Every Year around the time of school board elections, Doris Meyer comes out to write letters to the editor defaming board trustees, the superintendent, the PTA and the school district in general. Obviously, this year is no exception. Again she uses misinformation to make her case.

The organization that voted to stand against the State Education DepartmentÕs demand to eliminate local diplomas and force every child to earn a Regents diploma was the New York State Parent Teacher Association. This was clearly stated in Mrs. AshleyÕs editorial. No PTA unit nor council in OBEN voted on this issue. Nor has any OBEN PTA unit or council ever opposed higher academic standards either proposed by NYS or this school district.

How Mrs. Meyer could ÒmisunderstandÓ this point is difficult to grasp. She never attends school board meetings nor PTA meetings, yet she is convinced that there is a "PTA-School Board cabal working to ensure OBEN educational mediocrity into the next millennium.Ó We could dismiss her comments as the same old nastiness we have heard in the past. The only problem is that her attacks on our school district are costing all of us time, money and aggravation. She put her name to petitions to the commissioner of education to cast aside the approved bond, costing the district legal fees and hampering the boardÕs efforts to solve overcrowding on a long-term basis.

She continues to spread misinformation about our school district, ignoring that our programs are strengthening each year and our enrollments are growing. When we raised the academic requirements for high school graduation three years ago to 28 credits, long before the NYS standards revision and well ahead of every district on Long Island, Mrs. Meyer was silent. The fact that we are averaging six sections of classes in our elementary grades and that there are not enough houses available to meet the demand of interested buyers seems to have escaped her notice. Instead, she tries to create a sensation by fabricating the truth about the OBEN PTA.

Unfortunately, her impact on the community does not even stop here. Others have recently adopted Mrs. MeyerÕs poisonous style in their letters to the editor and comments at public meetings. When Mrs. MeyerÕs PAC organization C.A.R.E. (Complainers Antagonizing Residents Endlessly) makes its endorsements for Òresponsive, responsible trusteesÓ this spring, we should all be wary.