The Pressure Grows: Raise That Flag

Amherst Select Board will stick heads in sand and hope flag controversy goes away

So as usual I crossed that line between journalist and activist -- which, after 30 years I do pretty well -- and asked the Amherst Select Board during their 6:30 Public Comment segment to get involved with the Hampshire College flag fiasco by pressuring Jonathan Lash to do the right thing.



Since it was public comment their policy is not to discuss or engage with the speaker but I notice a few hours later just before they adjourned Chair Alisa Brewer brought it up because she wanted to give some "direction" to Town Manager Paul Bockelman, a Hampshire College graduate.

Ms. Brewer found the appearance at the rally of Springfield Mayor Sarno "weird" since he has no connection to Amherst in general or Hampshire College in particular.  She struggled with the idea of attending because she is after all Amherst's highest elected official but decided it would be "awkward."



Andy Steinberg pointed out each of the five Select Board members are kind of like one fifth of a Mayor so it's hard to act like an actual mayor aka  Mayor Domenic Sarno.

None of the five Select Board members expressed interest in now getting involved in the dispute since Hampshire College is a private tax exempt facility.

Although that would be some leverage since unlike Amherst College who pays the town $120,000 Payment In Lieu Of Taxes for Amherst Fire Department services Hampshire College pays the town nothing.

Thus this internationally embarrassing flag flap is now only going to get worse.  I told the Select Board another rally was planned for December 10th but now I see from my Facebook feed that one will also be held this Sunday as well.

Maybe this time Chair Alisa Brewer will attend to experience the power of people rising up in defense of the America way.   Even in Amherst.

Hampshire College President Jonathan Lash requesting APD come rescue him as Fox News followed him home.

— Larry Kelley (@amherstac) November 29, 2016

APD:  "Aggressive reporter bothering Hampshire College President Jonathan Lash was from Fox News O'Reilly Factor.  He's gone, I'm clear."

— Larry Kelley (@amherstac) November 29, 2016

What are they afraid of?

Stan Rosenberg:  Raise the flag

Awash In Red White & Blue

Large crowd was orderly and respectful

If Hampshire College is trying to forget what our flag looks like, well over 500+ folks from all walks of life showed up Sunday at their front gate to remind them.  Let's hope that even institutes of higher education can benefit by a teachable moment (or in this case a teachable hour).

Video taken 12:30 PM

 The crowd started gathering before noon for the 1:00 PM rally

Video taken 1:50 PM

B2 briefly put a flag back up on Hampshire College main flagpole

 Only their main flag in campus center was banned

Hampshire College Police Department and Alumni Relations flags still fly

Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno

Northwestern District Attorney Dave Sullivan

VFW Post 754 main sponsor of the demonstration  getting ready at 11:30 AM

Homeless Shuffle

Daniel Davenport storms away from APD  Friday morning last week

The "streets of Amherst" will be shy one of our regulars for a while as Daniel Davenport was arrested last week about 12 hours after I took his photo stomping away from the Amherst police department angry about a perceived mistreatment.

In Eastern Hampshire District Court on Monday the Commonwealth had his bail revoked from a previous case of Breaking & Entering where he was found guilty and both cases will be reviewed on November 29th.

Just last night an officer on patrol called Dispatch to have them leave a note for DPW that the lower level of the parking garage was a total mess, with trash and debris strewn about and an overpowering stench from feces and urine.

Click to enlarge/read

Those Who Fail To Learn From History

Hampshire College is the 3rd largest landowner in Amherst (but pays no property taxes)

So you know an issue has really gone stratospheric on the national stage when Snopes weighs in on it.  

The flag controversy at Hampshire College -- or perhaps I should say the lack of a flag -- is streaking along the same fast track to Public Relations nightmare Amherst regrettably wallowed in 15 years ago ... a shit-storm only pigs would love.

On the eve of 9/11 the Amherst Select Board voted to allow 29 commemorative flags to fly in the downtown on only 6 occasions and to keep them down until the first day on that list -- Veteran's Day.

At that now infamous 9/10/01 meeting a UMass professor branded our flag "A symbol of terrorism and death and fear and destruction and repression."  It would be later dubbed by the Wall Street Journal in a front page article as "The ill timed quote of the century."

Because of course only 12 hours later terrorism and death and fear and destruction reined down from a crystal clear blue sky, and before the smoke cleared 3,000 innocent people were dead.

To show what a slows news day 9/11 started out as, the Associated Press put out a brief mention of the Amherst flag flap story around dawn that morning.

In the wake of information overload a few hours later as stunning images beamed worldwide of Twin Towers making their last stand, both Fox News and CNN erroneously reported that Amherst was banning the rights of private citizens to fly the American flag.

Ouch!  

And now we have Snopes correcting that same mistake about the current flag flap.

Obviously Hampshire College President Jonathan Lash has little to no institutional memory, otherwise he would have leaned from the Amherst 9/11 commemorative flag debacle.

Especially since Hampshire College students and a professor were involved with burning American flags at an Amherst College rally only six weeks later, which garnered nationwide condemnation. 

Let's hope Mr. Lash shows up Sunday afternoon for the rally-round-the-flag demonstration at his front gate.

After all, seeing is believing. (But you have to remove your head from your ass.)

In The Name Of Freedom

On Sunday Hampshire College will learn a valuable lesson that one would think an institute of higher education would find self evident:  Don't mess with Old Glory.

Or to be more precise, Free Speech is a two-way street.  You have a right to say what you will but folks have the same right to respond.

Removing the American flag from the prominent location it formerly occupied in the center of campus borders on hate speech.

From half staff to gone

As a private institution Hampshire College can do whatever it wants with their flag, but by choosing to cave in to demands of privileged white kids they have embarrassed the town on a national stage.

So lets bring some glorious colors to Hampshire this Sunday afternoon:  red, white, and blue.

Decision universally panned on Hampshire College Facebook page 

Perhaps they should move campus to Saudi Arabia —> Hampshire College Stops Flying All Flags https://t.co/Cbf2uMKpa0

— Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) November 23, 2016

Unforgettable

It's one of those touchstone moments that comes along maybe once a generation, and is then handed down from that deleterious day forward to all future generations.

For the current generation it was that gorgeous late summer Tuesday morning when death came calling from the skies, bringing down those majestic Twin Towers of glass and steel with thousands of innocent people still inside.

For our grandparents generation it was December the 7th, 1941, a date which thus far has lived in infamy.

But for us aging baby boomers it was that early Friday afternoon exactly 53 years ago when breathless breaking news bulletins first somewhat prepared us for the unthinkable:  "Shots fired on the Presidential motorcade". 

All too many of which, found their mark.

Never have gray November skies seemed so cold and lifeless, never has silence been so sustained as the world seemed to come to a complete stop for days on end.

While our innocence was lost that awful day in Dallas, our resolve was not.  We are still the greatest country on the planet, although we bear scars from all these catastrophic events. 

As long as we remember who we are and from where we've come, the future beams brightly indeed.

Let's Put On A Demonstration!

Wildwood School Building Project: Back to the drawing board

Parents and their children demonstrate in front of Middle School auditorium

Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney always had the perfect answer to a social problem requiring a sudden infusion of cash:  "Let's put on a show!"  And with talent like Ms. Garland, how could it fail? 

Last night almost 200 Town Meeting members had to negotiate a gauntlet of Mega School supporters numbering over 100 but all confined into a rather small space directly in front of the entry to the Middle School auditorium where Town Meeting convenes.



Had this been an election and the auditorium a polling place they would have been required to stand a lot farther back as election law bans demonstrations within 150 feet of the polling booth.

Last night was our 4th and thankfully last session and since no Town Meeting member made a "Motion to reconsider Article 2," the only chance for the $67 million Mega School is for the Select Board to call a Special Town Meeting by a simple majority vote or for citizens to collect 100 signatures to call one by petition, either of which has to happen before February 2nd.

But it's not like the make up of Town Meeting is going to change over the next two months so the likelihood of another Special Town Meeting suddenly supporting the school project borrowing with a two thirds vote is pretty much zero.

Town Meeting was criticized yet again for ignoring "the will of the voters" who ever so narrowly supported the new school at the November 8th election.  But it did fail to even garner a majority since 10.4% of the voters did not bother to weigh in on Question 5.

Amherst had a 68% turnout for the Presidential election and Question 5 passed 45.21% to 44.38% or less than one percent. 

Town Meeting on the first night had a 88% turnout and Article 2 failed by 50.47% to 49.53% or less than 1%, which sounds pretty identical to the "will of the voters" to me.

Unless you think a demonstration of will is washing down that second slice of chocolate cake with a diet coke.