If Mahoning commissioners impose tax they will compound earlier error

If Mahoning commissioners impose tax they will compound earlier error
EDITOR:
The first stake driven through the financial hearts of the county voters was the resolution passed by the Mahoning County commissioners to enact a continuing sale tax. Imposing a sales tax will drive the second stake through county voters' hearts. Remember, it only took one stake to kill a vampire.
Isn't anybody listening? The sales tax was defeated in March, eight months ago and more recently, this month.
Imposing the sales tax will give the newly elected commissioners a black eye, if it passes or fails. They will be left with the legacy of the present commissioners -- the good, the bad and the ugly. Unfortunately, people will remember only the bad and the ugly.
At one of the two public hearings reference the sales tax, I suggested, and supported a half-percent sales tax for a five-year period and so informed the board. Had they taken my suggestion, the sales tax would have passed and all this jumping through hoops would not be necessary. If the commissioners used their own judgment in deciding a continuing sales tax, or took the advice of others, they erred. The public doesn't take too kindly to changes.
One cannot discount the 64,000-plus people who voted against the sales tax. Defeating the tax twice, in less time than it takes to have a baby, should send some kind of message to public officials. More importantly, the people pay the bills -- even George knows as much. In the business world, the county voters who rejected the sales tax, by any stretch of imagination, equate to 64,000 dissatisfied customers. That's a lot of unhappy people. Appropriately, one should query, why are so many voters defeating the sales tax?
I implore David Ludt and Ed Reese to rethink imposing the sales tax. I commend Vickie Sherlock for showing her independence.
If the sales tax is imposed, regardless of the outcome, the newly elected commissioners will be left to put Humpty-Dumpty back together again. I don't think the county government could afford all the glue necessary to complete such a task.
PATRICK STRANGE
Campbell
Lesson from Gettysburg, it's time to start getting along
EDITOR:
On Nov. 1, I was privileged enough to visit Gettysburg, Pa., and travel along the famous battlefield where so many thousands of men were lost. It was a battle between the North and the South, the Blue and the Gray. In the Civil War, brother fought against brother and father against son. And in its wake left carnage untold, destruction and resentful feelings on both sides.
Today we have in the United States a similar situation. This time it is a war between the blue and the red, each side prepared to do battle with the other, the liberal Democrats vs. the conservative Republicans.
Each side prays to the same God. But in the end only one side prevailed. We didn't have to go to the battlefields to do war, we did it through the media. Our battle rages on through the media. Not a musket or cannon was fired but verbal volleys were launched repeatedly through the airways. And sometimes words can do more destruction than any physical injury as was demonstrated.
I believe Lincoln did not gloat over the North's victory. He embraced the South in helping to create a new nation, one that drew its strength from each other. Let us hope that President Bush will do the same. Let us remember the old adage "United we stand, divided we fall."
SUSAN CENTORAME
Canfield