Valley News – Forum, April 10: Beware Upper Valley housing concentration

A recent short article in the Valley News explained the commuting difficulties faced by a lot of who work in Lebanon, Hanover or Hartford, but stay in the more compact, extra rural towns surrounding the core spot (“Commuters go the further, costly mile for Higher Valley jobs,” April 3). The report noted the deficiency of very affordable housing in the 3 core communities as a person of the good reasons for these prolonged commutes, and to some extent this is appropriate. Even so, the resolution to the difficulty is a lot more intricate than only constructing more housing shut to key employers.

In new several years, the reaction to the shortage of housing in the Higher Valley has focused on the design of substantial blocks of rental flats, generally in Lebanon and to a lesser extent in Hartford. For case in point, Mt. Help Road in Lebanon will soon have upwards of 1,000 residences, exactly where there were being virtually none a ten years back. This quick charge of growth will inevitably have major impacts on the town and its latest people.

Let’s think for a minute that many of the new apartments are intended to home present employees who presently commute long distances. Why would these staff members relocate — to help you save fuel, for comfort, or possibly for the facilities involved with residing in a far more urban environment? Potentially, but I would argue that for many people the rewards of possessing their own property in a much more rural setting extra than offsets the charge and inconvenience of commuting. They might not want to transfer! We ought to also consider the damaging ramifications to modest towns from mass migration to the main regions, this kind of as troubles in recruiting volunteer firefighters/EMTs or not acquiring enough young children to assist a area college.

Attracting and retaining the workforce essential to maintain a vivid nearby economic system will certainly demand supplemental housing, but it can not be concentrated in one or two communities, and can not be minimal to large apartment complexes. To realize success, we should have a coordinated regional technique to incentivize housing building a lot more broadly and equitably. This will gain all our communities.

Tim McNamara

Lebanon

McNamara is Lebanon’s mayor

Defend Croydon children’s instruction

Thomas Jefferson advocated for public training mainly because he said it would prepare our young children for citizenship. I, too, am an advocate for public instruction. In my feeling dad and mom try to do what is very best for their youngsters. It may possibly be public education, parochial university, dwelling education or personal faculty. Mothers and fathers with the indicates and want ought to pick whatever they think is best for their kids. Not all parents have the suggests for possibilities other than community training. But I sense strongly that it is by means of public education and learning that we learn how to reside in a civilized environment. It is through range that we master about just about every other and ourselves. It’s through understanding with many others that we discover endurance, compassion, crucial considering, perseverance, dilemma fixing and creativeness.

I have faith that the citizens of Croydon will show up at the special school district meeting on May possibly 7 at 9 a.m. at Camp Coniston. Let us help our small children and perspective their education by way of the lens of furnishing just about every little one with the understanding atmosphere that very best suits their require. Our little ones are our foreseeable future. We have to stand up and help them.

Rev. Donna Leslie

Croydon

U.S. silence on war crimes speaks volumes

A couple months or so in the past, a reporter caught Joe Biden and questioned him if he considered Russians ended up committing war crimes in Ukraine. To this question, he could have only replied “The whole war towards Ukraine is a crime” and he would have been proper. But he did not. He hedged, stating some thing like “We will be wanting into that.” Why?

Nullum crimen sine lege: no crime with no law. A person issue Russia and the United States have in common is that neither is a bash to the treaty that gave rise to the Intercontinental Court of Justice (ICJ). This court has jurisdiction in excess of war crimes. It concerns arrest warrants. It tries and punishes war criminals. No 1 else does. Is there then this kind of a matter as a war criminal offense in The us, if The usa does not figure out the authority of the Global Court docket of Justice?

A single point President Biden has in popular with President Trump apparently is that neither recognizes the International Court of Justice. Trump renounced the treaty and blocked all U.S. cooperation with the ICJ. Joe Biden has nevertheless to reverse this conclusion. Why? The reply is a pretty unhappy commentary on America.

Tyler P. Harwell

Weathersfield