Speak Out 3/26/08

Don't blame districts

I KNOW it's nitpicking. but the headline on the front page was wrong. It says, "School districts are cutting into students' vacation time." That's not correct. The school districts didn't cut into the vacation time. They set those days aside in case they were needed for bad weather. Mother Nature sent us all that ice, and Mother Nature sent all this water, not the school districts. Don't blame the school districts because the kids have to give up some vacation time.

Potholes repaired

I WANT to thank the city for being so prompt with repairing the potholes on Mount Auburn Road. I appreciate it, and I'm sure many others do. Thank you for the service.

Loud cars

WHAT ABOUT loud cars? Young punks are just as bad as the people with motor¿cycles who are going through midlife crisis. The loud cars are just as much of a hazard. At least motorcycle riders pay attention to the other drivers.

Bright fog lights

TO MOTORISTS on clear nights with your fog lights on: Fog lights are designed to flood light across the entire road in heavy fog, and they temporarily blind oncoming motorists on clear nights.

No on tax plan

DON'T GET your hopes up. The Cape Girardeau parks and storm-water tax proposal is dangerous. It would raise $25 million, of which only $3 million will go for storm water. That won't touch the problems of flooding. Part of this tax has no sunset. It will never end. The city doesn't properly fund the parks department. Please, don't vote for this. It won't help.

Kind gestures

MY CHILD was one of several who either didn't get anything or only got one or two things at the Easter egg hunt at Osage Community Centre on Saturday. There were two parents with their children who saw my son crying and shared with him. That was generous of you and your children. One of you gave him a bag of goldfish, which was funny, because that was the only thing he cared about getting that day. Thank you for being so generous. It meant a lot to him. Your kindness was appreciated.

Bent Creek cleanup

FOR CERTAIN people to have the perception that the Bent Creek area was cleaned up faster after the tornado because of where we lived is plain silly. Bent Creek was cleaned up quickly for several commonsense reasons. First, we live in a relatively new neighborhood, so we didn't have a large number of mature trees. Second, most of us paid to have a contractor come in and assist in the cleanup.

Take action on gas

LET'S TALK about something that is hurting all of us: gasoline prices. I know that you've all read about this in the papers and gotten e-mails about all of these remedies to resolve gas prices from all of the major suppliers. What we need to do is write to all of our elected officials and let them know that we're tired of this. My theory is that if they had to pay for gas like we do, something might get done. All of our elected officials have expense accounts along with a lot of other perks, so not only do we pay for gas in our vehicles, but also in their vehicles. We pay for theirs through our hard-earned tax dollars. I say let them know we're tired of it. Let's mandate that the oil companies build more refineries. Don't let them get away with this anymore. When an oil company posts record profits like they do, make them do something for the consumer. Let's do more research and development on alternative fuels for future use, but let's work on what we have now. Tell our Missouri elected officials, "No more."