Speed limits serve a purpose

Speed limits serve a purpose

EDITOR:

This letter is a follow up to one last Sunday, “City should heed warning” about drivers violating the speed limit. I couldn’t agree more.

We residents of Vestal Road face the same dilemma. After living here almost two decades, we have not seen any change in the speeders on our posted 25 mph road except that there are more of them.

Where there are no sidewalks, pedestrians are forced to walk on the street. There are not only parents with children, but elderly residents also. It is frightening to look out of your window to see a car swerving around a person because they are going too fast and cannot slow down in time.

It doesn’t matter what time of day or night it is. They are breaking the law all day long. Apparently these people feel they are above the law and can set their own speed limits to suit themselves. It also doesn’t matter if one is driving an automobile, delivery truck, or worse yet a large WRTA with a few people on it. Maybe if the bus driver would also go the posted speed limit, they would save some money on gas and not ask the taxpayers for more money to support them.

Something has to be done about obeying the posted speed limit signs, they are there for a purpose.

CAROL COOL

Youngstown

People need to get to work

EDITOR:

As a vocational counselor, I see clients everyday whose biggest impediment to employment is the lack of a vehicle. They are unable to drive because of physical or mental disabilities, or they take medication that prevents them from driving safely. They cannot afford to buy and maintain a car and insurance or the gas to get them to a minimum wage job. They lost their driver’s license from making bad decisions in the past. They cannot obtain a permit or license due to significant learning problems.

Because of cutbacks at WRTA, many of these people are not able to get to work. Several had to quit their jobs when the 422 line was dropped. I have had a number of clients turn down offers at hotels in Austintown because the bus no longer runs on weekends and restaurants in Boardman because it no longer runs in the evening.

If the citizens of the Mahoning County pass the WRTA levy, these problems will be solved. People will be able to work regardless of location, days, or hours. If the levy fails, bus service will be even further reduced if not eliminated altogether.

Future generations will ask us how we responded when Putin, Chavez, and Ahmadinijab threatened America’s sovereignty by trying to hold us hostage to their oil. Did we submit to their demands so we could fill our tanks, or did we use our brains and guts to look for alternatives, including public transportation, in order to preserve our independence?

In the meantime, a functional bus system will get more people to work, and that’s good for all of us, as it enables individuals to receive less government assistance and pay more taxes. It is in everyone’s interest to vote Yes on the WRTA levy.

BILL KOCH

Youngstown

We need organizers

EDITOR:

Recently, the governor of Alaska commented on being a community organizer as if that were a detriment to holding office. Whenever an opponent has strength someone will foolishly attack that quality. Gov. Palin has not put any thought into this attack. When her speech was given, I thought long and hard on what an odd and unusual statement she made. I thought of all the persons throughout history who were “community organizers” and to the benefit of all of us.

I thought of Paul Revere on his mid-night ride warning that the British are coming; Of John Adams, Samuel Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin, Alexander Hamilton and John Hancock to name a few. They were community organizers without whom we would not have a country.

When Martin Luther saw corruption within the church over indulgences, he desired to have a dialogue. Martin Luther became a community organizer in his own right, and was excommunicated for his actions that started the Protestant Reformation.

Moses, Jesus, and Jesus’ disciples became community organizers within their respected communities. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was a spiritual and political leader in India whose principles many around the world study to this day. Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison made abolitionism politically possible.

Cesar Chavez and Samuel Gompers, fought to give labor the right to organize. Susan B. Anthony, Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Stanton, helped win the right to vote. Medgar Evers and Martin Luther King earned for blacks the civil rights to which all of us are entitled.

Even within the confines of the military there are community organizers. When I served in Vietnam, some soldiers and Marines did Civil Action Duty. These warriors were community organizers and worked within small villages supplying and teaching to the needs of the people in areas of medical, dental, agricultural and self defense. It is my understanding that this practice goes on today in Afghanistan.

And finally, there is a young man here in Sebring, Ohio, who, because his uncle went to Iraq, told his mom that he wanted to organize the community for a march for the troops on Sept. 11 and there has been a march for the past two years now.

Being a community organizer is a good thing and those that help organize a community possess more responsibilities and qualities than Gov. Palin will ever realize.

CLIFFORD HAYES

Sebring