Dear Editor:
The moratorium on the sale of St Joseph’s convent by the city council took me by surprise.
It is not just that the city council appears so unwelcoming to the university, but it is their callous disregard for the plight of the nuns who so crucially need the income for their continued maintenance. Council unanimously halts UNE development
Have the members of the city council forgotten that these nuns spent their lifetimes giving the children of the city an exceptional education, permitted many of them to go on to graduate and postgraduate educations and professional lives? How many on the city council had their parents, themselves, or their children taught by the nuns?
Do the city council members not realize that the plight of the nuns results from the fact that they worked without salary and do not receive social security benefits as the rest of the community which they taught?
You would think that there would be an outpouring of gratitude for the immense benefit to the community provided by these sisters. Instead total ingratitude and disregard.
I cannot believe the citizens of Biddeford who I grew up with would support this callousness. It leads me to wonder how representative of the community the city council is.
A second issue: Most communities welcome a university campus in their city. The professional management, teaching, and research staff enhance the economic, social, and cultural fabric of the community, not to mention the educational benefits available locally. Many people looking for a community to relocate will consider a local university as a major benefit.
I also find it surprising that someone would bring up the value of the land the school sits on. You can be land rich and finances poor.
I myself had to go out of state to medical school because Maine was one of the few states with no in-state medical school at that time. I’m also convinced that my education at St Joseph’s Gramnar and High School were a major factor ability in my admission to that most competitive of professions. I also know how to be grateful.
This brings up another question. Who are these people whose complaints have such an outsized influence on the council?
Are they on the council themselves? What is their relationship to the council members? Who is the council representing? Certainly not the community, and certainly not its most deserving and vulnerable members, women in their 80s and 90s who taught generations of children without pay.
The ingratitude shown by the city council cannot possibly represent the sentiments of the community and the entire process should be investigated and reviewed.
Shirley Roy, Biddeford
Editor’s Note: The city’s six-month moratorium on development at UNE’s Biddeford campus, does NOTHING to prevent the university from moving forward with its planned purchase of the St. Joseph’s Convent. The moratorium also does not apply to St. Joseph’s Convent, which is located nearly two miles west of UNE’s Biddeford campus.
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