Letters
Letters to the editor
Highlands Today
Published: June 6, 2012
School pay cutsPublished: June 6, 2012
I'd like to challenge the current school board and superintendent candidates to see how committed they really are to solving the budget problem. If they really believe in small government, they should all take a pay cut of at least 25 percent. Currently, school board members are paid $373 an hour (having worked a total of just 82 hours in 2011).
School board members easily have the time to be on the board and hold a full-time job. While the current superintendent has cut hundreds of positions, the board's salaries have not been negatively affected at all. Only one candidate for superintendent has pledged to take a pay cut (Roberta Peck) and no other school board candidates have. I applaud her for pledging to take 25 percent of her salary, if elected, and put it back into the classrooms.
The superintendent makes well over $100,000 a year (not including over $30,000 for health care, Social Security and retirement) and is a perfect example of big government. We need fewer bureaucrats and more teachers actually in the classrooms.
Joshua Everhart
Sebring
Four more?
While attempting to discredit Mitt Romney in his Sunday morning rant, Anthony DeAngelo complained about his inability to afford tuition for his kids, pay for medical treatment and even put food on his table. And he wants four more years of this? Really? More?
Mark Conner
Avon Park
Voting counts
Bud Morgan's article Sunday on the ethical and moral decline of our nation ("The power of one person can make a difference") tells us how it really is. We are not going to hell in a hand basket because of the powerless, but because of the powerful.
Power serves to corrupt morals when it becomes an insatiable addition; this is the situation we are faced with today. Morgan sees this, rightly, as a tribal monopoly interested in taking over the government in order to satisfy their insatiable appetites —money being the access to power.
What we don't hear about are the millions of caring people who put others before themselves. What he tells us is that, "Those caring, singular endeavors are the foundation of this great nation … One day … they will enter voting booths and rid this country of reckless idiocy."
What better way to gain power than to rig the elections? What we are hearing today are all kinds of plots and intrigues designed to bring about a desired result.
Having worked at the polls, I know that provisional ballots are used when any question arises — which may or may not be counted. Now is the time to make sure that our votes count. This can be checked out by going to www.BeReadyToVote.org. There are three options; the first allows us to check and update our status, the second allows us to register and the third allows us to contact our supervisor of elections.
The things that must be checked out are our correct name and address, the correct precinct we must go to and our preferred political party. We can also check to see if we have requested an absentee ballot, or if desired, request one at this point.
In the words of Walter H. Judd, "People often say that, in a democracy, decisions are made by a majority of the people. Of course this is not true. Decisions are made by a majority of those who make themselves heard and who vote — a very different thing."
Your vote in November will decide the outcome, as well as our future.
Joan Morrone
Sebring