90s26 Wildlife Habitat

I have mentioned that hyperbole runs rampant in Iowa City and the Longfellow neighborhood. I got a taste of that right away with a number of small incidents and a few major ones.

Because there was a great deal of mistrust by parents due to things that happened before I got to Longfellow I worked to rebuild that trust with parents individually, with the neighborhood association, and the PTA (Parent Teacher Association). When the opportunity arose I tried to do things that made each group feel like the school was an important part of the community. That included sharing the building and the grounds with all of those who had a need to use them.

My biggest challenge had been with the PTA. They clearly did not like the previous principal and weren’t sure about me. I found them second-guessing my decisions as well of some made by the building staff. I noticed that their preferred mode for doing that was not privately with me, but publicly in meetings or the press. More than once I found myself being talked about as if I wasn’t even in the room. I found that very odd.

I had managed to build some trust with the PTA president and thought I could win over the group in time. She began to share with me some of her reservations about others in the group who had attacked her publicly a few times, too. We commiserated with each other.

One morning she came into my office. She was concerned about the poison ivy in the fencerow around the playground. She was especially concerned about the north end and was sure that was where her daughter and others had gotten bad cases of the itchy rash. She asked if the district could do something about it, as not just students, but joggers and walkers of the neighborhood used the area. I told her I would see what I could do.

The district contracted with a lawn service and I asked them if they could help. The said that they had dealt with that problem before and would come and take care of it. I was pleased that I had been responsive and done something that the PTA President would be pleased with. If I had only known!

Within a couple of days I got a call from a local newspaper reporter. He said a parent had called them and told them I had single handedly destroyed the wildlife habitat of Iowa City. I was incredulous! I explained the whole story to the reporter and he seemed to understand. Nevertheless, the story made the front page of the local paper the next day. There were scathing comments from the parent about what I had done. The reporter much to my chagrin reported that I had indeed admitted my involvement in this terrible destruction of wildlife habitat.

The lawn care company claimed it had only done what the principal had requested. They had simply cleaned out the brush and weeds in the fencerow, so they were no help.

So the responsibility for Silent Spring in Iowa City rested solely on my shoulders. It didn’t help that I told them this was Iowa and everything in the fencerow would grow back in a year or so.

In less than a week the disenchanted parent raised over $8000 to plant trees and shrubs to replace the ones the principal had callously destroyed. The trees and shrubs are still there to this day and so is the poison ivy, worse than ever.

Did the PTA president jump to my defense? Nope! She barely admitted any involvement.