Letters to the Editor

Support our children

Editor, the Journal,

I would like to urge you to vote “yes” on the upcoming Hood Canal School District Renewal Levy and capital bond on Feb. 8. Please note that the new rate will be lower than the current rate. The current rate is $2.47 per $1,000 of assessed home value; the new rate is estimated at $2.18 per $1,000 of assessed home value.

The purpose of levy dollars is to help fully fund education since the Legislature does not. These additional funds are used to supplement school operations, which includes special education, preschool and early learning, school counseling services, teaching assistants, food service, student transportation, music and arts, athletics, field trips and nonhigh fees for our students to attend high schools in neighboring districts.

Bond funds can only be used for major construction to support our students and address the needs of our school campus. We currently have a waiting list for preschool students due to a lack of classroom space; our administrative offices are off-site due to lack of office space and our middle school students need new STEM classrooms that can prepare them for high school.

Preparing our young people to become thoughtful and productive members of our community is one of the most important things we can do for our students. Education is much more than a simple investment in our youth; it is a shared investment in future leadership, our workforce, and our community as a whole.

We are fortunate to live in a community that has supported our students at Hood Canal School. I encourage you to continue that by voting “yes” for the renewal of the current levy and the new capital bond.

Lynne M. and Harry Robbins, Lilliwaup

Get real, people

Editor, the Journal,

It looks like way too many people are not reading factual books with references, and they also seem to have skipped high school civics. The Chinese didn’t send us the virus, they still have wet markets where live animals are butchered and thrown around. SARS, MERS, COVID come from bats. And, most of the “modern” virus species are coming out of the forests and jungles as we cut them all down to grow food for almost 8 billion people. AIDS came from a butchered chimp in the Congo in the 1930s or 1940s. Bacterial and viral plagues killed over half the people in Europe in the Middle Ages. Europeans brought smallpox to the Western Hemisphere after Columbus killed off 90% of indigenous people.

Pandemics from all ages are the great human “equalizer.” Read books with 20 to 30 or more pages of references — then you can count on the facts being verifiable, not just “Trumpian” disease theories.

And now, people are blaming President Joe Biden for inflation? He had nothing to do with the computer-chip problem in automobile production, the supply-chain problem or used car prices. Get the clue: Biden inherited the world commerce problems and lack of U.S. pandemic response from No. 45. Remember, it was No. 45 who wore out the knees of his pants kissing Putin’s behind. Some even claim he got chapped lips, too. So, by what elementary school logic is it Biden’s fault for what Putin is doing with Ukraine? How about starting with a junior high class in civics and economics?

William Busacca , Shelton

Bravo, Rep. MacEwen

Editor, the Journal,

State Rep. Drew MacEwen and I may not share many political positions. But now, I am fully supporting his effort to pass a constitutional amendment that would place term limits on state legislators and statewide elected officials in Washington (House Joint Resolution 4207.)

Quoting from his Jan. 20 legislative email: “We need term limits in Washington state. In my September email update, I asked you to weigh in on whether or not you would be in favor of a bill to limit state House and Senate members to 12 consecutive years in one chamber and state executives to two total terms in office.” More than 90% of his respondents (including myself) were in support.

I respect Rep. MacEwen’s service to his district and our state. And, I respect his courage as a sitting legislator to limit himself.

John Skans, Mason County District 3

Waiting for answer

Editor, the Journal,

So here is the next big lie. Robert Graham’s Jan. 20 letter to the Journal states, “January 6th was not an insurrection.” That’s a lie.

In Greg Dallum’s letter to the Journal, he states, “However, to me nothing, nothing compares to a treasonous president who tried on Jan. 6, 2021, to overturn the government of the United States.”

Why then does the Republican Party not condemn his treason?

Until we hear answers to Mr. Dallum’s profound question, all other Republican observations are moot.

Karen Skinner, Shelton

Vote ‘yes’ for schools

Editor, the Journal,

As longtime residents living in the Hood Canal School District service area, we will be voting “yes” on the two upcoming school propositions and we are asking for your “yes” vote. The propositions are the Educational Programs and Operations Levy and the capital bond. The school district has a long history of being good stewards of the funds provided through levies and bonds.

With a “yes” vote on these two propositions, your property taxes going to fund schools will actually go down. The levy collection rate will go from $1.14 per $1,000 of assessed home value to $1.04. The bond which you are currently paying $2.47 per $1,000 of assessed home value will now be $2.18.

The children enrolled at Hood Canal School deserve our support. We have an opportunity to see continued improvements not only in the academic programs provided to the students, but improvements in the facilities that serve these students.

Remember to vote “yes” for both propositions.

Dele and Kathy Gunnerson, Lilliwaup

Equality and equity

Editor, the Journal,

We are seeing the new policies in Virginia revolving around the misstatements of the GOP’s war on critical race theory. I thought I would attempt to explain at least part of this by focusing on one example. There are, of course, others. But this is an essay, not a book.

The exemplar is the issue of crop loans.

There is a long-standing practice of obtaining crop loans in the agricultural sector. The practice goes back generations. Farmers typically get loans, backed by the Department of Agriculture, that are administered by banks. It also was well-documented that loans to white farmers were at the front of the line and processed expeditiously. Those to Black farmers, not so much. Black farmers were systemically given lower amounts, further into the planting season. The effect on Black farmers was predictable. They began disappearing and white farmers bought their property at forced sale prices. You would have thought this practice ended in the 1960s, or perhaps the ’70s. You would be wrong. It went well past the turn of the new millennium.

Congress did attempt to redress this with special provisions for Black farmers that still existed. Provision was made for them to get expedited loans in 2021. What happened next was predictable. White farmers, the very ones who had benefitted from the discriminatory practice for generations, screamed discrimination. All of a sudden, practices had to be race-neutral. These same individuals were curiously silent when it wasn’t race-neutral.

This is a familiar pattern that goes to the birth of the nation. The Founders wrote a truly noble document in the Declaration of Independence. They put that noble document into practice with the Constitution. With one glaring exception. Black slavery. Why would they do that? The answer is simple. It was the economy, stupid. And the economy relied heavily on slave labor. The reliance was obvious in the South, somewhat less obvious in the North where it was hidden in banking and shipping interests. Plainly put, the Founders declined to put their money where their mouths were because it would have cost too much. So, they opted to cover it up in some pretty racist rhetoric to justify their actions.

The Civil War did not remove the original problem. Jim Crow was as much about the economy as anything else. If Black equality was truly implemented, whites might have to compete with them as equals. They were not about to do that. The effect continued into areas such as GI Bill housing after WWII when Blacks were systemically locked out of VA loans. That would have required white tax money to help blacks buy houses, an anathema.

During all of these historic events the nation preached “equality.” But the nation studiously refused equity, thus denying equality. And, when change grudgingly happened, the attitude was “Hey, we’re sorry we did that” and

acted like the former behavior had no effects going forward. Do the people advocating this really think that policies such as crop loans did not have a lasting effect on the Black farming community? Does simply saying “we’ll try to do better in the future” really the only thing we can do? Would you be happy being on the receiving end of this type of treatment? And would you accept that the past treatment had absolutely nothing to do with your current condition? I would say the answer is “no” based on the response of white farmers in this matter.

Andrew Makar, Hoodsport

Bigger assets

Editor, the Journal,

At times I think Mason County and its environs exhibit what’s best in this country — and I’d like to share it throughout our nation — or at very least, provide resistance to a dystopian political encroachment of our freedoms and quality of life which many of us sense, if we cannot rightly define.

With this as a goal, I’d like to see Reps. Drew MacEwen and Dan Griffey, and Sen. Tim Sheldon challenge themselves in the larger arena: Move from local office to the regional. We’ve got a good bench to assume their current responsibilities if they were to advance to greater regional responsibility.

This trio exhibit quality, integrity and just plain common sense locally, and would prove to be an even greater asset as regional officials.

This is a quality-of-life issue.

James Poirson, Shelton

Trying times

Editor, the Journal,

In January 1776, a pamphlet was published titled “Common Sense.” The author was Thomas Paine and more than 500,000 copies were printed and distributed — a bestseller at the time. The 47-page document asked citizens to think for themselves and to consider the future under a new form of government based on their God-given rights of freedom and the power to rule themselves. It promoted the concept of American exceptionalism.

Good neighbors, it is time to start thinking for yourselves. Be critical of what you see and hear in the media and use your common sense to make some sense of the current problems we have in this country. Is your standard of living declining? Are you accepting of the rapid price increases in everything you buy? Do you feel safe in your home and city? Doesn’t government exist to make our lives safer and better?

Does common sense tell you that defunding the police will increase crime and the probability that you will be a victim to it? Does common sense tell you that identifying each other by skin color, religion, politics, jab status, etc. is a way to bring us all together? Does taking away your guns (and ability to defend yourself) and leaving criminals on the streets instead of in jail improve your safety and freedom to live your life make any sense? A criminal is killed by a cop and there are riots. A cop is killed by a criminal and there is hardly a murmur. Does much of what is going on make sense to you?

Thomas Paine said in 1776 “these are the times that try men’s souls” and I believe it is again. What does your common sense tell you?

Bill Zeigler, Shelton