Sign up to win a
Feedback
to the
Send comments to themail@rochestercitynews.com, or post them on our website, rochestercitynewspaper.com, our Facebook page, or our Twitter feed, @roccitynews. For our print edition, we select comments from all three sources; those of fewer than 350 words have a greater chance of being published, and we do edit selections for publication in print. We don’t publish comments sent to other media.
TRIP FOR 2 MAYAN RIVERA
ENTER BY JUNE 1ST, drawing June 2nd No Purchase Necessary
Irondequoit • Webster • Penfield
MONTEALBANGRILL.COM
2014 Fifa
World Cup June 12 – July 13 Watch inside or outside! 10-foot digital screen in our courtyard Enjoy dining on our beautiful outside patio!
Come enjoy the World Cup with True Soccer Enthusiasts!
137 west commercial st | east rochester lemoncello137.com
385-8565
WEEKLY SPECIALS
• $1 Oyster Tuesdays after 5pm only • No Corkage Fee Wednesdays • $5 Custom Craft
Cocktails on Thursdays OPEN FOR DINNER: Monday-Saturday
Local. Seasonal. Lento. 274 N. Goodman St., Rochester www.lentorestaurant.com
Call 271-3470
2 CITY
MAY 21-27, 2014
Is integration really an answer?
“… hundreds of thousands of African-American and Hispanic children are getting a very limited education….” (“Segregation Forever,” Urban Journal). How can that be, with teachers in Rochester being among the highest paid in the state and, probably, the country? What are they doing? Oh, of course: The reason is poverty, as you proceed in the next paragraph to absolve schools, teachers, and principals. But why does the children’s poverty, however defined, prevent teachers from applying their skills (which I presume they have)? Are parents not cooperative? Why would mixing these kids with kids from Brighton or Pittsford make parents more mindful of their kids’ education? “Standardized tests, tougher standards, public school choice, charter schools, longer school days…. By God, we’ll prove that we can give children a good education without integrating the schools. And off we run after the latest trend.” Trends, you call them? They are the time-honored means by which we instill good education, madam! Or do you subscribe to the soft bigotry of low expectations, that black and Hispanic kids are just too stupid? I lay the worsening of graduation rates, test scores, poverty rate, and racial segregation, things that we should all bemoan, at the feet of the administration of these schools. And where do you get the statistics? You mention School 23, whose student population is 34 percent white and 62 percent poor. There are only white and poor? None of the 34 percent whites are poor? And all of the 62 percent are blacks and Hispanics? No overlapping? I wonder what
cracks the remaining 4 percent fell through. Gosh! ITALO SAVELLA
Highland’s growth
On residents’ concerns about Highland Hospital’s expansion plans: This area is so pretty, and I
understand some of the neighbors’ concerns. On the other hand, our city needs more hospital beds. I used to work at Highland Hospital, and I would never buy a house in that area because of the hospital: too much traffic, ambulances coming and going, people driving up streets and attempting to park because they want to avoid paying for parking, in general too much commotion. And more important, the hospital was there long before the people were. If you don’t like it, move! ROCHESTER GAL
1) The cost of employee parking at the UR Medical Center is already outrageous. 2) URMC has shuttle buses to and from remote parking sites. Most employees are not thrilled about adding another half an hour to their travel time on shuttles. 3) Incentives to live close by? Like subsidize purchasing homes on Mulberry and Mt. Vernon? URMC is one of the largest employers in the county. They run 24/7/365. There are nurses, techs, CNA, and all other kinds of employees. Many of them are single parents who need to get their children to child-care providers. If you want URMC to provide onsite child care at Highland or the main site – well, that’s more space they’ll need to create. 4) I know we’re talking primarily about Highland, but URMC sucked up a large employee lot for College Town. The new free-standing Golisano Children’s Hospital also took a chunk of land. 5) You want to live where you want to live. You don’t want people telling you that if you don’t want to live near Highland Hospital then you need to move. Employees at Highland also want to live where they want to live, some of which may have to do with school districts. Making it more difficult and
expensive to work, or requiring them to live in certain locations so they can walk to work or wait for a bus in the midst of a Polar Vortex is no different from suggesting you move. LIZZIE HOWELL
The University and East High
On the state’s endorsement of University of Rochester involvement at East High School:
That a school needs to be rescued pretty much points out that those in charge do not know what they are doing. To me this is a signal that everyone has to go: Vargas, Urbanski, the entire school board. It is time to shock the system. It is time to change everything. It is time to have people in charge who have no idea what the status quo has been. Making a drastic effort with one school while leaving the failed structure in place is insane. TOM JANOWSKI
Partnering with the UR frees East from the dysfunctional bureaucracy of Central Office and provides East with needed advisory support and the opportunity to transform itself. Once East proves that urban schools can turn themselves around – and into highly competitive high schools, with beautiful facilities, with sports and other after-school opportunities that large suburban schools offer – there is no way charter schools will be able to compete, with their large class sizes and under-paid / uncertified / inexperienced teachers and few extra curricular opportunities located in warehouse type facilities. SUSIE R.
It’s way too simplistic to say that the failure at East is because of Central Office dysfunction. Don’t get me wrong: it’s bad, but it’s not everything. Schools have had the power to opt out of Central Office through the Living Contract provision. They just haven’t done it. It’s easier to blame the Central Office bogeyman. This UR takeover will be a rude awakening for the ivory towertypes who’ve confused theory with practice. And it will be painful for the rest of us to watch. GEORGE O’CONNOR
News. Music. Life. Greater Rochester’s Alternative Newsweekly May 21-27, 2014 Vol 43 No 37 250 North Goodman Street Rochester, New York 14607-1199 themail@rochester-citynews.com phone (585) 244-3329 fax (585) 244-1126 rochestercitynewspaper.com facebook.com/CityNewspaper twitter.com/roccitynews On the cover: Photo by Mark Chamberlin Publishers: William and Mary Anna Towler Editor: Mary Anna Towler Asst. to the publishers: Matt Walsh Editorial department themail@rochester-citynews.com Arts & entertainment editor: Jake Clapp News editor: Christine Carrie Fien Staff writers: Tim Louis Macaluso, Jeremy Moule Arts & entertainment staff writer: Rebecca Rafferty Music writer: Frank De Blase Calendar editor: Antoinette Ena Johnson Contributing writers: Paloma Capanna, Casey Carlsen, Roman Divezur, George Grella, Laura Rebecca Kenyon, Andy Klingenberger, Dave LaBarge, Kathy Laluk, Adam Lubitow, Nicole Milano, Ron Netsky, Suzan Pero, David Raymond, David Yockel Jr. Art department artdept@rochester-citynews.com Art director/production manager: Matt DeTurck Designers: Aubrey Berardini, Mark Chamberlin Photographers: Mark Chamberlin, Frank De Blase Advertising department ads@rochester-citynews.com Sales operations: Matt Walsh New sales development: Betsy Matthews Account executives: Nancy Burkhardt, Tom Decker, Christine Kubarycz, William Towler Classified sales representatives: Christine Kubarycz, Tracey Mykins Operations/Circulation kstathis@rochester-citynews.com Circulation manager: Katherine Stathis Distribution: Andy DiCiaccio, David Riccioni, Northstar Delivery, Wolfe News City Newspaper is available free of charge. Additional copies of the current issue may be purchased for $1 each at the City Newspaper office. City Newspaper may be distributed only by authorized distributors. No person may, without prior written permission of City Newspaper, take more than one copy of each weekly issue. City (ISSN 1551-3262) is published weekly by WMT Publications, Inc. Periodical postage paid at Rochester, NY (USPS 022-138). Address changes: City, 250 North Goodman Street, Rochester, NY 14607. Member of the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies and the New York Press Association. Annual subscriptions: $35 ($30 senior citizens); add $10 for out-of-state subscriptions. Refunds for fewer than ten months cannot be issued. Copyright by WMT Publications Inc., 2014 - all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, photocopying, recording or by any information storage retrieval system without permission of the copyright owner.