Our weekly round-up of letters published in the Buffalo News.
Just wondering, why can’t we have the Buffalo Jills back? For years we were told that the lawsuit had to be settled. It was settled this March. Seeing that Kim Pegula was a cheerleader in college, thought it might happen. Would love to see the Jills back.
Chris Termini
Buffalo
I find that the Supreme Court’s draft decision of Roe v. Wade that was leaked not only undermines precedent law but threatens individual rights that are the foundation of the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.
Justice Samuel Alito, in his writing of the draft, reaches too far in banning all abortions, including cases of incest and rape. We have witnessed draconian laws already passed in states such as Texas and Oklahoma, and 13 states have passed "trigger laws" awaiting the overturn of Roe which will deny access to virtually all reproductive health services to women.
The Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment “provides a “right to privacy” that protects a pregnant woman’s right to choose whether to have an abortion. It also ruled that this right is not absolute and must be balanced against governments’ interests in protecting women’s health and prenatal life, like exceptions for cases when they were necessary to save the life or health of the mother. The Court classified the right to choose to have an abortion as fundamental, which required courts to evaluate challenged state abortion laws under the “strict scrutiny” standard, the highest level of judicial review in the United States.”
For years, except in states like New York and California, we have seen more and more restrictions making it difficult for women to access abortion services. Should Roe be overturned women will be seeking illegal abortions that are dangerous and even deadly. The United States already has the highest maternal mortality rate among developed countries, an unconscionable statistic. Is that number not high enough?
The Supreme Court needs to revisit this draft and realize the enormous emotional and physical damage that its decision would have on women in our country, particularly brown and Black women. Polls show that the majority of voters want Roe to stand as is. The Court should respond to the will of the people they are charged to serve.
Joelle Logue
Williamsville
The recent Supreme Court leak has inspired a lot of intense feelings and conversations across the United States.
Pregnancy is an incredibly personal experience that significantly impacts the pregnant person’s life. There’s a lot of debate about who thinks what about abortion. Abortion is a health care decision. The national conversation around Roe v. Wade is not ultimately about what is the right or wrong decision to make.
It’s about who should make the decision, the government or the person.
Though we cannot currently change the makeup of the Supreme Court, our elected officials at all levels of government will affect how the final Supreme Court decision will affect our lives. It’s vital that people turn out to vote in the coming elections. Our lives depend on it.
Sarah Burger
Buffalo
Please let me be brief. As a direct result of the rise to power by Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Party in Germany and the devastating consequences of World War II in Europe (1939-1945) it has been estimated that there were between 15 million and 20 million military and civilian European deaths. Including most notably the 6 million Jewish victims of the Holocaust.
And now the absolute utter absurdity that I once thought could only come from former President Donald J. Trump and his Trumpete minions has to my surprise been bested; the Mayor of Williamsville and her cohorts have out Trumped Trump.
As reported in The Buffalo News, the analogy made by Deputy Mayor Dave Sherman would equate a state public health rule, which provided further guidance with regard to how those infected by Covid–19 should act to isolate and limit the risk of further spreading the highly contagious and deadly disease, with the annihilation of 20 million defenseless victims by authoritarian methods of extermination. This analogy is preposterous to the highest degree.
To measure the atrocities and genocide of pure evil with a public health policy that has already saved millions of lives worldwide represents an atrocious assault of humanity that has become the typical histrionics of Trump’s right-wing base which is obviously very much alive and well in Western New York.
From a more global perspective it further demonstrates a total disregard for the millions of lost souls during the Nazi regime when their lives are reduced to a bickering point of contention by a local politician with really a very minor role within a very small community of minimal significance to begin with.
Doug Miller
Albion
Although I had heard of the plan to construct an amphitheater with a paved parking lot for 1,000 cars on land which comprises Buffalo’s Outer Harbor, it didn’t really get my attention until now. I was recently made more aware of how destructive the current plan would be to migrating birds, as well as other native plants and animals that live in the area.
Mentor Ohio had a similar choice to make back in the 1990s. The area was an estuary called Mentor Lagoons located about 20 miles from Cleveland. Developers wanted to use the land for housing but were thwarted by the local community. Instead, a nature preserve with walking trails, bird habitats and scenic vistas along Lake Erie’s shore was the choice made by the City of Mentor residents. The preserve is a jewel that is worth a visit located just three hours from Buffalo. It would be a wonderful alternative if the Erie Canal Harbor Development Corp. followed a similar example. The amphitheater parking lot would leave a huge ugly imprint on the Outer Harbor, destroy wildlife habitat and native shoreline plants while only being used a handful of times each year. The money raised from parking fees, concert tickets and concessions would only benefit a very small number of individuals. Anything left over would have to be budgeted to maintain the parking lot which would rapidly deteriorate in the rough conditions experienced along waterfront most of the year.
A nature reserve with walking trails, information kiosks and wildlife viewing platforms would allow everyone to enjoy the area not just those that can afford event tickets. The parking area required would be a fraction of the current plan. There are an adequate number of concert venues already in Western New York.
Francis Gallagher
Wilson
Women’s rights to safe abortion was confirmed as law by the very “justices” who now vote to strike it down. Prior to their emplacement on the Supreme Court, the newest justices all had agreed (under oath, no less) to the precedent that Roe was settled.
We know exactly why these justices were selected: specifically to remove a woman’s rights to body autonomy. Some states are actually considering murder charges against women who have abortions.
Forcing a woman give birth is punitive – as though a pregnant young woman did a bad thing … and now she must pay. Of course, this all fits in with conservatives’ foolish concept of abstinence & the denial of sex education for teens.
Yet what happens to the expectant mother who is emotionally, financially, or situationally unable to care lovingly for the newborn? What are the penalties to the biological fathers?
Most crucially, what happens to that unwanted child? At worst, this child will be unloved, neglected, even abused … often becoming a troubled adult.
To those who exhort adoption, I would ask: How many children have you adopted? How about those of mixed race? Kids with special needs? None? I thought so.
Conservative Republicans – laughably calling themselves the party of “family values” – historically have voted against funding for prenatal care for mothers, preschool programs, food stamps, funded childcare and social assistance programs for single mothers. Many in the GOP even balked at the child tax credit. One leading Christian Republican senator, Ron Johnson, said it isn’t “society’s responsibility to take care of other people’s children.”
We can draw no conclusion other than this: Anti-abortion conservatives value fetuses. But certainly neither mothers … nor babies.
Every child deserves to be a wanted child.
Nancy Denault Weiss
Clarence
The recent leak of the Supreme Court’s decision concerning Roe v. Wade resurrects some interesting social questions with far reaching possibilities. In a controversial 2001 paper “The Impact of Legalized Abortion on Crime” by Steven D. Levitt and John J. Donahue, the authors correlate the decrease in the crime rate 20 years later to the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. Their study concludes that states with more access to abortion have lower crime rates than those with lower access. While this thesis was and is still open for debate, Donahue coins the term of children suffering from “unwantedness” and the relationship to them being involved in future illegal activities.
It would make sense, whether one supports or objects to Roe that, as Levitt states in a 2019 interview, “… if unwantedness is such a powerful influencer on people’s lives, then we should try to do things to make sure that children are wanted.” Clearly, it is to the benefit of society that all children are loved and wanted. Are the states which prohibit or severely limit access to abortion willing to provide the support necessary to create an environment that decreases cases of the unwanted child? Will inexpensive and better access to contraception, prenatal care, delivery services, and postnatal care, be provided for those women who are not in the proper economic or mental state to care for a child? Are the residents of those states willing to pay the taxes to provide necessary supports, besides simply offering adoption?
Brian Burke
Kenmore
Wow. Invading property of the Supreme Court which demands fencing to protect the justices; gathering in front of homes of the justices; gathering in front of Catholic Churches. These are protestors that are pro-abortion. Hate and violence. Typical of the radical left. In retrospect, pro-life gatherings are peaceful while making a statement – abortion kills life. Pro-abortion only thinks of the carrier, the woman. There are two people, the baby in the womb, heart beating, has no voice. They have my voice. President Reagan made a statement that sums it up simply and factually … “I’ve noticed that everyone who is for abortion has already been born.” Speaks volumes.
Ilona Klein
Orchard Park
Here is more evidence our government leaders have lost touch with reality. Federal and state funds to spend $1 billion to cover three-quarter-mile section of Kensington Expressway. The goal is to revitalize the dilapidated section on one side by connecting it to the other dilapidated section. What?
I remember when an insane amount of tax dollars built the Main Street Rapid Transit so it would revitalize downtown. It destroyed Main Street businesses. Nothing positive changed downtown by this underused and overspent transit system. Now, a similar spend of a pile of cash will also change nothing.
We have a huge Broadway area deteriorated neighborhood with proximity to downtown.
A majority of homes are burned down or leveled due to inhabitability. There is lack of businesses willing to go into these areas. Covering the 33 Expressway is equivalent to putting lipstick on a pig. One billion dollar taxpayer-funded lipstick. And people are complaining about a government-subsidized stadium?
The stadium project will produce huge tax revenue and jobs.
A better spend of this cash would be to do the infrastructure project necessary to put the stadium at the Central Terminal site.
Centrally located, this would revitalize the area around it, provide jobs, create tax revenue and be a boon to downtown restaurants and hotels. A light rail line could connect to the stadium from the existing line.
Our government officials are lost souls. We need some experienced, private sector business people making decisions rather than career, out of touch politicians spending tax money to garner votes.
This project is a foolish move and will result in nothing positive and a loss of money with no return. We are on the verge of another massive government bad decision.
Dr. David Stasiak
Clarence
With the surrender of Germany at the end of World War II, Gen. George S. Patton wanted to continue against Stalin. What we have today is Stalin’s protégé, Vladimir Putin, who leads the world into a continuation of World War II. Patton was right, what we now have is another human rights monster having his way.
James Drozdowski
Lackawanna
I was overjoyed to see The Buffalo News cover the Titletown development in Green Bay. As a longtime Buffalo resident and Packers stockholder who recently returned from an event in (and around) Titletown, I have been hoping the Bills would take notice. I would like to add a few points that might be overlooked.
First, while the area around Titletown is residential in some directions, Lombardi Avenue is quite commercialized including a convention center next door and numerous other hotels within walking distance. This gives the area life for the weekend of a home game, for conventions, meetings, and with water parks in some hotels, tourist families during the summer. Titletown is not just a game day experience.
Second, Titletown, and the stadium, are very accessible within the city. City streets fan out in all directions (including to the interstate.) So getting in and out is much easier than in Orchard Park. In fact, it is easy enough that the Hinterland Brewery and 1919, the Delaware North restaurant at the stadium, get lots of business seven days a week. Much of Titletown is devoted to playgrounds for local kids to come by and play.
Third, Titletown is intended to be a moneymaking development (helping to pay for the stadium upgrades.) The apartments and town houses that will keep people there year-round are just being finished (and are being sold for a profit.)
Should Buffalo follow this model? Yes! But will it work in Orchard Park? Probably not. If you want to emulate Titletown, it needs to be within walking distance of Buffalo’s tourist attractions and shopping. If we are going to invest $1.4 billion it better be an investment in Buffalo, not just a stadium.
Ted Lightfoot
Amherst
What is next for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis? Is he going to throw Mickey Mouse in jail? He was in favor of the Jan. 6 riot with participants carrying clubs, wearing bull’s horns and war paint, but 100 people carrying signs and wearing Mickey Mouse ears intimidates him.
The enacting of a law revoking Disney World’s rule of government autonomy was a pure act of revenge on DeSantis’ part.
Using his position and the law for vengeful purposes or for personal gain is totally dictatorial, and very Putin-like. He should be impeached.
Authoritarianism is a goal of many Republicans (Trumpers) as they seek to destroy democracy.
Republicans do not have the courage to stand up to this corruptive movement, and we all may pay dearly for it.
Make sure you vote this November. It well could be the last time your vote counts.
Will we have government “by the people,” or “government by the person?”
James Weig
Tonawanda
My husband and I just completed another trip to visit family in Alabama. It always amazes us when driving through Pennsylvania, Ohio, Tennessee, and then Alabama, that the states are expanding their interstates from two lanes to at least three lanes to accommodate all the traffic. These states work in sections, increasing the number of lanes, open up the completed sections and then move onto another section when they have the funds. Not so in New York. Other than the section between Rochester and Canandaigua, the Thruway Authority has not worked to expand the number of lanes, despite all the revenue it takes in through tolls (which the other states mentioned do not impose but are still able to improve their roads). It’s incredulous and aggravating that New York State only barely maintains the roads without little improvement despite all the tolls and taxes that are paid.
Joanne Kavich
Lockport
Two items recently caught my eye, noting different takes on responsibility.
In My View, Amy Brinkworth cited her work experience at the popular Niagara Falls Como Restaurant during her school years. Even after graduating college and starting a “real” job,” she stayed at the Como to earn the extra money she needed to repay her student loans.
Just imagine. She wasn’t seeking a government handout or other subsidy. Cheers to you Amy!
Next reference to the library system’s decision to remove fees for overdue materials and reserving books. I don’t know how much this income loss will affect the system’s finances but it seems to me that accepting responsibility for the privilege of borrowing oh so many items which could be costly if purchased is well worth an occasional fine.
Incidentally, I find the library system and its may services many just be the most worthy benefit of our tax dollars.
Mary Almeter
Tonawanda
I saw Mark Poloncarz on the news the other day and I am in total agreement with him that motorists need to watch out for motorcycles on the road as well as motorcyclists need to watch out for cars. Motorcycles come in many sizes and shapes and their occupants are the most vulnerable people on the road.
In my opinion, if we were to eliminate all those sport bikes (commonly referred to as “crotch rockets”), there would be a lot less accidents and deaths. These vehicles were made for speed and belong on the racetrack not city streets. Unfortunately, some owners think the city streets are racetracks. They speed up and down and weave in and out of traffic. I have even seen them showing off and doing “wheelies” in the middle of traffic. We need to get these death traps off the road. Next time there is a fatal motorcycle accident reported on the news, check out what kind of motorcycle is involved. Nine times out of ten it’s going to be one of those “crotch rockets.” These vehicles need to be outlawed and taken off the streets.
Be nice, look twice and watch for all motorcycles.
Paul Murphy
West Seneca
According to a letter from Researchers at the University of Michigan Institute for Firearm Injury Prevention (IFIP), 2020 saw that for the first-time guns became the leading cause of death for children. The letter revealed that this horrific change was driven via a 33.4% increase in firearm homicides. Gun related suicides of children also rose 1.1% during this period. In addition to the sullen increase in gun deaths, “drug overdoses and poisoning were up by 83.6% from 2019 to 2020” in kids, making it the “third leading cause of death in that age group.”
In case you are wondering, for the previous six decades, car accidents were responsible for the leading cause of death of children. That dreary statistic is now been downgraded to number two. One should also wonder how leaders of such an exceptional country could allow its future to be diminished by not addressing the carnage in the same manner it did with cigarettes and auto oversight. Why is it that adults in this country place an incoherent need to be heavily armed over a more desirable fundamental need to see their kids grow old? It’s puzzling and abhorrent unless one images the profile of an armed parent (whose child was killed by gun violence) includes that parent being a smoker and one who drives without seat belting their kids.
Stephen Saracino
Buffalo
In April, the Business Roundtable announced their support for carbon pricing, which would signal markets to decrease dependence on fossil fuels, invest in clean energy and otherwise “incentivize the development and deployment of technologies to lower [carbon] emissions.” The Roundtable – including major companies like Amazon and Google – is “an association of chief executive officers of America’s leading companies working to promote a thriving U.S. economy and expanded opportunity for all Americans through sound public policy.” I congratulate the Roundtable on its forward thinking in reducing climate change.
For decades, prominent economists have touted carbon pricing as an effective mechanism for shifting the economy away from coal, oil and methane. Carbon pricing would, they recognize, nudge businesses and consumers toward renewables more efficiently than would regulations, due to its reliance on market forces rather than government bureaucracy.
I am heartened that the American Petroleum Institute, too, supports carbon pricing, adding that the collected fees should be returned, in equal shares, to households and invested in new technology. Such rebates would insulate lower-income households from energy price increases. The API recommends starting the fee at $35 to $50 per ton of carbon dioxide emissions, with annual adjustments.
Due to accelerating sea level rise, and intensifying hurricanes, droughts and floods, mitigating climate change is more important than ever. Furthermore, the war in Ukraine has reminded America of the hazards of relying on petrostates – such as Russia – for energy supplies. Reducing America’s consumption of fossil fuels is, thus, indispensable for our continued economic prosperity, health and even national security.
I urge readers, this week, to contact Reps. Chris Jacobs and Brian Higgins, and ask them to support a carbon fee system with cash back to households.
Andrew Hartley
Elma
I would like to clarify some of the statements made in The Buffalo News regarding the proposed new Daemen University Shatkin College of Dentistry. According to the American Dental Association’s Health Policy Institute, there were 61 dentists per 100,000 population in the United States in 2020. This number is expected to increase to 67 in 2040. Currently there are 72 licensed dentists per 100,000 population in Erie County. While the Health Resources and Services Administration estimates that there is a current shortage of dentists in the United States and in New York State, there are other factors that determine whether the current and future workforce is sufficient. Similar to other health care services there is an insufficient number of dentists among disadvantaged populations and in inner city and rural areas. Opening another dental school in a smaller metropolitan area will not address this problem. There are only 70 dental schools in the United Sates currently and many large metropolitan areas and a number of states do not have one at all, so one must wonder the wisdom of opening another dental school in Western New York.
Furthermore, the State University of New York at Buffalo School of Dental Medicine students do in fact treat patients year-round. Patients do not “take the summer off” as stated in the article.
Guy DiTursi, DDS, MBA
East Amherst
So the school year is almost over and here in one of the hotspots in South Buffalo the cameras are down, much to my dismay to begin with. Yours truly was one of the biggest proponents of the cameras. OK, the Common Council hears the complaints, but have not witnessed what I see on a daily basis.
On a side street in Buffalo (Choate Avenue) there are speed humps from McKinley Parkway to South Park Avenue. Are you kidding me? What an absolute joke. Approximately every 75 yards there is another one. Now whoever came up with this brilliant plan obviously forgot the area schools.
Once again I sit here daily and watch morons fly through red lights, passing, no, wait, flying, in the inside lane at their leisure. OK, you took the cameras down and put flashing lights up but, guess what? It’s not working. How about over the summer, people in charge use their infinite wisdom and put these speed humps in front of the schools, not the rubber ones. How about the real ones like they are on Choate? Someone please answer this: Why the side streets and not our schools wherein lies our future?
Mike McGavis
Buffalo
Abortion triggers many emotions for many people. It is murder of a human being. That baby has a heartbeat at six weeks. How in God’s name do we think it’s something else? It is not a salami sandwich, a blob of molecular tissue, it is a child. There are wonderful options available for women. adoption. I know of a few moms who would not be moms, had they not had the baby. When a woman decides to abort the fetus, one heart dies and another breaks. Overturning Roe v. Wade will not stop abortions from occurring but will drastically reduce them. For that, I say, Thank you.
Diane Tripi
Eden
What a surprise that the head of the Propane Council would try to sell propane-fueled school buses to unsuspecting New York school districts as a “means to craft New York’s clean future” (“Public funds are better spent on more propane school buses,” April 26). Problem is, they aren’t.
While cleaner than diesel, these propane-fueled vehicles are not free of the tailpipe emissions breathed in by schoolchildren who ride in them, as electric school buses are. And as far as emissions from the electricity generation that powers electric school buses go, those will improve steadily as New York meets its target of 100% carbon-free electricity by 2040, while the gas fumes and carbon emissions from propane school buses will remain forever the same.
That’s why, under the state budget passed last month, these gas-burning school buses won’t be available for purchase by New York school districts as of 2027 and won’t be allowed in school bus fleets at all come 2035. And there will be funds from an environmental bond bill that goes to voters in November to help school districts finance the transition. So what the propane industry is peddling to school districts in New York is not so much a yellow school bus as a white elephant. Don’t buy it, Buffalo.
Leah Meredith
Policy Principal
Advanced Energy Economy
Washington, D.C.
Rarely does an elected representative step into a leadership position and help positively influence the direction of an entire system. Well it happened this past two years in the New York State Legislature. Sen. John Mannion, current chair of the Senate Committee on Disability and a representative of the Syracuse area did just that. Through his hearings, bills, and advocacy he has clearly gotten the attention of our governor, Kathy Hochul, and other elected officials to help see that individuals like our son, Craig, who has intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD) are not left behind like so many years before.
Mannion has helped to raise public awareness of the value of direct support professionals (DSPs) and need for them to get a cost of living adjustment, help the education system that provides support to students with special education needs attain parity, “853” and “4410” schools, and much more.
Having an opportunity to meet with him recently at a rally for DSPs in Albany, we are convinced he is the real deal. It is heartening to see an elected official display such passion in a person of influence and authority. As advocates and parents, we are grateful for his leadership and dedication to helping individuals with I/DD be recognized as important and deserving of governmental help to assure they can live their best lives.
Max and Joyce Donatelli
Hamburg
The health care industry is made up of licensed clinicians in every specialty and setting. We are trusted and rigorously educated to ensure patients are comfortable and confident in our diagnoses and treatment plans. This trust is not merely given but earned and physician assistants understand the role of working towards this endeavor. It is a great feat to establish a team that can be reliant on professionals of all health levels, but our government can also help make this feat an undeniable reality. It is vital that our communities experience a medical visit with confidence in whoever stands before them. PAs are highly regarded in the health industry and should be represented in such a way that gives us autonomy to administer high-quality care to those that need it the most.
Now is not the time to go backwards and limit access to care. The executive order, issued during Covid-19 and still in effect, has allowed PAs to increase health care access and equality for New Yorkers at a time when our health care system was in crisis and the workforce was depleted. By allowing PAs to practice at the top of our education, experience, and training, we will be giving support to a comprehensive health care system that is flexible to the needs of our communities. This has been the mode of operation for over two years and its constant presence should be encouraged.
Madeline Robinson, PA-C
Buffalo
I recently returned to Buffalo after living in Tennessee for the past 24 years. Though the city has done much to turn itself around the roads are deplorable. I took a drive downtown and north of the city and almost had my teeth jarred out of my head. In all the years I lived in Buffalo the roads had never been this bad. With the taxes we pay you would think that the roads could be maintained better. Don’t blame it on the weather because the winters were much worse when I lived her 20 years ago and the roads were much better. I am embarrassed to invite my, out of state, friends to visit Buffalo, a city I was once so proud of.
Sandy Bruzga
Lackawanna
I was one of the veterans invited to attend the Buffalo Niagara Honor Flight on April 30, accompanied by my son, Joe. There was an honor guard to greet us at the Buffalo airport as we began our journey.
When we arrived at the Baltimore airport, there was a fire department water cannon salute. Hundreds of people were there to greet us, cheering and applauding.
We were then led by a motorcade of military veterans to the World War II Memorial, where they took a group picture of the 46 veterans being honored. Our other stops were the Korean War Memorial, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall, the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument and the newly constructed Air Force Memorial.
The highlight of the day was touring Arlington National Cemetery, and viewing the formal ceremony of the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. I had the privilege of placing a wreath at this grave with three of my cousins, Richard, Harold, and Raymond Wohlfeil.
We also visited the Iwo Jima flag raising statue. This brought back memories of my late brother-in-law Frank Lewis, who fought hand to hand combat with the Japanese in Iwo Jima, the Philippines, and Okinawa, when he served with the Marines. He was a true hero and was actually there when they raised the flag.
At dinner we received “mail from home” from our families and school children. When we landed back in Buffalo around midnight, we were greeted by Amherst Police, the Sheriff’s Department, the Buffalo Fire Department Pipe and Drum Corp., and hundreds of people cheering and applauding us on our arrival home.
Credit to Tom Petrie and all the volunteers from Buffalo Niagara Honor Flight for organizing this amazing experience. It was truly overwhelming and an honor I will never forget.
James Gatta Sr.
Buffalo
I am an educated Seneca mother of five. I’ve also made it my business to stay informed on developments and decisions made by my Nation. I have become active in the Mothers of the Nation’s effort to protect our assets and resources for our next generations.
In recent months, together, more than 200 Seneca Mothers have acted to ensure that the Seneca Nation is paving a sustainable economic path forward. This is the very basis of the Mothers of the Nation’s mission.
Most non-Seneca do not fully understand the past three months of agitation on the gaming dispute with the state. They would not understand because The Buffalo News, the largest paper in the area, has seemingly, with deliberation, failed to provide accurate or comprehensive insights or reporting on the matter.
The News’ editorial board has done nothing but attack the Senecas, repeatedly, leaving out salient information and facts about the case.
We get it. The News is not our friend; we can count on the editorial board for a steady stream of written disparagements.
Within my lifetime the reservation has transformed from a sinkhole of poverty, unemployment and welfare dependency. The Seneca Nation has grown, given birth to more than 5000 jobs, and by the end of the 2023 gaming compact, will have buttressed New York State with more than $2 billion in gaming revenue shares.
The sad part is in 2022, despite all of this, the local newspaper beats up on the Indians and treats us like dirt.
Dawn Colburn
Allegany Territory
Continued Attacks on CAO Impact the Whole WNY Community
After The Buffalo News editorial reporting of the Community Action Organization on May 3, I must, as someone who has worked with the CAO as a communications consultant, ask: When will this organization get a reprieve from The Buffalo News? These repeated narratives tell a story of a “failed and corrupt organization with incompetent leadership.” And unfortunately, this story is told over and over again by the newspaper.
The Buffalo News strongly influences people’s attitudes and our shared knowledge. The bulk of the stories published by the paper not only fuels the stigma against an urban-centered organization, it also impacts the communities they serve in negatively.
Thomas Kim, the new CEO, is of South Korean descent. He is portrayed in the editorial as “a former youth pastor and social worker.” In reality, Kim is an experienced C-level executive and honored Iraq War Veteran. Recent stories about CAO refer to activities dated years back. Since then, Kim and a newly appointed and respected board of directors have been hard at work, creating change for those they serve.
Sabina Ramsey
Snyder
I attended the public meeting held by the Greater Buffalo-Niagara Regional Transportation Council. It was obvious from the get-go that planners had already made up their minds about the future of the Scajaquada Expressway. Which seems to be headed towards no expressway at all. I think that’s why they put “Full Removal” at the top of the comment form.
These are my responses to each scenario:
• Full Removal: This is a non-starter for me. Too much traffic depends on the expressway and I don’t believe only 18% use it for work. Please expand that survey. A huge amount of commuters use it going to work and back home.
• Partial Removal: This makes absolutely no sense. That would tie up traffic and cause constant gridlock. I find it hard to believe anyone could even consider it.
• Boulevard: This is doable but most drivers would look for alternative routs. It’s not easy to put expressway drivers in a stop and go scenario.
• Status Quo: Slight changes to allow bikes, walkers and drivers to use this highway. It would need heavy monitoring to be successful.
• General Comments: The driving public should not be held responsible for one driver with medical issues and a design flaw in the protection of park pedestrians. Rip out that ugly metal median and design a safe thoroughfare.
Joseph Allen
Buffalo
Last Monday night’s big reveal, the leaking of Justice Alito’s draft opinion concerning Roe v. Wade, has our country literally reeling. His opinion, which proposes to return the fate of legal abortion to the states thereby enabling voters to decide, has resulted in widespread protests and news pundits predicting mayhem and prophesizing the end of the world as we know it. President Biden who vehemently supports a woman’s right to choose labeled those who would oppose abortion the most “extreme group” in the history of our country. Yet what could possibly be more extreme than legal infanticide? If those who seek to save children’s lives are vilified what does that say about us as a people? As we near our nation’s 250th birthday, one might wonder if our Founding Fathers have forgiven us for disregarding the fact that they risked their lives to protect our unalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness in order to give women the right to kill their babies in utero? Despite all the progress we’ve made, unborn babies were safer in 1776 than they are today.
Elizabeth Kolby
Amherst
If, as now seems likely, the Republican dominated Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade, the ruling will be based on a very flawed argument.
Justice Alito argued that abortion cannot become a constitutional right because it is not “deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition.”
I don’t know why Alioto would be surprised at the lack of a judicial or legal history related to women and their right to control their own bodies. What he ignores is the fact that most rights were denied to women for the first 200 years of America’s existence. So, of course there would be little or no history or tradition related to this particular one.
At the very same time Roe was being decided in the early 1970s, women could not get a credit card without their husband’s consent, and could legally be raped by their husband.
It is absurdly disingenuous to deny a constitutional right to certain people – women and minorities – who have been denied these rights for most of our history, and base it on the argument that there is no “history or tradition” associated with this right.
How many more rights will the Republican Court take away from us using this same specious argument?
Patrick Henry
Orchard Park
Well, at least everyone in this state of dysfunction is consistent. Case in point: the “solution” to Gov. Kathy Hochul’s reelection campaign lieutenant governor problem.
So, the solution is to pass a law that allows anyone indicted in a state election to be removed from the ballot? And this is common sense?
Let’s think this thru a bit. Are we saying that, in this case, a New York citizen is guilty before proven so and must be removed? An indictment alone is enough?
Just for fun, let’s wager on how many times this will happen in New York going forward now that, and I quote The News editorial of May 4, “…pass a common-sense law that allows an indicted candidate to be removed…”
That kind of law just weaponized state politics to an unimaginable degree. I can see it now. Let’s indict so and so. Find something. Anything. Just think of the win we can manufacture.
The News editorial board opinion is unfathomable.
Vincent Morabito
Williamsville
As a working mother of three, New York State’s quarantine requirements for children in daycare programs continue to significantly impact my family and many others.
Children exposed to Covid-19 at their daycare programs are still required to quarantine for a minimum of five days, even if they are completely asymptomatic.
In the past month, my 2-year-old has been quarantined three times because of exposures at daycare. Meanwhile, my center is still charging us for the days we have to keep my child home.
More than two years into the pandemic, and with the cost of full-time child care over $300 per week for one 2-year-old, this approach is not sustainable for working parents. It never was and certainly isn’t now.
I feel helpless and stressed, and I can’t imagine I’m the only parent in this situation. The state has left us with no answers or information about an off ramp for these guidelines. An update is long overdue and an absolute necessity for working parents trying to stay above water.
Kathryn Parrish
Tonawanda
Three related historical episodes. Vladimir Putin and many of the Russian soldiers are war criminals.
Electing an African-American like former President Barack Obama did not eradicate racism from this country.
Would the election of a Jewish president eradicate anti-Semitism from Ukraine as Ukraine played a major in the Holocaust? Ironically, a 10-minute drive from Kyiv is the site of one of the most horrific crimes of World War II: Babyn Yar and on the outskirts of Mariupol, the very first massacre of thousands of Jews took place. I know that all the local killers are now dead and their children are decent human beings, but history is what it is and people should not forget about it.
Andre Toth
Williamsville
I am a 70-year-old white woman, who has never had an abortion, but could have, if one had been needed. I have nothing but compassion for the many, many girls, and women, who have had to make that choice. What I’m trying to understand is the need for a government policy that would dictate to doctors and patients what medical procedures need to be used in each and every unique situation. I wonder if this could also lead to doctors being told how to deal with men’s medical procedures and prescriptions pertaining to their sexual organs. I’m trying to listen to what our pro-life judges are advocating, however what I see is men dressed in flowing robes, encouraging religious women to have more children. I continue to hear shouts to “build a wall,” but weren’t these immigrants once a fetus? And are they not breathing humans with a heartbeat? I feel the anguish of the Black community, human beings still seeking equality for health care, housing, education, policing and a living wage in this year of 2022.
Karen Decker
Buffalo
So Chief Justice John Roberts is feeling wounded by the “betrayal” of the Supreme Court, lamenting the “egregious breach of … trust” that he believes is an “affront” to the worthies in robes who are poised to strip millions of American women of their right to abortion services.
His sense of judicial propriety dictates that the high priests and priestesses of the court must safeguard the details of their solemn deliberations from the simpleminded masses who are thirsting for the moment they descend the mount and bestow, hewn on stone tablets, their lofty decrees.
Why shouldn’t the American people be privy to early drafts of Supreme Court decisions? Thanks to state and federal Freedom of Information Acts, every email, memo and phone message of the executive branch of government is open to public scrutiny.
The legislative branch routinely debates bills on the public record be-fore voting anything into law. Taxpayers should have access to the evolving work product of Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, et al. After all, we’re paying for it.
Roberts is deflecting.
The issue isn’t an unprecedented leak, it’s the fact that his Supreme Court is bent on implementing its twisted anti-women, anti-family activist agenda.
James Hufnagel
Niagara Falls
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s 98-page “1st Draft” abortion opinion, which would overturn Roe v. Wade, will be debated for many months. This writing was dated and circulated on Feb. 10. It was published by Politico, a political journalism company, on May 2. The banner on the first page of the court document states that: “This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication…”
Notable is that there were no writings, as is often the case with certain court documents, that alerts the reader that the document is confidential, and its distribution is restricted.
The unauthorized publication of this court document may have been prevented if it had been stamped: DRAFT – Confidential to Authorized Personnel of the Supreme Court of the United States.
The question arises as to whether the release of the document was accidental or intentional? An investigation of this leak has been announced by the Chief Justice John Roberts, and hopefully this question will be addressed.
John Pauly
Amherst
Who decided that school board elections should become a public display of how red or blue one’s politics are? Don’t teachers and principals have enough difficulty dealing with Covid, electronic device impaired attention spans, and bad parenting? Why make their curricula subject to political whims and power struggles? The purpose of education is to expose our children to new ideas, and let them develop to the full extent of their abilities.
I am more worried about students being harmed by guns, drugs or limited job opportunities, than by encountering a controversial idea. If we teach them to reason, research, ask questions and intelligently discuss the resulting thoughts, they can defend themselves. They will grow and get wise, something that won’t happen if we limit what teachers can say. How will our children deal with climate change, race relations, new developments in biology and artificial intelligence if we tell them history ended in 1950.
Book burning and banning are wrong. Using our children as political pawns is worse. Ideas and beliefs must compete in the free market place of the mind to acquire depth, meaning and utility. The “values” people want to give their children are the results of this intellectual process. Thinking and talking lead to a much richer life than one based on slogans, fears and prohibitions. Teaching children that thoughts are dangerous and must be controlled is the wrong message. It is the message used in totalitarians states to control and confuse.
We can’t be afraid to let our kids think, talk and be different from their parents. The job of the school board is to enable and encourage this growth, not to stick their own egos in the path as roadblocks.
Charles Kucharski
Hamburg
I’m sick of watching innocent civilians being shot, starved, executed, burned and bombed to dust in Ukraine. And I cringe reading Letters to the Editor in The News making excuses for Vladimir Putin, blaming Joe Biden or asking Ukraine to surrender via negotiation.
Putin tried to get Donald Trump reelected so Trump could withdraw the United States from NATO and cripple the alliance allowing Putin’s army to march through Europe like Hitler did in 1939.
It could still happen.
Putin has the audacity to flaunt the threat of nuclear annihilation if he thinks Russia is threatened. If Putin flies into an insane rage and launches only 300 of his nuclear warheads at both of our coasts, he could kill several million Americans, our counter strikes notwithstanding.
We cannot wait for Putin to go berserk.
If a terrorist seized a school and threatened to kill the children with a bomb we would not negotiate with a madman. Putin is a war criminal who is committing genocide on innocent Ukrainians and threatens nuclear war on the rest of us. We need to end this threat before Putin is forced into a corner and decides to annihilate civilization in some insane act of misplaced glory. The Russian people should take the lead, for their sake and ours. If they don’t, others should act. No individual with the ability and the means should be allowed to blackmail civilization with annihilation.
Bob Catalano
Derby
The placement of the fence (new eight-foot-tall fences) at the Supreme Court shows the disdain the court has for the Bill of Rights. If I want to do “A” (protest) and the court wants to do “B” (secure the property), can they achieve “B” without infringing on “A”?
This question is the heart of strict scrutiny on measures that limit freedom of speech. The correct answer is “Yes, they can.” They could put the fence on the plaza, but they didn’t. That is contempt for the second clause of the First
Amendment (free speech), and we are not even getting to the third clause (protest): redress of grievance.
The placement does not survive strict scrutiny. Shame on the Supreme Court justices. Once again, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. allows the unconstitutional. The other time was the day after Hodge v. Talkin was decided, allowing protest on the Plaza. The Supreme Court justices did by regulation what Judge Beryl A. Howell said could not be done by statute, and Roberts signed off.
Martin Gugino
Buffalo
Sean Kirst’s recent column about the global community at Our Lady of Hope captured so very well the spirit that is present in this multi-national, economically diverse, and faith-filled community. Many names were mentioned but there is one that deserves special recognition for what he has and continues to accomplish in this unique Catholic parish, Ronald Thaler.
Leadership is the key and without it many endeavors including parish life can diminish. Let the record show, Ron embodies the pastoral leadership needed today. Let those who seek a true servant of God look no further than the corner of Lafayette and Grant. Let those whose hearts burn with the fervor of discipleship know that parishes can thrive. A community such as Our Lady of Hope does not just happen without a leader. Well done servant of God, well done Ron!
Timothy Sember
Williamsville
All the recent talk about the Super Flea brought back a lot of memories. Note that I didn’t say “good memories.” Way back when, I was quite disappointed when the old Walden GEX store was closed and the building was repurposed. They had the best prices around for sporting goods and car parts. The Super Flea was dark and dank and contained way too much junk. The outdoor vendors literally had nothing but garbage.
Resurrecting a garage sale on our beautiful harbor is yet another folly being foisted upon our beautiful landscape. Besides, who is going to be responsible for paying for the cleanup after each event?
Then it dawned on me. We already have a magnificent venue to hold estate sales. Rich Stadium (now known as Highmark Stadium) is in wonderful condition and will undoubtedly last another 50 years. The taxpayers just put hundreds of millions into upgrades. Charging each vendor a minimal fee would provide a revenue source for future maintenance. The best part is that we would save the millions needed to tear it down. As a dedicated business site, with vendor setups out of public view, the vendors could even leave their tents set up all the time.
Maybe we should leave the Outer Harbor as a nature site instead of turning it into a trashy eyesore and using it for commercial purposes.
James Seufert
Wheatfield
