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Health & Fitness

Sharing the Responsibility for Education, and Equity for All

Sharing the Responsibility for Education, and Equity for All

We all reap the rewards of a well-educated community: better schools have a direct impact on our property values, a win-win. Additionally, good schools bring in younger families who help to stimulate the local economy and in turn, support senior citizens through their own income taxes (used for Medicare and Social Security). The Town of Tolland has a program called Ordinance 60 that provides a tax freeze for qualifying seniors and the permanently disabled (for more information, contact the Tolland Tax Collector's office).

At the core of recent discussions regarding the budget and pay to play, is what comprises a well-balanced education? I am sure that most of us who no longer have children in the school system played team sports that were a part of our core curriculum, and that our children also had that opportunity. Additionally, at this time that we, as a nation, have an epidemic of childhood obesity, physical education (including sports) is much more cost effective in the long run as we strive to gain control over rising health care costs that are crippling our society. I do understand, however, that due to economic constraints, it is a reality that some of the costs associated with school sports will fall upon families and perhaps we, as a community, can work together to find ways to keep these costs down. 

I ask all of us to remember how we as a community, came together to help out those who could not afford to or were physically unable to remove all of the debris caused by Storm Alfred. Other communities were paying millions to contractors while in Tolland, hundreds of people, including kids from our schools, were helping seniors and the permanently disabled. The Emergency Operation Center was filled with volunteers, both young and old, working together to help each other through a terrible ordeal. Not only did it shine a light on all of the good that we are capable of as a community, we will reap a financial reward from FEMA to cover costs associated with the storm because FEMA takes into account the volunteerism and community support when calculating the reimbursement. I have never been as proud as I was at the way the citizens in our community unselfishly worked together during such a difficult time. Let us never forget all of the goodness we, as a community working together, are capable of.

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As a member of the Town Council, I am committed to working together with integrity and civility, with the other Councilmen and Town Manager over the next month + to help craft one budget that serves and is fair to the entire community.  Equity for the good of all of the citizens of the community is possible and we must strive to get as close as we can to that.

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