Endorsements

Wellesley Community Members

Lisa Ahn
Susan Bailey
Joe Balsamo
Elisabeth Bassler
Liu Baxter
Amy Benjamin
Ellie Bergstrom
Lily Biro
Nova Biro
Peter Biro
Sophie Biro
Carla Bloomfield
Kevin Bruyneel
Cady Bubeck
Julia Bucci
Sarah Wendy Burman
Ellen Burns
Sarah Butter
Kelly Caiazzo
Maggie Calcio
Christine Carpenter
Haley Cheek
Jonathan Cheek
Megan Conroy
Lucy Costa
Arianna Cozza
Paul Criswell
Maggie Davidov
Lee de Fontaine
Julia de Peyster
Jillian DeBusk
Stephanie De Oliveira
Lauren Desautels
Sarah Ditelberg
Bernadette Dore
John Dore
Shannon Duffy
Kevin Durkin
Leda Eizenberg
Susan Ellison
Wendy Englebardt
Lamia Farah
Susan Fasten
Maureen Febiger
Devon Fitchett
Catherine Friendly
Kelly Friendly
Yeimy Garcia
Mateo Gariepy
Meghan Gayton
Michelle Gee
Arthur Gertler
Judith Gertler
Emma Goldenthal
Abbie Goodman
Stephen Gomperts
Mary Green
Katie Griffith
Karen Haddock
Emma Hammond
Katy Hanson
Robert Hicks
Emma Himmelberger
Jules Holland
Bianca Horner
Christina Horner
Howard Horner
Darlene Howland
Greg Hurray
Norma Kamar
Kathy Kaufmann
Caroline Kinsella
Betsy Komjathy
Cole Krasner
Pam Kubbins
Lisa LaBanca Rogers
Hannah Landau
Rachel Landau
Arielle Langer
Michelle Lee
Theresa Levy
Wendy Li
John Logan
Cathleen Lunger
Freya Maltz
Karen Marans
Peter Mawhorter
Jacqueline Maxwell
Jeanne Mayell
Mark Mayell
Charley Mayhew
Dennis McCormick
Alison McIntyre Lukes
Eleanor Medley
Hannah Medley
Quintus Medley
Gracie Meisner
Elaine Mittell
Brett Miwa
Cori Miwa
Elise Miwa
Julia Miwa
Parker Morse
John Muckle
Ashley Murphy
Lina Musayev
Billy Near
Liza Near
Jane Neilson
Abby Nicholson
Julie Norem
Kylie O’Donnell
Oreoluwa Odeyinka
Lise Olney
Abby Ow
Janie Penn
Margaret Petrovich
Gayatri Pradhan
Quentin Prideaux
Mary Prosnitz
Jan Putnam
Caroline Quan
Erin Reilly
Whitney Retallic
Leslie Richman
Lisa Robbins
Alyssa Robins
Susan Ryan
Samuel Sanchez
Allison Sargent
Tom Sargent
Jennifer Sawyer
Jessica Sawyer
Annika Schafer
Dawn Shearer Coren
Kayla Sheets
Holly Simons
Kamana Singh Jain
Sydney Spangler
Finn Sullivan
Carol Tham
Kay Thompson
Caroline Thornton
Andrew Tollison
Brian Tom
Matthew Tom
Diana Turk
Jay Turner
Priya Verma
Alison Wade
Kristin Kelly Walton
Shelly Ward
Sally Watts
Sue Webb
Lauren Wilwerding
Caroline Wilson
Betsy Zahniser
David Zahniser
Susan Zelenko
Joanne Zhang 

Town Offices

Advisory Committee Vote

8 to 2

Town Meeting Vote

63%

in favor of Article 42 to Support the Establishment of Indigenous Peoples Day in Wellesley
See article full text

See how Town Meeting members voted on Article 42

Town Groups

Let’s Talk Wellesley

OUT MetroWest

Sustainable Wellesley

Young Ethnic Scholars (YES)

World of Wellesley

Statements

"OUT MetroWest supports the efforts in Wellesley to officially recognize and honor Indigenous Peoples Day. As an LGBTQ+ organization, we note the particular harm inflicted upon Two Spirit people under European settler colonialism. We honor the resilience of those on whose ancestral lands OUT MetroWest operates and recognize that LGBTQ+ liberation is not possible without Indigenous liberation."
OUT MetroWest
"Indigenous Peoples Day is an often overlooked step in acknowledgment, but Let's Talk Wellesley hopes to push forward."
Let's Talk Wellesley
"We demand our voices be heard."
YES - Young Ethnic Scholars
"As an educator who supports the acknowledgement of the harm done to Indigenous people by the European settlers who founded this nation, and the continued oppression of Native Americans, I urge our town to recognize Indigenous People’s Day."
Leda Eizenberg
"As we have learned more about the true history of the North American continent, honoring the First Nations feels long overdue."
Darlene Howland
"Choosing to honor Indigenous People over the man who is said to be responsible for many of their deaths, is not implying anything bad about Italian people. We should have a celebration of Italian heritage in Wellesley, too; just not celebrating Columbus."
Erin Reilly
"Honoring the people who lived for many generations on the land we now live on, and teaching about colonialism from their point of view, too, is one way for us all to deepen our understanding of the complexity of American history, and to honor Indigenous People in our land today."
Betsy Zahniser
"An apology is long overdue from the government to the Native Americans as other countries have done."
Arthur Gertler
"If the statement 'Europe is a continent that was discovered by Batu Khan in 1236,' doesn't make sense to you, then the sentence 'The Americas were discovered by Columbus in 1492,' shouldn't make sense to you either. Honoring a perpetrator of genocide is wrong."
Peter Mawhorter
"Wellesley College activists, particularly the Native American Student Association, have worked tirelessly in support of this measure. The student body is committed to supporting Question #1."
Alyssa RobinsWellesley College
"May Wellesley promote truth, healing, reconciliation, redress and justice for our local Massachusett Tribal heritage and our national Indigenous roots, history and contributions."
Mary Green
"Honoring Indigenous People’s Day is about one thing only: Acknowledging that the land we live on has a history deeper than the one taught in history books. This is about rewriting a wrong attribution and celebrating the roots of the land."
Matthew Tom
"Two of my degrees are in history, and I have read Columbus' journals, which are disturbingly cruel. He was an enslaver who mutilated Indigenous People in his quest for gold and enabled child trafficking. He brought Indigenous People to Europe against their will, stole natural resources, and was lucky rather than intelligent when it came to "discovering" the Americas. I do not believe that Columbus is a good figure to celebrate, nor did I ever associate him with Italian-American pride. I do not believe it marginalizes Italian-Americans to stop celebrating an enslaver and child trafficker who is symbolic of imperialism. My children are 25% Italian and I am proud of their cultural heritage and went to Italy on my honeymoon because it was so important to my husband who is 50% Italian. Honoring Indigenous Peoples' Day is NOT anti-Italian. It is anti-slavery and sex trafficking, something I believe we can and should all unify against."
Kelly Caiazzo
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