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Education Should be a Priority

My name is Louis Pacelli. I’m a resident of East Haven, and serve on the Board of Education. I’m thankful to God to live in a free and diverse society of talented individuals with great ideas. I offer some suggestions to our mayor and Town Council.

I read with great appreciation the mayor’s recent press release announcing a budget surplus this year. I’d like to see this administration work to fund our education system with some of this surplus. The last three budgets presented by the Board of Education were underfunded. Our children’s’ education should be a priority when doing the town budget.

I’d like to see our mayor and economic development officer encourage more businesses to move to East Haven. We have beautiful shoreline town that, if marketed positively, would attract more businesses to move here, reducing our tax burden. The infrastructure in our town drastically needs to be addressed. Roads and town parks need to be better maintained. Services need to be increased, making sure our public works staff is called in during inclement weather and have appropriate and updated equipment to perform their jobs safely.

Our Senior Center and transportation needs to be addressed. The senior bus is more than 10 years old. We only have one bus for a town with a population of more than 30,000. Surrounding towns half our size have two or three buses. We also need more programs and facilities for our children, like a skate or dog park, which smaller, surrounding towns currently have.

We must ensure that the safety and quality of life is addressed for all taxpayers. It’s great to have a healthy bank account, but, if the house needs major repairs and maintenance, that should be considered when putting our budget together. Our greatest asset is our children.

Louis Pacelli

East Haven