It has been called to my attention that the Bethlehem School Board meeting of February 5 is at 6:30 pm, not at 7 pm as I wrote earlier.
One more thing. If you know a person who is intelligent, vigorous, and dedicated to serving the community in what seems often to be a thankless job, ask that person if he or she would like to run for school board. New blood seems very much needed for this vital organization.
Maybe you yourself are the perfect person. If so, don't hold back. I don't think you'll come to thank me for it--but remember, one four-year term is not forever, but it could be long enough to make a very positive difference.

A special meeting of an organization called Friends Of Broughal School was held Monday, January 22 at the Forte Building in Southside Bethlehem. It took place under the auspices of the Mayor's South Side Task Force.
About 40 people were in attendance, a mix of general community activists, citizens concerned chiefly with this particular issue, and Lehigh University faculty, and students.
Bethlehem School Superintendent Dr. Joseph Lewis also was in attendance. During the course of the evening he listened to a great deal of advice and information that contradicted his administration's recommendations calling for the destruction of Broughal.
Among the speakers at the crisp, well-ordered meeting were citizen activist Stephen Antalics, prominent in the fight to save Broughal; City Councilwoman Jean Belinsky; Michael Kramer of the South Bethlehem Historical Society and co-founder with his wife Amy Senape of Save Our Steel; Michel LeFevre of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission; former Bethlehem city official Dana Grubb, and several others.
Architect Christine Ussler, Bethlehem's historic preservation officer, also spoke briefly, and mentioned her work as a consultant in helping to preserve the old Nesquehoning and Summit Hill High Schools in Carbon County. She said those buildings had been in an advanced state of disrepair, and yet had been successfully rehabilitated. She added that in her view, rehabilitating Broughal would be a much easier job--it is a building in use and in good repair.
In his presentation, Michel Lefevre of the PHMC spoke of the concern in Harrisburg about the determination to destroy Broughal. He said Bethlehem is special, one of the best preserved places in the state, historically speaking; and that this preservation policy was a great boon to the economy of the city. The destruction of Broughal, he pointed out, would mean a loss of many millions of dollars in tax money.
Addressing Superintendent Lewis, LeFevre made an impassioned plea to save the old building.
Michael Kramer and Dana Grubb also detailed the financial losses and gains involved to the public, depending on whether or not old Broughal survives. Grubb also explained RFPs, or Requests for Proposals, to his rapt audience.
RFPs are a procedure for the disposal of public property in which the availability of the property is advertised, and firms and individuals are invited to make bids to acquire it.In the case of the school, only bids from bidders who wish to retain the school and maintain its historic appearance would be entertained.
Grubb pointed out that RFPs are a way of determining if there is a market for public property. If there is, it can be sold, to the profit of the public. If there is not, it can be disposed of otherwise.
The process avoids the problem of finding that there had been a market for property that no longer exists, and the public ire that
such a discovery might generate.
At the end of the meeting Superintendent Lewis said he was not the final authority on the matter; he himself was an employee of the nine-member school board. But he suggested that an idea might be brought before the board, urging haste because "the clock is running."
"Yes; but will we be listened to?" asked several of the community activists.
And that, indeed, is the question. Perhaps it will be answered at 7 p.m. on the evening of February 5, when there will be another school board meeting. I think it will once again be a meeting of the facilities committee, but am not sure.
It may be hoped, though, that this time the board does not keep us waiting 45 minutes to an hour, as happened last time.

Last night the Bethlehem Area School Board attempted to put the final touches to the doom of the historic Broughal Middle School on the South Side.
The Administration and the majority of the school directors insist they have exhausted all the possibilities for saving the old building, citing discussions with Lehigh University. In fact, they ignored many creative ideas, both from professional preservationists and from the citizenry. As to the notion that a viable solution to the situation could lie with Lehigh University, that idea is laughable on the face of it.
Yes, Lehigh generates some jobs in the area--even many jobs.
But the university is one of those non-profits that seems to me to keep on taking from the community around it. It does nothing to make its neighborhood any better; and its housing needs and policies have done a lot to destroy the housing stock. If it were interested in acquiring the Broughal building right now, my guess is that it would only destroy it.
Yet it is bound to want the land on which the building stands. Perhaps it is calculating on letting the building be destroyed by the School Board, and later on picking up the empty field for a virtual song. Who can be sure?
I repeat: It seems to me that the School Board has gone to considerable lengths to make excuses to destroy the building. I cannot figure out why. I have heard that the test scores of Broughal students are high--in fact, that they are the best in the city. If this is true, shouldn't it be a matter for pride? For real self-esteem? Shouldn't it be convincing proof that you do not need to go to a new crackerbox of a building with all the bells and whistles in order to get a good education?
Yet someone has sold Broughal parents a bill of goods: That it is demeaning to their children to have to go to a school that has been an important part of its community for 92 years, and that is architecturally fine enough to qualify for the National Register of Historic Places.
It is, in fact, a great opportunity to go to such a school. And it would be a crime to destroy it.
I would suggest calling a community meeting of Broughal parents--and where better than at Broughal? The meeting could explain to these parents what is special about the building, and what is special about its tradition. Above all, it could explain why it is an honor to go there, and how its heritage can be enriched and continued, for the benefit of the whole South Side community.

On January 25, citizens and board members of the Hazleton Area School District will attend a dedicatory ceremony for the new Hazle Elementary School.
What makes this more than local Hazleton news is that Hazle is the former Hazleton High School, an imposing building long known as "the Castle." It was saved after what seems to have been a long and fierce battle to preserve it, when it was realized the space it encompassed was desperately needed.
In a January 15th Standard-Speaker article by Sam Galski, Hazleton Area School Board President Rick Morelli commented, "After a long time of battling back and forth with the architect and contractors, I'm pleased to see the finished project... I think the public is going to be very impressed with the building."
And he added, "We did not have to rebuild this. But, there's no question in my mind--we made the right direction."
Bethlehem Area School Board, please copy.

It will take some time, I suppose, to shake off the gloom of that last post. But I am about to return to present issues.
Especially with the casino in the offing, one of the major issues facing the Bethlehem area and the rest of the Lehigh Valley is going to be transportation.
To put it another way, if you think the air is seriously polluted right now, wait until you are breathing the poisons generated by an additional couple of hundred thousand motor vehicles, all coming to the casino or to other local visitors' attractions. This is not to mention the dangerous challenge of trying to cross, or to drive on, local streets--particularly,but not limited to, the streets of the South Side.
Those who have been here for a while are invited to cast their minds back a few years, to the last time the Hill-To-Hill Bridge was closed for repairs, and Third and Fourth Streets were close to impassable. Think of that as a preview of coming attractions.
Which brings us to--trains. Why on earth did we ever let them take away our train connections to New York and Philadelphia? If we had them, and a shuttle bus to take visitors around to all the interesting sites and sights in town, we would have a far better place to live, and the visitors would have a far better place to visit.
Sounds like a win-win situation, doesn't it? But it's interesting how often the human race walks away from win-win situations. A couple of days ago a friend of mine went hopefully to a meeting on railroads. To her great disappointment, she learned that it was mostly about the prospect of extending rail service from Lansdale to Quakertown. Quakertown is all right, but it is the major population centers of the Lehigh Valley--Allentown, Bethlehem, and Easton--that are in major need of such services.
We are assured there is no demand for trains. Isn't there? Maybe, maybe not. I rode the old bullet train from South Side Bethlehem to Philadelphia during the very last of the old days. By that time the train and the tracks were pretty run down, and very few people were on the car in which I traveled. Proof of disinterest, right? Again, maybe, maybe not.
On the other hand, isn't it true that if government wants to stop offering a public service, a tried-and-true approach is to let it run down to the point where nobody wants to use it? What would happen if, instead, you spruced things up and started offering some small amenities, such as courteous and helpful employees?
And what if visitors to the city were offered some small incitements, gifts or whatever, to come here by train and travel about by the shuttle bus and regular LANTA service? It is not hard at all to imagine a very successful train and public transportation operation under those circumstances, is it?
But what of the tracks that have been pulled up and will be pulled up to make way for a walkers' greenway? Put the tracks (which are REALLY historical) back, and run trains on them. The greenway, or whatever it is called, would serve only a portion of residents and visitors--namely, the young and physically fit. Moreover, I have heard that it is likely to cost the astounding figure of $30 thousand a year to maintain it. Surely that money can be better spent, and a wider range of people can profit from it.