There are salient arguments to be made both for and against the proposed Marsden Street land acquisition by the Sag Harbor School District. But that debate is turning quarrelsome — and nobody benefits. It has to stop.
Focus on the facts. Numbers, especially, can be manipulated. In a news article this week, we parse the numbers carefully — it’s meant to provide a road map for the conversation moving forward to the May 16 vote on the proposed bond issue to purchase the land. Any defensible position will be rooted in the facts.
It also has been disappointing to see flyers and signs supporting this purchase defaced in past weeks — in one case using language that suggests parents, teachers and supporters of the Marsden purchase are in some way “entitled” or greedy. It is not entitled or greedy to hope for — and to fight for — better school facilities for the children of your community.
At the same time, it’s unfortunate that some of the Sag Harbor School Board’s members are adopting a pugilistic stance, suggesting that opponents of the project are committing “fraud” rather than spin. That is an unfortunate escalation — some opponents see it as a threat, or an effort to discourage criticism, even to suppress the vote. Regardless of whether it’s the result of frustration, school officials won’t help their cause with this rhetoric.
The truth is that opponents sometimes have been loose with the numbers, adding, for instance, the cost of borrowing via bond issue to the $6 million total, inflating the bottom line. Yes, financing costs are part of the amount paid — as is true with car loans and home mortgages. Nobody cites their home purchase as three times higher because it takes 30 years to pay it off. It’s misleading.
And school officials, who seem to be saying they’ve abruptly brought the entire conversation back to square one, wiping the slate clean, are being disingenuous. Critics who suggest that an athletic field — and an artificial turf field in particular — is still very much on the minds of both School Board members and the administration have plenty of cause. It will be up to the district to convince voters that the land acquisition is all that’s on the ballot for now, and the use of that land is still to be decided. If some remain skeptical, that’s understandable.
Rather than making a strong, convincing case for or against a project, and letting the voters decide, it’s tempting to try to “win” at all costs by muddying the waters or appealing to emotions. Passion is welcome when it comes to community issues, especially where children are concerned. But zeal can sour into something downright unneighborly.
