|
[Back to
Columns & Stories]
Nuns
aren't going to take Enfield's games sitting down
September 10, 2006
Jesus never said to turn the other cheek when the safety of youngsters was
at risk.
So it is with the gallant and gracious Felician Sisters of Enfield. Their
mission is to spread the good word by contemplation and action. These nuns
are the action kind. They are just like their predecessors who were kicked
out of Russia in 1864 after they took in orphans, poor women and the
disabled and nursed all sides in a bloody civil conflict.
Now, the town of Enfield is trying to kick the Felician Sisters out of a
school they have run in various forms since 1944. Lame and cowardly town
officials are rolling over for political and business interests who have
no conscience when traffic accidents are waiting to happen right under
their noses.
The simple issue at hand is a parking lot and the safety of little ones
who are dropped off on a front lawn and picked up on busy Route 5 every
school day. All the sisters have been trying to do is move the parking lot
to the back yard, away from the highway.
The Felician Sisters opened a school in Enfield in 1944. The town of
Enfield would not pay for its own kindergarten until the late 1960s.
Meanwhile, the sisters would educate as many as 325 kindergartners a year.
The private school saves the town about $350,000 annually in education
expenses.
Out of the blue, the Enfield zoning enforcement officer tried to shut down
the parking area for the school in December 2003. The town has been going
gangbusters to shut down the lot and the school ever since. At the same
time, the town has allowed a nearby medical complex and a public school to
expand parking.
The Enfield Zoning Board of Appeals revoked the shutdown order after an
exhaustive hearing. Attorney. Ken Slater of Hartford presented
incontrovertible evidence showing the parking area had been used for at
least 40 years, prior to the establishment of special permit regulations
that had been cited in the sham shutdown effort. Justice was done, or so
it seemed.
As the controversy played out, a prominent and politically powerful
opponent of the school surfaced. He is Anthony Troiano, the school's
next-door neighbor, a major business and property owner in Enfield. I went
to see Big Anthony as the controversy raged, but he wouldn't answer his
door or the phone. Big Anthony has a pretty nice ride in Enfield. At one
point, he and his partners owed the town about $40,000 in property taxes,
but the town still paid them about $180,000 to repair cop cars and other
vehicles. Big Anthony scares a lot of people in town. They are terrified
of crossing him. And so they do his bidding or they are silent like sheep.
Now a successful developer, his projects move through the approval process
like greased-lightning.
Troiano once told town officials "historic vegetation" would be
destroyed if the nuns moved the parking area behind the school. That area
is not so far from where similarly "historic vegetation" -- some
of us call it grass -- was removed to make way for Troiano's pool and
cabana.
The Montessori School's victory before the Enfield Zoning Board of Appeals
was short-lived. Some town officials assented when the Enfield Planning
&Zoning Commission decided to sue its own ZBA, seeking to reinstate
the parking area shutdown order. I guess that's the way they spell
gratitude and appreciation in Enfield.
Naturally, this is costing Enfield taxpayers truckloads of money. How
much? The town manager and the mayor aren't talking. Neither is the legal
department. They are actually farming out the work, paying expert counsel
from out of town so one municipal department can sue another.
The Felician Sisters are about to unveil a public information program that
will demonstrate the full force of their dual mission: contemplation and
action. "Stop the Nonsense!" Sister Francine Mary demands in a
flyer that will be distributed with various parish newsletters this month.
Meanwhile, the battling town agencies -- P&Z and ZBA -- and the
sisters will be in Hartford Superior Court Sept. 12, as the town
inexplicably continues its vendetta against the Montessori School.
Andy Thibault is author of Law & Justice In Everyday Life. He
also serves as a consulting editor for the literary journal Connecticut
Review. Web site, www.andythibault.com,
and Blog, http://cooljustice.blogspot/.
com
LINK:
http://www.norwichbulletin.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060910/OPINION/609100309&SearchID=73256433761143
Back
to Top
|