Letters to the Editor

Support teachers

Editor, the Journal,

Dear friends in the Shelton School District,

As we approach voting time for the replacement levy for our local schools, I appreciate this opportunity to tell you about my school experiences over the last year. Most people know me as the owner of Smoking Mo’s restaurant in town, but some new faces now know me as Ms. Mo, the substitute teacher. A little over a year ago, I developed some health issues that required me to step away from full-time kitchen work. After hearing a number of friends discuss the extreme teacher shortages our schools are experiencing, I decided to throw my hat into the substitute game. I did this both to help my own family financially, but also to be able to better understand the inner workings of our school system. You see my daughter started kindergarten during the pandemic.

For most of her first year, her schoolwork was done on a computer at our kitchen table. During her first-grade year, parents weren’t allowed inside the school in an attempt to keep COVID out, which I totally understand. But, as a parent, it was an unusual and scary feeling to send my little one off every day to a place I had never been full of people I didn’t really know. Eventually, I was able to apply to be a parent volunteer. Once a week I was able to spend one hour helping out in my daughter’s classroom. That progressed to me applying to be a part-time substitute teacher. One year later, I can tell you from personal experience, our schools and our teachers need our support. Children come to school hungry, and too often the price for snacks that I’ve seen young kids rely so heavily on each day falls on the teachers. School supplies, again, paid for by teachers who barely make enough to support their own families.

You think teachers only work from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.? Wrong. Lesson planning can’t be done during class, so teachers take their work home with them. Again, those materials provided by the teachers. Trying to teach every day to all different personalities and abilities in one classroom is so hard, so hard, but our teachers do it with true love and care for their students. Catering to so many different needs also requires more learning materials and educational opportunities, all of which require funding. Even sports and clubs serve their need. For some students it’s their eligibility to play that is the only thing that keeps them motivated to stay in school. For some, perhaps the locker room is their only reliable place to shower. Yes, we have homeless kids attending our schools, and even the smallest amenity at school can make the biggest difference in their lives.

All of these little things come with big costs, but they can provide even bigger rewards to those who most need them. Kids bring troubles from home in with them, and it’s our teachers and school staff that pick up that weight in order to give their students a safe place and moment to rest.

I am telling you, from what I’ve seen with my own eyes, our teachers need help. Our students need help.

Too often I hear, well my kids are grown so I shouldn’t have to pay for schools anymore. To you, I say consider this: Consider where those young kids will be in 10 or 20 years. They’ll be our shop owners in town, our lawmakers and city workers, our first responders, our neighbors. One of those little kids may even be the doctor that greets you or your loved one at the hospital someday. Kids grow up fast, and regardless of whether they’re in your life now, they most certainly will be someday. That’s why their education should still matter to everyone. That’s why their well-being is a responsibility we all share.

And that’s why this levy matters.

As the new semester begins, I send all of our teachers my gratitude and respect. Their job is not easy, but they rise to the challenge with grace, creativity, kindness, patience and inspirational energy.

And to my fellow voters, please, if not for our teachers now, then vote “yes” for the future of our little town. I thank you for your time and consideration.

Monica (Mo) Carvajal-Beben, Shelton

Have a good year

Editor, the Journal,

I really do wish everyone a happy and peaceful new year! I hope for a safe and prosperous future for the country, too, but with the current administration, that’s iffy.

To all of you who voted for Joe Biden for president and now regret it, you were horribly duped, but had plenty of company in the scam. I suggest victims here check the TV ratings, seek out the truth and switch channels.

Now go out and have a happy new year.

Robert E. Graham, Union

Oil and inflation

Editor, the Journal,

I was amused by a letter attacking me on the issue of oil production and inflation. Let me clarify a few issues for the befuddled writer. And he is befuddled because he misrepresented my letter. The letter was a response to the assertion that U.S. pipeline policy prevented an increase in domestic oil production. It did not. Nor has the Biden administration’s policies. The proof is that oil production increased, not decreased.

Now, I suspect that the writer has gotten so far over the edge of his skis that he has forgotten his lessons in business and economics. So, let’s start with a simple one. If prices fall below cost of production, you will lose money. More production will not save you. It will just give you bigger losses. Oversupply will force the price down even further, and the resulting margins will make the losses bigger. In the real world, the U.S. problem is that advanced drilling techniques are required to increase production, and that increases break even. When your competitors don’t require those incremental costs, you have a problem. So, what is the oil producer supposed to do? Well, the logical thing is to simply cut your losses.

And that is what happened. When prices collapsed in the previous decade, U.S. producers shut it down. They gutted their wells. They had to. Investors weren’t going to throw good money after bad. So yes, U.S. production will require higher sustained

prices. And lower prices will mean lower profits, or a return to losses. That isn’t price fixing. It is responding to the facts on the ground.

Now, when prices do go up, don’t expect investors to go running into a market with lots of cash to drive up production. Why would they after taking a beating doing that exact same thing the first go-round? They are doing the rational thing. They are taking it slow. In the meantime, they are enjoying big profits. Why would they screw that up? This isn’t price fixing. It is simply not making the same mistake twice. This is just how people behave. Unless you like losing lots of money.

The consumer has a problem. Gas prices are relatively inelastic in demand. If you have to commute, you can’t radically drop your consumption based on prices going up. Now, if you didn’t need gas to commute, then demand would be more elastic. And it makes it easy to raise prices without radically driving down demand. If you had good public transportation, or maybe had a competing energy source to oil, you would have options. That might make it harder for oil oligarchs to fleece you. Just saying.

The writer is selling us the old neo-liberal trope that government spending is the root of all evil. And once again, deficits are the problem. He ignores that while oil production has gone up, deficits have gone down since 2021. And he ignores the myriad other reasons markets behave the way they do. That doesn’t fit the narrative.

There is a familiar pattern here. Republicans wait until Democratic administrations work hard to bring down the deficit. Then, at the first opportunity, they immediately take the savings and give it to their rich buddies, driving up the deficit. Then, when the Democrats start bringing it down, they scream fiscal responsibility. It isn’t federal spending or deficits that bother them. It is any spending that isn’t going straight into the pockets of their rich donors. Their problem is that the spending involved will improve infrastructure and help the bottom 90% of Americans. That is perceived as a waste of their donor’s money. In simple terms, workers, or anyone not in their club, are not worth it.

Don’t take my word for it. Take the word of an honored, conservative icon. Rush Limbaugh stated in July 2019 that “Nobody is a fiscal conservative anymore. All this talk about concern for the deficit and the budget has been bogus for as long as it’s been around.”

Andrew Makar, Hoodsport

Please support levy

Editor, the Journal,

I am writing in support of the replacement levy on the February 2023 ballot. This levy is not new but replaces the funding that expires in December 2023. It provides incredibly important services in our school system that are not currently paid through the state education funding. These include instructional technology, nursing, counseling, the swimming pool, facilities, facilities maintenance and campus security, just to name a few. Additionally, without this levy, we as a community will also miss out on $3 million in state funding that is provided to equalize levies across the state, but again, only if we have a levy in place. As someone who works for a major employer in town, I can unequivocally state that the quality of our schools is a deciding factor in the recruitment of employees from out of the area. This community has worked hard to improve our schools, and while COVID may have set a few of the improvements back, we are on the verge of providing top-notch educational programs for our students. Join me in supporting this critical funding.

Lisa Perry, Shelton

Treason day

Editor, the Journal,

The Republican holiday is coming up — “Republican Treason Day.” They hate free and fair elections. They showed America what they think of democracy. “C” — the Constitution — beat “Q” — the Quacks — and put the Republican coup plotters, domestic enemies and the Trumpsters in the dumpster with the rest of the garbage.

Roderic Whittaker, Shelton