Letters

I’d like to talk about how a single Board of Education official is being allowed to behave in public — it is rude and disrespectful to residents and even other elected officials (like Southampton Town Board officials).

We moved across the street from Pierson about two and a half years ago and are happy to be living across from the school. But when this Marsden proposition came about, I have never experienced so much bullying from the opposing side. Calling us liars, making threats to places of employment, mocking us because we don’t want a 72-space parking lot literally in our backyard in a residential neighborhood in a historic village. The bullies say things like, “Oh, I bet you’re pissed at your real estate agent now!” or “Haha, the value of your house is really going to go down!”

The pleasure the opposition is getting from bullying neighbors who are understandably concerned about all that has been proposed by the Board of Education over the last nine months is disheartening to say the least. And the neighbors’ concern stems from the same Board of Education that repeatedly tells neighbors that, as a school, they are beyond the reach of zoning and village rules that we all live together by.

And a single Board of Education official is fanning the flames.

Maybe what’s best for the future of our children isn’t spending millions of dollars on a soccer field and 72-car parking lot, but perhaps spending more money on programs educating our next generation to be kind human beings.

Who would ever believe that the worst things myself or my husband have ever been called would come from an elected Board of Education official? This individual knowingly continues to use an incorrect newspaper article to call my husband a liar. The board president, Sandi Kruel, will not stand up to this individual as he breaks board rules repeatedly by directly addressing individuals. Why is this allowed to go on?

The best leaders — our parents, teachers, religious officials, our wonderful artists and individuals who uphold our laws — they all lead by example. That is what this Board of Education needs to start doing, and one way to jolt them into understanding that things have to change is to vote no on Proposition 2. Voting no isn’t a vote against Pierson High School — it is a vote against behavior that is unbecoming of the leadership of a school, and it will make Pierson even better than it is today.

Vote no on May 16 to Proposition 2.

Deborah L. Pagano

Sag Harbor