Letter: Focus on the Unmet Needs in Our Community

I attended yesterday’s special town council meeting (April 14). It left me with a profound sense of sadness that I just can’t shake. Again and again, I heard praise for our community. There was confidence that community members would come through for the library project, honoring earlier pledges, as they always have. That the fund raising target would be reached, that more aggressive fund raising could be done. The sentiment was that, in the current situation – more than ever – a library is needed. It would be a community center serving all.

But what I see happening in our community is that USDA has cancelled $440, 000 worth of food deliveries for the Western Massachusetts Food Bank, that there are 132,000 people in the area (four counties, including Amherst) that rely on food assistance, that the Amherst Survival Center is desperate for donations to make up for the recent funding losses. Our community has not come through with eliminating food insecurity in our town. What immigrants most urgently need is not English classes in a brand new library, but legal help. And I have yet to see homeless families offered shelter in a library. It’s just not true that in the current situation – more than ever – libraries are needed.

Do we really want to build a top-of-the-line library at a time when many in our community don’t have a home, don’t have enough to eat, or have to live in fear of being deported? If we need to do fundraising for community projects, aren’t there other priorities?

Angelika Kratzer

Angelika Kratzer is Professor of Linguistics Emerita, UMass Amherst.