Published in the Current
Airman First Class Mike Layton, a 2001 CEHS graduate, has been in Bahrain providing support for the war in Afghanistan since his 19th birthday, Nov. 26, 2002. He was initially supposed to be there for 90 days, said his father, also named Mike. But now Mike the younger has been “frozen,” meaning he will be staying in that location for the time being, his father said.
Layton has been in the Air Force for a year and a half. He joined right out of high school and is now assigned to the 509th Security Forces Squadron, which normally provides security at Whiteman Air Force Base, Knob Noster, Mo., the home of the B-2 Stealth bomber.
Layton volunteered for overseas duty, and his father said he wants to be a policeman when he gets out of the military. Layton’s father is himself a 24-year veteran of the Coast Guard now working in law enforcement.
The family e-mails Layton regularly and also sends pre-paid phone cards so Layton can call home, his father said. In addition to the people in his family, “the dog misses him,” his father said.
Thursday, February 20, 2003
Cape volunteers become brothers’ keepers
Published in the Current
Several Cape Elizabeth High School students, in cooperation with high school students from other towns and the United Way of Greater Portland, are trying to give homeless teenagers in the area a better shot at making it by providing them with a backpack filled with the essentials of daily life.
Leslie Preti, Whitney Turkanis, Hannah Botto, Mary Ann Chapman and Schuyler Armstrong are among a group called Youth Engaged in Service, or YES, getting teens involved in community service and leadership through the United Way.
They want to put together 50 backpacks, 25 for males and 25 for females, with toiletries, pens, phone cards, batteries and more. The catch is they have to do all the work themselves.
Jessica Esch, the United Way coordinator of the project, said her job is basically to facilitate the kids’ efforts and make sure they all stay more or less on track. It is up to the teens to decide what projects they want to undertake and to carry them out, Esch said.
“It’s a loose group because kids are so busy,” Esch said.
Students find out about it from their friends, who have been involved with it in previous years. “The word just kind of gets spread around the schools,” Botto said.
Three CEHS students were in YES last year, and five are in it this year. Some of the students involved found out about it through the Volunteer Club at the high school. Jill Dalfonso of South Portland, a student at Catherine McAuley High School in Portland, said her school’s Key Club is the way most students learn about YES.
The year’s first task is to decide what the group will focus on. “When we had our first meeting, we just kind of started yelling out random ideas,” Preti said.
They were inspired by a flyer Turkanis had found about the BluePack Project, an initiative giving school and basic hygiene supplies to children in Afghanistan.
“We decided we wanted to help people our own age,” Armstrong said. They are now out soliciting donations of goods and money from community members, businesses and non-profit organizations.
Some of the work involves writing formal grant proposals to organizations like the Libra Foundation.
Other efforts involve heading to a local dentist and asking for help buying toothbrushes, toothpaste and dental floss, or asking Sam’s Club in Scarborough for toiletries.
Donations of money are also helpful, and the students plan how they will spend the money, depending on how the solicitation goes for donations of actual products.
They also learn to revise their plans as they go along, determining – with the help of the staff at the Preble Street Teen Center – that deodorant and socks are more important than, say, playing cards.
They also ensure that each backpack has a personal touch, with a container of nice lotion for young women and shaving cream for the young men.
Several Cape Elizabeth High School students, in cooperation with high school students from other towns and the United Way of Greater Portland, are trying to give homeless teenagers in the area a better shot at making it by providing them with a backpack filled with the essentials of daily life.
Leslie Preti, Whitney Turkanis, Hannah Botto, Mary Ann Chapman and Schuyler Armstrong are among a group called Youth Engaged in Service, or YES, getting teens involved in community service and leadership through the United Way.
They want to put together 50 backpacks, 25 for males and 25 for females, with toiletries, pens, phone cards, batteries and more. The catch is they have to do all the work themselves.
Jessica Esch, the United Way coordinator of the project, said her job is basically to facilitate the kids’ efforts and make sure they all stay more or less on track. It is up to the teens to decide what projects they want to undertake and to carry them out, Esch said.
“It’s a loose group because kids are so busy,” Esch said.
Students find out about it from their friends, who have been involved with it in previous years. “The word just kind of gets spread around the schools,” Botto said.
Three CEHS students were in YES last year, and five are in it this year. Some of the students involved found out about it through the Volunteer Club at the high school. Jill Dalfonso of South Portland, a student at Catherine McAuley High School in Portland, said her school’s Key Club is the way most students learn about YES.
The year’s first task is to decide what the group will focus on. “When we had our first meeting, we just kind of started yelling out random ideas,” Preti said.
They were inspired by a flyer Turkanis had found about the BluePack Project, an initiative giving school and basic hygiene supplies to children in Afghanistan.
“We decided we wanted to help people our own age,” Armstrong said. They are now out soliciting donations of goods and money from community members, businesses and non-profit organizations.
Some of the work involves writing formal grant proposals to organizations like the Libra Foundation.
Other efforts involve heading to a local dentist and asking for help buying toothbrushes, toothpaste and dental floss, or asking Sam’s Club in Scarborough for toiletries.
Donations of money are also helpful, and the students plan how they will spend the money, depending on how the solicitation goes for donations of actual products.
They also learn to revise their plans as they go along, determining – with the help of the staff at the Preble Street Teen Center – that deodorant and socks are more important than, say, playing cards.
They also ensure that each backpack has a personal touch, with a container of nice lotion for young women and shaving cream for the young men.
State cuts local school aid
Published in the Current; co-written with Kate Irish Collins and Josh Williamson
School districts across the state are getting their first look at next year’s state funding for education, and locally it doesn’t look good.
Cape is looking at a reduction of $486,000 in state aid for education and Scarborough is looking at a cut of a little over $600,000. South Portland will actually see a $500,000 increase this year, but the total percentage of the school budget funded by the state will drop to 5 percent, the lowest allowed under state regulation.
The tough budget news comes as the Secretary of State’s Office certified on Tuesday a referendum question that would require the state to pay more to communities in education aid.
The proposal, proposed and backed by the Maine Municipal Association, would require 55 percent of total education expenditures statewide to be funded in the state budget.
The Legislature can either approve the proposal itself or put the question out to voters in November.
The education aid numbers, released this week by the state’s Department of Education, are based on the governor’s proposed budget, but have not yet been through the Legislature’s committee process or been voted on by lawmakers. They provide, however, the first look at how district budgets could be affected.
“This is the starting point for the discussion,” said Jim Watkins at the Department of Education.
Cape Elizabeth Business Manager Pauline Aportria said the expected $486,000 cut this year is on top of the nearly $450,000 cut in 2001-2002.
“It’s going to make life very difficult,” said Superintendent Tom Forcella.
He said the Town Council has asked the schools to keep any budget increase from causing a tax increase of more than 2 percent.
Replacing the money lost from the state with locally raised property taxes would require a 64-cent increase in taxes in Cape, an increase of 3.8 percent.
There is a $3 million “cushion” available to soften the blow, which has yet to be divided among schools throughout the state, but Forcella said it is unclear what that will mean.
Last year there was a $4 million cushion, of which Cape got $200,000.
In Scarborough, the superintendent’s office was all set to present a budget to the Board of Education based on the assumption the town would get the same amount of state aid for education as it did this year.
“There’s no doubt this is a lot for us,” said Herb Hopkins, the school finance director, about the now anticipated cut of $600,000 or more.
“We were hoping for flat funding because of our increasing school enrollment,” he said. Scarborough is expecting an additional 100 students to enroll in the fall.
On Thursday, Feb. 27, at 7 p.m., at Town Hall, the school department plans to hold a public hearing on next year’s school budget, which as it currently stands would total $28.1 million. This represents a 12.6 percent increase over the current school budget, or an additional $2.4 million.
Scarborough Superintendent William Michaud was out of the office this week, and Board of Education Chairman David Beneman was reluctant to comment on the anticipated reduction in state aid, arguing that there has been no formal announcement from the Department of Education.
“The school department certainly did budget planning on the assumption that there would be no increase in general purpose aid, even though we’re going to have an additional 100 students,” Beneman said. “Any decrease in revenue doesn’t affect the cost of running the schools,” however, he added.
South Portland, which lost $1.1 million last year, will see a $500,000 increase this year, bringing state aid up to $2.77 million. However, the total percentage of the school budget funded by the state will drop.
Last year, the state’s $2.2 million contribution was 8 percent of the city’s school budget, but budget increases due largely to the debt service from five elementary school projects mean that even with the aid increase, the state is covering just 5 percent now, the lowest percentage allowed under the funding formula.
“I think we are the only municipality in the state that is a minimum receiver that I am aware, certainly among the larger school districts,” said Polly Ward, business manager for the South Portland school department. “We get so little state aid that we really couldn’t get any less.”
South Portland’s tax base is roughly 65 percent commercial and 35 percent residential, accounting largely for the low funding from the state.
School districts across the state are getting their first look at next year’s state funding for education, and locally it doesn’t look good.
Cape is looking at a reduction of $486,000 in state aid for education and Scarborough is looking at a cut of a little over $600,000. South Portland will actually see a $500,000 increase this year, but the total percentage of the school budget funded by the state will drop to 5 percent, the lowest allowed under state regulation.
The tough budget news comes as the Secretary of State’s Office certified on Tuesday a referendum question that would require the state to pay more to communities in education aid.
The proposal, proposed and backed by the Maine Municipal Association, would require 55 percent of total education expenditures statewide to be funded in the state budget.
The Legislature can either approve the proposal itself or put the question out to voters in November.
The education aid numbers, released this week by the state’s Department of Education, are based on the governor’s proposed budget, but have not yet been through the Legislature’s committee process or been voted on by lawmakers. They provide, however, the first look at how district budgets could be affected.
“This is the starting point for the discussion,” said Jim Watkins at the Department of Education.
Cape Elizabeth Business Manager Pauline Aportria said the expected $486,000 cut this year is on top of the nearly $450,000 cut in 2001-2002.
“It’s going to make life very difficult,” said Superintendent Tom Forcella.
He said the Town Council has asked the schools to keep any budget increase from causing a tax increase of more than 2 percent.
Replacing the money lost from the state with locally raised property taxes would require a 64-cent increase in taxes in Cape, an increase of 3.8 percent.
There is a $3 million “cushion” available to soften the blow, which has yet to be divided among schools throughout the state, but Forcella said it is unclear what that will mean.
Last year there was a $4 million cushion, of which Cape got $200,000.
In Scarborough, the superintendent’s office was all set to present a budget to the Board of Education based on the assumption the town would get the same amount of state aid for education as it did this year.
“There’s no doubt this is a lot for us,” said Herb Hopkins, the school finance director, about the now anticipated cut of $600,000 or more.
“We were hoping for flat funding because of our increasing school enrollment,” he said. Scarborough is expecting an additional 100 students to enroll in the fall.
On Thursday, Feb. 27, at 7 p.m., at Town Hall, the school department plans to hold a public hearing on next year’s school budget, which as it currently stands would total $28.1 million. This represents a 12.6 percent increase over the current school budget, or an additional $2.4 million.
Scarborough Superintendent William Michaud was out of the office this week, and Board of Education Chairman David Beneman was reluctant to comment on the anticipated reduction in state aid, arguing that there has been no formal announcement from the Department of Education.
“The school department certainly did budget planning on the assumption that there would be no increase in general purpose aid, even though we’re going to have an additional 100 students,” Beneman said. “Any decrease in revenue doesn’t affect the cost of running the schools,” however, he added.
South Portland, which lost $1.1 million last year, will see a $500,000 increase this year, bringing state aid up to $2.77 million. However, the total percentage of the school budget funded by the state will drop.
Last year, the state’s $2.2 million contribution was 8 percent of the city’s school budget, but budget increases due largely to the debt service from five elementary school projects mean that even with the aid increase, the state is covering just 5 percent now, the lowest percentage allowed under the funding formula.
“I think we are the only municipality in the state that is a minimum receiver that I am aware, certainly among the larger school districts,” said Polly Ward, business manager for the South Portland school department. “We get so little state aid that we really couldn’t get any less.”
South Portland’s tax base is roughly 65 percent commercial and 35 percent residential, accounting largely for the low funding from the state.
Deal with Pvt. Wars: Then look further afield
Published in the Portland Phoenix
Its Friday opening performance put off by frozen pipes, Pvt. Wars managed to draw a small crowd of about 20 people Saturday night, hours after a worldwide peace rally’s local event ended in a super-cooled Monument Square. Rather than chanting anti-Bush slogans or expressing concern about the well-being of the people of Iraq, however, the Cast — a grassroots theater company made up of three actors who rope their friends into lighting and stage managing — takes a look at war from the other end, through the lens of a Vietnam-era Army hospital. It is a reminder of how war affects people, distills them to their most basic characteristics, and of how humor may yet save us all.
Beautifully acted, hilariously funny, and backed by well selected music from the 1970s, Pvt. Wars deserves to fill the house at the St. Lawrence. It shows us the best we have to hope for if war does break out: If our military casualties have the resilience and humanity of these three characters, our world will get on fine.
Woodruff Gately (David A. Currier) is a shell-shocked simpleton with a good heart, determined to fix a broken radio, no matter how many working radios he must steal and dismantle to do it. He is able to befriend Natwick (J.P. Guimont), a foppish Long Island boy who joined the Army to continue, it seems, his trend of failures begun while he was growing up. Natwick’s physical injuries are hidden from view, but his psychological ones are very visible. Fortunately, actor Guimont’s senses of irony, delivery, and comedic timing were untouched by Natwick’s war.
Their relationship is complicated and enhanced by Silvio (Craig Bowden), who becomes a sort of misfit squad leader for the trio. It is Silvio who drives the dialogue, bringing up wide-ranging topics based primarily on his own fears of inadequacy now that he has had his testicles and penis blown off by shrapnel.
Rather than dealing with this injury in a depressing way, dwelling on the message the gods are sending him, Silvio chooses to take a more Kramer-type approach, concerned with how underwear feels and its effects on sperm motility.
Conversations between the three are awkward at first, as they adjust to their situations and become friends. As the play develops, they move on into learning more about each other and beginning to prepare for a return to the world.
There is both quiet and agitation on the stage, with between-scenes blackouts used not as a way for actors to move around unseen, but as a time for sound itself to become the performance. Hospital announcements, Natwick’s voiced letters home — clearly covering the truth of his crisis to assuage his parents’ worries — and period music break up the play’s moments and provide reminders that there is a world outside the hospital, and one outside the theater as well.
The actors are all very strong: Currier is bursting with Gately’s dynamic energy and goodwill; Bowden coils, springs, and relaxes like a comic Tarzan, fixing on an idea, ensnaring it and then finding it has escaped; and Guimont’s affected mannerisms and self-assured superiority mask his character’s vulnerabilities as well as any real Long Island boy could. Each has a sense of moment, timing, and expression, drawing out each of the play’s laughs naturally from the audience.
The characters are also well crafted in the writing and fully explored by the actors. Mannerisms, accents, and blocking all build onto the powerful base of the play’s introspection, showing us visually what we can also hear and feel going on in the characters’ lives.
And though it may seem a bit cliché to have the simplest man also be the deepest, Gately, who senses the true meaning of Longfellow’s epic "The Song of Hiawatha," also sees through the fog into the reality of the world outside the hospital, and into which our political leaders could stand to peer. We all have enough to deal with on our own, he says, "And if everybody would fight their own private wars, things would be all right. But, no, people have to stick their noses into other people’s wars."
The humor reigns supreme, however, which, possibly more than politics, is why the three chose the play for production. Looking for three-man shows, they found Pvt. Wars and "couldn’t stop laughing," Guimont says.
Laughter is a powerful weapon of war and tool of healing. Natwick’s admission of cowardice and thoughts of suicide is powerful, as he explains to Gately that a suicide threat is a cry for help. Gately’s replying offer of a razor blade to "help" Natwick, who shaves electric and has no blade, is the ironic punch line. And Silvio’s motivational tactic of radio-parts theft adds a darker, but still funny, aspect to the show, forcing us again to see beyond initial purposes and into our own hidden agendas.
Pvt. Wars
By James McLure. Produced by the Cast. With Craig Bowden, David A. Currier, and J.P. Guimont. At St. Lawrence Arts and Community Center, through March 9. Call (207) 775-5568.
Thursday, February 13, 2003
Board says support for schools dropping
Published in the Current
While the Town Council likes to point out that Cape Elizabeth spends more per capita on schools than any other town in the state, the School Board says the truth is the town’s support of schools is dropping and it now ranks 30th in terms of per pupil spending.
“You’re not putting into your school system what other districts are,” Superintendent Tom Forcella said of the town’s contribution at Tuesday night’s School Board meeting.
“The amount of money we’re spending per pupil has fallen dramatically” compared with other schools, Forcella said. “We’re not putting in the effort financially that the towns around us are putting into their schools,” he said.
School officials say the town’s per-pupil spending is being outpaced by towns throughout the state, including many in Cumberland County, to which the school system regularly compares itself.
In 1995-1996, Cape was fourth in the state and second in the county in per pupil spending, when compared with other K-12 school districts with more than 500 students, according to state statistics distributed by Forcella.
In 2001-2002, the district was 30th in the state and seventh in the county, indicating what Forcella called “a continuous downward trend.”
The state Department of Education ranks schools’ per-pupil spending after factoring out transportation costs and loan payments. Adding those in would probably lower the town’s ranking even more, Forcella said.
Board member Kevin Sweeney said the numbers disturbed him because the district made a significant push to raise teacher salaries three years ago, which seemed to have no effect on the slipping ranking. He went on to say that cuts already have been made wherever they can be, and even in some places that might not be able to be sustained with less money.
“When it comes to what kids need in classrooms and what teachers need in classrooms, we’ve been cutting,” Sweeney said.
Finance Committee Chairman Elaine Moloney said the School Board was reassessing how much effort townspeople want them to make on behalf of the schools.
“We really will be looking at getting a better feel from our community about how much support they want to put behind our budget,” she said.
While the Town Council likes to point out that Cape Elizabeth spends more per capita on schools than any other town in the state, the School Board says the truth is the town’s support of schools is dropping and it now ranks 30th in terms of per pupil spending.
“You’re not putting into your school system what other districts are,” Superintendent Tom Forcella said of the town’s contribution at Tuesday night’s School Board meeting.
“The amount of money we’re spending per pupil has fallen dramatically” compared with other schools, Forcella said. “We’re not putting in the effort financially that the towns around us are putting into their schools,” he said.
School officials say the town’s per-pupil spending is being outpaced by towns throughout the state, including many in Cumberland County, to which the school system regularly compares itself.
In 1995-1996, Cape was fourth in the state and second in the county in per pupil spending, when compared with other K-12 school districts with more than 500 students, according to state statistics distributed by Forcella.
In 2001-2002, the district was 30th in the state and seventh in the county, indicating what Forcella called “a continuous downward trend.”
The state Department of Education ranks schools’ per-pupil spending after factoring out transportation costs and loan payments. Adding those in would probably lower the town’s ranking even more, Forcella said.
Board member Kevin Sweeney said the numbers disturbed him because the district made a significant push to raise teacher salaries three years ago, which seemed to have no effect on the slipping ranking. He went on to say that cuts already have been made wherever they can be, and even in some places that might not be able to be sustained with less money.
“When it comes to what kids need in classrooms and what teachers need in classrooms, we’ve been cutting,” Sweeney said.
Finance Committee Chairman Elaine Moloney said the School Board was reassessing how much effort townspeople want them to make on behalf of the schools.
“We really will be looking at getting a better feel from our community about how much support they want to put behind our budget,” she said.
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