In 2017, two young New Americans spoke at my church asking us to sign a petition to city council for lighting at Keach Park which would allow workers and students to play soccer after work or school. They were doing business the right way and the proposal was approved in 2018. Out of my sight, out of mind, until I learned from a recent Monitor Monitor that the council reversed the decision and postponed the lights until 2031. That’s a generation! Currently, proposals are going forward for a multimillion dollar clubhouse at Beaver Meadows, our public golf course.

Kevin Porter describes in his My Turn (Monitor, 2/17) the postponing of Keach Park lights and the pushing of a multimillion Beaver Meadows clubhouse as modern day redlining. It is. However, Fisto Ndayishimiye, a New American from Democratic Republic of Congo, is speaking out to established power by demanding New Americans and the Heights be heard and represented in council decisions. Just as in New York City, the Irish, the Jews and the Italians pushed their way to becoming full Americans, so must Concord’s immigrants through work, education, and, yes, political activism. Go Fisto!

Terry Irwin

Concord

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