary to get sun to most of the roofs. Are they truly installing solar?

Who really is in charge of tree removal? No one  seems to be. A private owner in Lincoln often gets a lot of grief if they want to change something on their property. How do these owners get to do whatever they want without regard to the overall way Lincoln regulates and thinks of land, privacy, and conservation? I and many others would like to know.

Now we have had three unnecessary and irreplaceable denudings of our environment (Route 2, Lincoln Woods, Greenridge Lane.) These two pictures show you how utterly unnecessary it was to remove this beautiful maple at Lincoln Woods, which made the buildings look attractive and artistically shielded the extent of the buildings behind it and did not really block the roof. This show the thoughtlessness of just one beautiful tree being cut down.

Mr. Gumbart, please don’t just say “things will grow back.” Not in my time.

Sincerely,

Claire Mount
Tower Road

Letter to the editor: leaf blower mailing questioned

letter

To the editor:

The Lincoln Leaf Blower Study Group recently sent a brochure to everyone in town in which it quoted a March 2014 statement by the Board of Health saying, “Exposure to high-intensity, episodic or long-duration noise and air particulate and vapor dispersion from leaf blowers represents significant potential health hazards to our citizens.”

That statement is misleading because it fails to reference the Board of Health’s December 10, 2014 statement in which it said that exposure to dust and noise generated by leaf blowers is a concern only in the paved town center and that, “in contrast, the board is much less clear that the use of leaf blowers in other areas of our town presents consistent or even frequent bystander health risks from noise or air pollution.” Other statements in the brochure suffer from a similar lack of context.

I am informed that the brochure was prepared and mailed at town expense. The brochure is obviously a prelude to an effort to enact a by-law to limit or prohibit the use of leaf blowers in Lincoln. The taxpayers of Lincoln should not be paying for campaign literature supporting an initiative that many question or oppose. Will the town pay to prepare and mail a brochure that corrects the misleading statements in the Study Group’s mailing, and to state the other side of the issue?

Sincerely,

Michael R. Coppock
214 Aspen Circle

Letters to the editor must be signed with the writer’s name and street address and sent via email to lincolnsquirrelnews@gmail.com. Letters must be about a Lincoln-specific topic, 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.

Key votes on Minuteman slated for Monday night

mm1By Alice Waugh

Selectmen from towns in the Minuteman High School district met last week to endorse a new regional agreement with a few minor changes—including adding language that would allow Lincoln to leave the district along with several other towns without having to pay for the new school project.

[Read more…] about Key votes on Minuteman slated for Monday night

Letter to the editor: Building interreligious understanding in Lincoln

letter

To the editor:

Boston.com published a story on December 17 about the recent experiences of Muslim youth in the metro-Boston area, including the story of Amal Dirrane, who attends school in Lincoln. Dirrane shared her mixed experience, in our town, of both struggle and support in being identified as Muslim in the wake of the recent Paris and San Bernardino tragedies. Lincoln Public Schools Superintendent Rebecca McFall subsequently sent out a letter to the community affirming our school district’s commitment to supporting cultural and religious differences. I commend Ms. Dirrane for courageously sharing her experience with us, and Superintendent McFall for her strong and unequivocal support of values that our town holds dear.

[Read more…] about Letter to the editor: Building interreligious understanding in Lincoln