.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

While most of us condemned the farce that was the loss of the University of Massachusetts Star Store Campus of Visual and Performing Arts by the UMass system that could have owned the building for a dollar and how the loss of the students will affect the downtown area as an anchor to its life has been weighed.

We were shocked to see that after the move and the need to leave some kilns behind, the new campus will be in a closed Bed, Bath, and Beyond store in a sickly strip mall just in time to share the corner of the place with a Spirit Halloween pop up store..

We may be angry at the loss of students and their loss of what their future could have been, but we may not be aware of the more concrete problem that the public neither sees nor experiences but those art students have and do.

Along with the students demanding it, New Bedford mayor Jon Mitcheell and the state senator who had gotten the university to move into the Star Store with the financial arrangement for the university to own it for a buck after 20 years, Mark Montigny, have called on the University of Massachusetts to refund tuition.

Senator Motigny released a statement in support of the students’ demand for tuition reimbursement.

“UMass must provide student-artists with tuition reimbursement for their ill-advised and rushed exit from Star Store.” 

For his part the mayor stated,

“I agree with the affected students that, at a minimum, they deserve a partial refund of their tuition. We continue to discuss the matter with the governor, the UMass president, and the building’s owner to see what might be possible in light of the condition of the building and the needs of the program.”

They signed a lease for a useful apartment and the landlord threw them into the garage.,

Student organizers pressured elected officials to respond to the university’s abruptly closing the downtown New Bedford campus weeks before the start of the academic year which has been almost nonexistent since the closure and, actually, while the mess was being made, and have pointed out that the university has also failed to furnish proper course materials and space for classes. As a matter of fact, they have also pointed out that during all this confusion, no clear plan for the College of Visual and Performing Arts, including impending midterms, have been disclosed even as the ball is rolling.

Some administrators have met with the students who organized a recent campus rally demanding reimbursement, and assured them that the former Bed, Bath, & Beyond location will lack gas kilns, glaze mixing equipment, and other essential tools. 

That is the response to tuition reimbursement?

Telling the victims that there is more bad news as you ignore their concerns?

When pressed, administrators explained the university would set up a fund for which students could submit receipts for art materials they have purchased since the Star Store’s closure. Who knows if, after a full academic year, the students will get back in material reimbursements more than a miniscule fraction of the tuition they paid for a better education and the remainder of which the university keeps.

I taught for 38 years. I know the ratio of work done to promised reimbursement never evens out. The house always wins.

Obviously the students saw this for what it is and did not buy it asserting that the university is playing political and PR damage control as this offer, as cute as it is, does not address the reduced education or their request for reimbursements.

Art students have now gone almost two months without studio space and one month without receiving the education they paid tuition for when they thought they would be in a state of the art studio building in downtown New Bedford that called for housing costs along with tuition.

Now, along with the obvious and vocal community support, the students have the vocal and visible support of the mayor, state senator, and, possibly, the governor. 

Meanwhile the university people seem to think a crumb will satisfy the artists.

“It’s been easier to meet with the Mayor, our state senator, even the governor than it is to meet with our own chancellor,”

according to one of the student organizers.

Imagine telling the football team two weeks before the season begins that the stadium and facilities are going to be somewhere else but the athletes will be reimbursed for their traveling expenses and equipment costs after they paid to play. Of course that would not happen. It’s sports.

But these are students seeking an education, so it is okay?

The budgets of the university system athletic program need a serious audit.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

100% complain, only 6% bother to vote in city primaries.

.

.

.

.

.

This past weekend I spent time at a college reunion gathering in Minneapolis Mn. Just as I was getting ready to go to the one last October, I, and all the tenants in my building at Elm and County, became the victims of gentrification but did not remain silent. There were blogs, meetings, mea culpas, and indications that there might be something done to mitigate renters being the playthings of landlords as they are housed and unhoused as a guarantee that the property speculation pays off not by wise investing but bilking tenants. There is even some state-wide attention.

This year at the reunion with people I went to school with a half century ago and some who came for the first time and have not been seen in those years, I was able to give an optimistic account of the events and follow ups. My sheriff friends from other states, including Florida, were glad we had changed sheriffs as the last one was one that gives sheriffs everywhere a bad name, unless you are one of the bad ones already, and everyone in my building was rehoused eventually and others might not have to face this demeaning treatment in the future.

However, when it came to the place for next year’s gathering, based on my blogs and facebook posts, and as many of these men have a love for history, New Bedford was mentioned, and I had to demure.

I had to explain the present uncertainty with a series of failed plans to save the city that are more about how the city could be saved for the benefit of speculators and investors and not the people already here. I had to add the Star Store debacle that has left downtown in doubt and with it the life of the city as downtown becomes, once again, dead.

There is a local web site that I used to go to for information about upcoming events but has seemed to have devolved into a space for people to point out city failures, like its failure to trim the grass on the edge of a highway while there is major city crumbling going on which, because it is not as visible as tall grass, goes ignored. They complain about the pot holes yet do not question why the streets are being improved and repaved in those areas to which the city wants those with more money than the locals to come and move in. 

The present hew and cry is that the city is making a lot of wrong decisions in its attempt the be reborn and many people in town have an opinion on the failed plans and losing the Umass art school because someone didn’t have pocket change. The university system could have owned the building for a buck.

People are demanding change in leadership from the mayor on down.

Because of the difficulty of getting from New Bedford to Logan Airport because of yet another misstep and nose out of joint and even more fun getting  back, I had arrived home from my trip on Primary Day for city council members at large and within wards, and the mayor. 

After some minor delays and missed connections,I finally got home and just crashed on the bed putting off anything I needed to do until later. After a few hours-long Disco Nap, I woke with plenty of time to get to the polls and vote on the mayoral and city council primary candidates.

If one considers the totality of the day, I had left Minneapolis after a two hour delay, traveled from Logan to South Station only to be shown the door from Midnight to 5:00 am when the station opened again creating the impression that a lot of homeless people hang around the station at night when many of those people are middle class people who just arrived early at the station without knowing it closes for 5 hours, grabbed the first train to Middleboro, took an Uber from there to my home, took my nap, cleaned up a bit, and got to my polling station at 6:25 PM in time to choose my five at-large city council members and not the present mayor as a candidate. That last was my personal protest for his being so willing to screw the locals for the hoped for moneyed people from Boston.

This was all done within twenty-four hours.

My polling station is in the center of the city as the ward covers that and the area just south where there is a dense population of working class people, and I was voter #96.

With all the complaining and the chance to change things and doing so by electing new city council members, #96 at 6:25 PM when the polls would be closed not long after does not show a real concern. My polling place is in the old New Bedford Hotel which is now senior housing with 224 units, some single, some more. Voting is a mere elevator ride, my walk is 6 blocks. And, if anyone offers the “Oh, but they are old people” excuse, I am 73.

If this dribble shows itself to be the way it was city wide which, as it turned out, was the case as only 6% of eligible voters voted, it is time the complaining ends as it is obvious its purpose is just to complain without any effort, (an elevator ride in the old hotel?) to help make those changes.

I hoped my blogs, rally attendance, community involvement et al would pay off.

It seems after yesterday these will just be cathartic for me and butt coverage as I can show I not only complained but worked for change while others will just accept what happens and happily complain about it.

If you did not vote, you cannot complain

.

.

.

.