Returning The Favor

To the Editor:

Newtown. Nice people. Nice town. Good schools. People come here and stay here for those reasons. Newtown was made that way by its citizens who, over years and generations, contributed their time and their hard-earned tax dollars to something beyond themselves. The vast majority of those people were able to make those contributions because of the skills and values they learned through public education — in taxpayer-funded schools in Newtown and elsewhere, under the GI Bill, and with scholarships provided by state and federal governments and the generosity of others.

But now, many of those who themselves received a public education don’t want to contribute their share to preserve that system for the benefit of somebody else’s children. They were glad to take the help offered by other taxpayers back then, but they don’t want to now give back to the system from which they received so much.

When we need help in the future, perhaps from medical professionals, we’ll expect them to be available, but if we starve the current public education system, where will those professionals come from when we need them?

The benefits provided by a good public education program are important not only to the current crop of students (they’ll work smarter in the workplace if we let them, or they’ll have to work cheaper if we don’t), but it also makes Newtown a desirable place to live — and it’s a system that enhances property values.

I know we’re all hurting financially, but this same problem — and this same “can’t do” attitude — existed when times were better. I don’t want to pay taxes I don’t have to, but, among all the tax dollars we pay, education dollars are among the best spent — they pay rewards for years and generations to come, and they don’t need repair afterward. If we don’t do things right the first time, we can always fix a bridge or a building, but we can’t always fix a kid. So I’ll pay for an education system even though my children are no longer in it, and so should Newtown’s other citizens. It’s discomforting to think there are those in town who were so wiling to take then and are so reluctant to give back now. We had a name for that…

Don Mitchell

8 Budd Drive, Newtown                                                 March 10, 2009