Speak Out 1/22/04

Make hard decisions

WHAT A mess. If it's not the city's budget, it's the schools or the university. Everybody depends on the state or federal government for help. What direction are the leaders going in? Sometimes I feel like it's the blind leading the blind. Sometimes it takes more than common sense to solve a problem. I'm so tired of hearing that the problems were inherited. Making hard decisions is why our leaders are getting paid the big bucks. If our leaders were involved with every facet of their area of responsibility and they weren't there to make friends, many areas could be streamlined with very little problem.

Waiting for complaints

I WAS reading about the proposed ordinance about the number of pets a person can have. It says that it will be enforced based on complaints. I think this clause in any law is ridiculous. If a police officer driving down a street sees a car up on blocks for a year and doesn't have the authority to say the car is not being driven, then the law shouldn't exist. If you can see vehicles sitting all over town that haven't been moved in months or years, and it doesn't appear anything is being done, then why would you want a law that makes the police officer unable to do anything about it until somebody complains?

None of your business

I CANNOT imagine what is going on in this city when I see that the Cape Girardeau City Council is thinking about passing an ordinance saying people can't have more than four dogs or four cats in their residence. Do you want to tell me how many children I can have? This is none of your business. I have five dogs. It doesn't matter why I have them, but as long as I am taking care of them, it's none of your business how many pets I have. Why doesn't the city council spend time on what's important and earn the respect of this community.

All about spending

ANYTIME YOU have government officials involved, spending is all they think about so they can put a feather in their hat.

Bring in a casino

EVERYBODY HAS a song and dance about taxes. Why hasn't the Cape Girardeau City Council tried to bring in a casino? Maybe we could help our schools and meet the demands of the firefighters, police officers and the city workers. The Bill Emerson Memorial Bridge is up and running. It can hold the traffic to downtown. The banks of the Mississippi River could shine again and smell like a rose.

Handy for carts

YOU KNOW why we have handicap parking places? So able-bodied people can park their shopping carts in these spaces.

More serious needs

I'M CALLING about the proposed limit on animals that you can have in your house. Unless animals are being neglected or there are complaints, the city has no business sticking its nose into how many animals you've got. The city needs to worry about more serious things like getting more police officers.

Comparing morals

I WOULD like the caller to back up what he said about foreigners being more moral than Americans. I don't think that's the case. The United States has its problems, but I dare say if you traveled overseas, we're going to look pretty good.

Confused taxpayer

I'M A taxpayer in Cape Girardeau, and I've watched with interest the things that are going on with the school board. I have questions about the proposals for all of the current budget cuts. We just built a new elementary school a few years ago. Now we're talking about possibly having to close an elementary school. A couple of years ago we went through a big transition where we restructured the whole elementary process and built a high school. We hired new teachers to beef up our programs. The district spent a lot of money to refurbish the board office building. Now we're going to tell many of the teachers who were hired that they no longer have jobs or that they're going to have an increased number of children in their classrooms or that they have to make do with much less in terms of materials in their classrooms. I'm confused about whether this was truly an issue of a substantial decrease in funding or if there was some overspending in the past that we're all going to have to live with.

State spending

I KEEP reading about Missouri's financial condition, and then I pick up Sunday's paper and read how many additional millions of dollars the governor and the legislators want to spend. I would like to ask our elected officials how come they can't go through one or two years with no new spending. That would help correct the problem of being over budget.

Share the blame

I AM 68 years old. As far back as I can remember, when a student does good the teachers take the credit. When the student does bad the parents get the blame. I think most parents are cooperating with teachers. But please share the blame. That's all we ask.

Not forgotten

SINCE WE were unable to be at Charlie Hutson's celebration of life ceremony, we would like to give our condolences to the Hutson family and say that Charlie was a leader in his community and a loving and caring family man. He will be missed but never forgotten.

Personal agenda

THERE WAS a time when George Bush pretended to operate through consultation and cooperation. But the gloves are clearly now off. By sneaking through the appointment of right-wing extremist Charles Pickering to the federal court when Congress is not is session, he has demonstrated flagrant disregard for the system of checks and balances that the Constitution established. This president is single-handedly trying to create a judicial system that serves his personal agenda.

Nothing for kids

CAPE GIRARDEAU may be a fun city for some people, and it's a nice town to live in. But there is no kind of family entertainment except the movies. We need something here for young kids to go to. Sometimes I take my kids to the mall just to play in the new play area.

Real problems

TO THE caller who wants to go after the mountain lions: I live west of Cape Girardeau. Instead of going after these beautiful, awesome animals, how about we spend our time on the coyotes (who keep us up all night) and the copperhead snakes (which I see every summer) instead of mountain lions. And how about those wasps, hornets, velvet ants, poison spiders, mosquitos, ticks, fleas and chiggers? Our real problem is people dumping their animals.

Diet information

I AM so tired of everyone bashing the low-carb diet without knowing anything about it. The only thing you cut out of a low-carb diet is processed foods and replace them with natural foods. Before you think we've just all turned into nothing but meat eaters, read a book about the diet first.

But we fixed that

THE COMMUNITY Assessment Partnership reports that adequate public transportation continues to be a major problem in Cape Girardeau County. Impossible. The Cape Girardeau County Transit Authority was created by the Cape Girardeau County Commission two years ago to fix that problem. Is the assessment report saying that even though the county has added our tax dollars to the mix over the last two years, the problem remains?

It's up to the board

"THROW THE bums out" and "the buck stops here" are common phrases in the American political lexicon. When it comes to the Cape Girardeau School District, the buck stops with the school board. The district's current budget crisis occurred on its watch, and board members are the ones who must be held accountable. If the school board cannot fix this mess, then I say it is time to throw the bums out.

Salary adjustments

I HAVE recently learned that Cape Girardeau School District superintendent Mark Bowles' salary is higher than the statewide average for superintendents. Teachers' salaries in the district, however, are below the state average. Perhaps Bowles needs to explain why he ignored a recommendation from the budget reduction task force to reduce the salary of the administrators. It appears that Bowles would rather see a few teachers in the unemployment lines than reduce his higher-than-average salary.

Jaded cynics

THERE IS no doubt that Paul O'Neill's criticism of President Bush is correct. It is backed by documentation. Efforts to portray O'Neill as lacking objectivity because of sour grapes are wrong. Even if O'Neill lacked objectivity, the record speaks for itself. We have become a nation of jaded cynics. We have come to expect and tolerate the worst from our leaders and believe the end justifies the means.

What data?

I'D LIKE to see the data used by the Speak Out writer to determine that the Cape Girardeau City Council's use of money is the wisest in the country. The study must have been enormous in scope. How was it funded? Perhaps we could tap into that funding the next time our city wants to do a study.