Cover the magazines

Cover the magazines

EDITOR:

The Vindicator featured an article on the Feb. 25 front page about the embarrassing advertising of a strip club in Austintown. I applaud Township Trustee Lisa Oles and Zoning Inspector Michael Kurilla for addressing this issue. I only wish they could do something about the embarrassing and distasteful magazines that are displayed at grocery store check-out lines.

Ohio Revised Code 2907.311 on “Displaying matter harmful to juveniles” may not apply in this circumstance, but it should. Read the cover of Cosmopolitan, by far the worst offender, and see what your 9-year-old is learning while you unload your cart.

I recently asked the manager at a store where I’ve shopped for years if some of the more objectionable magazines could be covered with blinders or placed in their magazine section, which can easily be avoided by patrons with young children. Hundreds of supermarkets around the country have instituted these policies to protect kids from overtly sexual, adult materials. The manager basically told me that nobody has ever complained about this and that the opinion of one customer doesn’t matter to him. I’ll be shopping elsewhere from now on.

I would like to urge parents, grandparents, teachers and anyone interested in preserving the innocence of children to look at the topics advertised on the covers of these magazines and bring it to the attention of your store manager if you think they are unsuitable for kids. And don’t forget to “check out” this months’ Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue; your five year old is.

JULI HUGEL

Girard

Brookfield board wastes money fighting busing issue

EDITOR:

Regarding a Feb. 23 story (“Bus students to JFK, parents say”), the community should know that the request to bus children to schools in Warren was never going to cost the Brookfield Local School District any money.

The Ohio State Board of Education has decided that Brookfield schools must bus the children to Warren schools. This has been tried through the legal system as required, we have done everything according to the law — and now have won the right to have busing, but are still denied the legal right granted to all children in all school systems.

The school board president and the superintendent have repeatedly said that this is about money, economics and being fiscally responsible and that it is cheaper to pay fines. First off, there are no fines. The $600 they speak of is the payment in lieu of transportation they must pay for each child not bused. This money comes from the State of Ohio and should be given to any family that resides in a district and sends their children to another school. The state reimburses the school district for transportation of all children. The interim busing supervisor testified in the Columbus hearing that it was possible to do this without hiring a driver or purchasing a bus and with little increase, if any, in mileage. Some rerouting of the bus schedule was doable. The state agreed.

The school has litigated and lost and has spent at least $55,000 in legal fees through January 2008 on this busing issue alone. How much more will be wasted in trying to defend their opinions? Why does the Brookfield superintendent and board want to continue to fight a battle they won’t win? Is this any indication that they are acting in the school’s best interest and they are being fiscally responsible? I don’t think so. They have been ruled against and they must be forced to do as required by law.

VALERIE LUCHETTE

Brookfield