Readers feedback 3.9.05

‘WE’VE MOVED SCHOOLS WITH SUCCESS’

Lawrence Jones’ letter (“Achievement’s not a Small Issue,”
February 16) expresses skepticism of the City School District’s ability to move
high-quality schools, terming this a “convenient assumption.” In fact, the
district possesses an enviable history of doing so. In the past decade alone:

            1) “Old” School 56 (in the basement of
Franklin) was successfully moved to become “new” School 57 on Costar Street.

            2) “Old” School 57 is now the highly successful School 20, on Oakman
Street.

            3)“Old” Children’s School 55 (at St. Ann) successfully transitioned
to “new” Children’s School 15, on Averill Avenue.

            4) “Old” School Without Walls was on Andrews Street and now has a
lovely new building on Broadway.

            5)“Old” School of the Arts was in the back of Monroe High School
(where School 15 is currently located), and now has one of our area’s most
beautiful and stunning buildings, on University Avenue. (A recent national
report ranked SOTA 11th among all US high schools; evidently this move didn’t hurt
much, either.)

            As
important, there have been no instances where the moving of a high performing school was not successful; this has been consistently in the right direction.
This is why we can be confident in moving School 25 and Flower City School 54.
These are great schools that deserve to and shall continue on their respective
missions.

            The school
district staff has been in continuous contact with Buffalo and Syracuse staff;
we’re all pretty much in the same boat and are trying to learn from one another.
It turns out we are the envy of Syracuse and Buffalo for our uncanny knack in
successfully moving great schools. So mark the issue of moving great schools as
a Rochester school district “Underrated Hall-o’-Famer” achievement (like so
many unnoticed quality schools and programs), one that will matter even more in
the coming years.

            Andrew MacGowan III, Rochester City School District Department of Research, Evaluation, and Testing

BUS STATION? BIG MISTAKE

In the 1950s and ’60s, ripping up historic Corn Hill was
considered a boon because it allegedly opened up the city to faster-flowing
traffic. Consider what has happened since. Calls are being heard today for
ripping out most of the Inner Loop.

            The current
push to open up the city with a bus garage is part of the same
counterproductive thinking, for two reasons:

            One: The
garage is proposed for the wrong place and has the wrong design. A single,
intermodal facility should be located near the New York Central terminal north
of downtown. By intermodal, I mean that the entire bus system should be
revamped. The hub-and-spoke system currently used must catch up with the 21st
century. There must be six or seven satellite stations around the entire
bus-system service area. Downtown Rochester must not be the focus of the
system. (See www.peopleforabetterbussystem.org.)

            Two: Its
proposed configuration as an underground facility generates significant health
and traffic questions. Having a bus turning the Main Street corner at Clinton
Avenue every 20 seconds does not make for pedestrian hospitality. Not only
that, but at tremendous costs the facility will quickly become a homeless
shelter that will need constant police attention — which, by the way, will
not be provided by Rochester police but by rent-a-cops such as we have seen in
Midtown Plaza.

            The
inclusion of the proposed bus garage as part of Renaissance Square, as Mark
Hare observed in the Democrat and
Chronicle, “opens the lids on several pots of state and federal money.”

            Yes, it
does. But in running for City Council, I choose to listen to the advice of both
State Comptroller Alan Hevesi and Rep. Louise Slaughter and look back into
history before compounding the city’s already-acute downtown problems with this
mis-located and ill-considered project. While the concept of the Renaissance
Square has some merits, it should be open up to full citizen participation.
Criticisms of the bus garage must be addressed.

            Just
because there are “several pots of state and federal money” available does not
make this bus garage the right decision. We took that road in the 1960’s, and
we know where it got us.

            Harry Davis, South Avenue, Rochester (Davis
plans to run for an at-large seat on Rochester’s City Council.)

IT’S INSURANCE, NOT PENSION PLAN

The American people need to understand that Social Security
is an insurance program, not a pension plan strictly for retirees. It provides
insurance benefits for the disabled and survivors, as well as retirement
benefits.

            How is privatization
going to affect those citizens who are under 55 or retirement age? SSDI, SSI,
and survivors benefits are accessible at any age and are part of the same plan.

            Rather than
create a crisis that doesn’t exist at this time, the government should focus on
major problems that do exist, such as the crisis with the Social Security
Disability program, Medicare, Medicaid, and health care. You often hear that
the reason for the SS “crisis” is that baby boomers due to retire
will drain the trust fund, and that there aren’t enough workers to cover them
since people are having fewer children. When addressing this issue, we must
also raise concerns about the unemployment rate, lack of decent-wage jobs, and
the millions of jobs shipped overseas. These are the major reasons the Social
Security trust fund is lacking.

            Linda Fullerton, Warwick Avenue, Rochester (Fullerton is president and co-founder of the Social Security Disability
Coalition.)

THE BUSH SCAM

Here are some thoughts on Social Security that readers might
consider:

            Social
Security is protected against inflation by adjustments based on the cost of
living. The stock market is not protected and is a risk. If the market goes up,
fine; but what if it performs as it has recently?

            How do you
make up for a projected shortfall in funds in the future by diverting money out
of the payroll tax?

            On
privatizing: Putting part of your Social Security tax away for personal
accounts sounds like a good thing, but let’s look a little deeper. First,
consider that a tax is money collected for use by the general public. Now,
let’s say I make $50,000 a year and have a percentage of my tax set aside in a
“personal account.” And my neighbor who makes $100,000 a year does
the same, but a bigger chunk of tax money goes into his account.

            That means
that a big chunk of what would have been tax (for the general public) is now
going into his personal pocket. And I, as part of the “general
public,” have had the available Social Security funds reduced by what is
going into his pocket (and my own pocket, to a lesser degree).

            Congratulations,
Mr. Bush. That is a really, really clever scam, to reward the higher-paid by
taking it away from the lower class.

            Homer Burdick, Rochester

WRITING TO CITY

We welcome and encourage readers’ letters for publication.
Send them to: themail@rochester-citynews.com or The Mail, City Newspaper, 250
North Goodman Street, Rochester 14607.

            Our
guidelines: We don’t publish anonymous letters — and we ask that you include
your street name and city/town/village. We don’t publish letters that have been
sent to other media — and we don’t publish form letters generated by activist
groups. While we don’t restrict length, letters of under 350 words have a
greater chance of being published. We do edit letters for clarity and brevity.
And in general we don’t publish letters (or longer “op-ed” pieces) from the
same writer more often than about once every two months.

This article appears in Mar 9-15, 2005.