Dueling petitions in the town of Hooksett over the conduct of School Board Clerk John Lyscars and the school board’s decision to sign an exclusive contract with Pinkerton Academy, which eventually requires ninety percent of the town’s public school high school students to go to the Derry school, are drawing attention. As of seven o’clock last night, the anti-Lyscars petition started by Lyscars antagonist Alyssa Zapora Ehl on December tenth had collected eighty three signatures, including nine from other states and countries. Many of the signatories have publicly bashed Lyscars while persistently supporting the Hooksett School Board’s quote unquote “Pinkerton only” policy. The petition launched in opposition to the Pinkerton contract by Hooksett resident Scott Barker on Christmas Eve has already collected eighty five signatures. As far as we can tell, there are no out of state or international signatories. Comments on both sites are interesting reading with the “remove Lyscars folks” complaining about his antics in opposition to the school board’s process and posture and opponents of the Pinkerton contract stating the reasons why they believe it’s bad for them and the town. We’ve linked to both from this news read at Girard at Large dot com so you can take a look.
We revisit the question of whether or not Hooksett Superintendent Charles Littlefield provided the Manchester School District with an estimate of students for the coming school year as required by its legal settlement. Littlefield’s letter of December nineteenth referencing a December second conversation with Manchester Superintendent Debra Livingston got us looking through our inbox. We found a December sixth email from Livingston in which she says she and Littlefield spoke on December second and that Littlefield estimated there would be three hundred twenty nine students for the coming school year. The email also states the number of incoming freshmen for the oh fifteen oh sixteen school year was unknown and went on to reference, incorrectly in one case, the numbers of students that could attend schools with which Hooksett had a Memorandum of Understanding. We’ve posted the email which raises a number of questions, but seems to answer whether or not Littlefield notified Livingston as per the contract.
News from our own backyard continues after this.
The Manchester Police Department saved Christmas for a Sommerville Street family whose gifts were stolen from the basement of their apartment building. After arriving at the scene of the crime on the twenty third and taking the necessary information, the attending detectives and officers decided to help the family. They notified department personnel that Christmas wouldn’t be coming for the fifteen year old boy and eight year old girl without their help. Uniformed and civilian personnel donated cash as did the department’s unions. Community police officers reached out to several groups, including the Salvation Army, City Welfare Department , the Police Athletic League and Child and Family Services who all stepped up to help. We’ve posted the department’s press release with the details of who did what along with a great picture of all the presents the department was able to get for the family in short order, ensuring a Merry Christmas for the kids and their very distressed mom. The release also has information on the crime and asks for the public’s help.
Public Service Company of New Hampshire is warning its customers of a scam. Scammers claiming to represent P S N H may call customers and tell them their service is scheduled to be shut off, then advise them to make a payment by purchasing a “Green Dot” VISA card. Customers are then told to call another phone number where information is obtained from the credit card which enables them to take the money off the card. P S N H says customers should ask anyone claiming to be from the utility basic account information, such as address, account number and past due balance to know the call is legit.
A water main break closed parts of Kelly Street, the Biron Bridge and parts of Pinard Street yesterday from roughly eleven A M to nine P M. While the fifty year old, sixteen inch main is relatively young by system standards, system engineer Guy Chabot said there was an unusual amount of corrosion along its exterior. He said no customers lost water service thanks to a parallel twelve inch main that was able to satisfy the demand, though there was a drop in pressure. Chabot said the mains in the area will be inspected in the spring to determine if the corrosion problem that caused them to remove a damaged four foot section of pipe is isolated or more wide spread.
That’s news from our own backyard, Girard at Large hour ___ starts right after this!
