Sound off!
With July 4th approaching, please be considerate of your elderly neighbors, pets, small children and wildlife that are all affected by fireworks. If pets are outside, they’ll run away in terror, be lost or run into traffic. Frightened wildlife will abandon their nests and young to escape. Very stressful for house pets. People with PTSD are especially vulnerable. Fireworks can be enjoyed at public events by trained professionals. This also avoids the many fireworks-related injuries that happen every year.
• Boardman
Keep screwing up, Youngstown leaders, until there is nothing left downtown. The Italian Festival is one of the biggest money makers of all and you still screw that up!!! Get the Realty Tower building down before the whole downtown dies.
• Youngstown
Just read an editorial where the writer opined we need to stop the body count. I feel search and frisk is questionable, so let’s fix it from the judicial system instead. Judges downtown have been the Oprahs of sentencing lately. For example, the mother of one of the defendants in the Rowan Sweeney case got probation after trying to obfuscate her son’s phone. If defendants keep getting light sentences for violent offenses, the body count will keep rising!
• Youngstown
I’m watching with interest the efforts of the Youngstown city administration to deal with the Realty Tower situation. I’d like to remind everyone that Youngstown has not even been able to replace the fire escape to their own council chambers in years. I’m not expecting much. Look what has happened to the entire Downtown Youngstown area the past few decades. Wasting taxpayer money except for the Covelli Centre and the amphitheater.
• Canfield
May 30, 2024, was the day the judicial system shined. All investigations and indictments were complete, and trials set before Trump announced he was running for president. The judge and prosecutor do not determine guilty or not guilty. The prosecutor, Trump, and his lawyer selected the jurors. These same 12 jurors found him guilty on 34 counts. Also, anyone else who abused 10 gag orders would have been in jail by number three. No one is above the law.
• Warren
In response to the letter to the editor from the president of The Ohio Automobile Dealers Association. In 2022 and 2023 near the end of the COVID-19 pandemic some automobile dealers were increasing prices up to $10,000 over MSRP. Many automotive salespeople told me they never made so much profit. I say it was price gouging and taking advantage of the public. So, if the association wants a better reputation, it needs to fix itself.
• Cortland
Very late on Monday, June 17, the Boston Celtics won the 2024 NBA Title. OK, late, nothing in the sports column for Tuesday, June 18. On Wednesday, June 19, nothing was printed about the Celtics’ accomplishment;, however, there was a large article about the star on the losing team. And the beat goes on.
• Campbell
After seeing the commercial about Bernie Moreno on TV, it aggravates me to hear people talk about something without any knowledge. When dealers order cars, GM Corp. tells them what cars or trucks they must take then they can order what they want out of stock from there. Just goes to show someone doesn’t know what he’s talking about before he speaks just to support a particular party. Please get your facts straight before you bash a Republican.
• Brookfield
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Sound off!
I’m curious about the school board at Girard giving the treasurer a car allowance that went from $400 a month to $500. Why does the treasurer need a car allowance? Who else on the Girard school board is getting an allowance for this? Is this common practice for other school boards also?
• Canfield
Property taxes for Hubbard area residents are rising again. The reassessment and the Hubbard fire levy raised the taxes on my 50-year-old home by $398 for the year. Now the auditor reports they miscalculated taxes for Hubbard area residents. Subsequently, my taxes are increasing an additional $496 per year. That’s a $894 increase for the year or $457 per half. I will now have to consider if I’ll ever vote Yes for another tax levy.
• Hubbard
The recent findings from a state audit in the Girard school system with the misappropriation of $461,000 in funds is another example of fleecing the public. Our public school systems have been broke for many years and they continue to ask for more money from taxpayers. Instead of prudent consolidations of expenses and administrative duties, they continue to build new school complexes with declining enrollment. If these people operated a school system like a business, most would be bankrupt.
• Warren
I am surprised that more people, especially seniors, did not voice support for the local airport. Warren used to have a service to Chicago every week but that was discontinued. As seniors, having a local airport would be very helpful and there are many “snowbirds” in our area that would love to have this accessibility. The big airports offer wheelchairs, but that does not compare with having an accessible airport and most seniors would gladly pay more for this convenience.
• Warren
Municipalities are acting like Charles Manson is going to be running the cannabis dispensaries. If you would visit one you would realize you probably don’t know they are a dispensary from the outside. They are usually in a strip mall and are well secured as to who they let in with everyone having to show ID. Kudos to Niles for doing its research and due diligence in educating themselves.
• Warren
Star Parker’s recent article is an embarrassment to journalism. It suggested that the Civil Rights Act increased the divorce rate among blacks. That’s like saying blacks voting at the end of segregation increased black divorce rates. GOP Rep. Donalds says it’s because LBJ ended Jim Crow. This is ridiculous. A little research will show that increased incarceration of blacks and welfare laws that increased benefits for single moms had a greater effect.
• Campbell
Trump is not going to choose Vance or Rubio or a woman because he would not choose anyone who has any intelligence, good looks, is outspoken or could outshine him in any way. He will choose someone who is blah and rarely gives an opinion because Trump thinks only he knows everything and will have the last word despite what anyone says.
• Youngstown
Sherrod Brown is running a commercial blaming Bernie Moreno for shutting down the Lordstown Plant. This is absurd. Everyone in the Mahoning Valley knows Moreno had nothing to do with Lordstown closing.
• Hubbard
Sound off!
For 20 years I have been purchasing tickets for events at the Covelli Centre from their ticket windows. But today I read in the paper that their box office is not selling tickets for the Tim McGraw concert; only Ticketmaster is. I’m glad that I’m not going (I am one of the few people not enamored by country western music). Ticketmaster is a monopoly and should be broken up so others can compete, which is healthy for the economy.
• Boardman
I want to thank all my retired neighbors who are off Monday through Friday while I am at work and as soon as I go outside to relax on Saturday or Sunday right in the middle of the day you decide you have to cut your grass for an hour and a half when it could be done in 15 minutes. Never fails…
• Girard
It is a sin and a crime to permit convicted persons to remain in prison for years at the expense of the people. These people were given fair trials, multiple rehearings, convicted and sentenced to death, guilty beyond a shadow of a doubt. What is the law worth if it does not work?
• Warren
Niki Frenchko has hit a new low…or should I say another low. Her statements about fellow Commissioner Dennis Malloy were not only disgusting and repulsive, but also bordered on slander. In addition, she should be fined or have her pay docked every time she chooses to be absent from a commissioners’ workshop. Attendance at those workshops is part of her job. Jan. 1, 2025, the final day of her term, cannot come fast enough.
• Warren
Trump will lose the presidential election because freedom-loving women and men know that he took away women’s health care. Law-abiding people don’t want a criminal to be president and they will remember a million COVID deaths, the $8 trillion debt, and the divisiveness that he spews. They will also remember that he failed to build the wall, tried to cancel the ACA, never had an infrastructure meeting and Jan. 6.
• Campbell
Trump was in court and Robert Kennedy is fighting against the White House in court for ballot access. It is very clear who the real threat to democracy is. It’s the Biden White House. Joe thinks he is Slobodan Milosevic by throwing his political opponents in the court system.
• Boardman
What a sad day for America when a convicted felon is among its former presidents. No one wins here. Those who continue to believe the rantings of a remorseless man have lost their soul. Elected officials who refuse to respect the judicial system they’re supposed to uphold have lost their conscience. Citizens who allow lies and deceit to divide this country have lost their strength. We’re all losers today.
• Youngstown
Glad to read that Donald Trump is “OK” with the prospect of possibly doing jail time. Most felons are not so forgiving. Of course, they actually do time, hard time, in prison. That may be what the self-appointed patriot needs to help him overcome the narcissism compelling him to claim he is “…very innocent…” It may even stop him dog whistling veiled threats of “breaking points” to his minions. Many of them are already doing time on his behalf.
• Canfield
A former president being convicted is a tragic passage of U.S. history. However, it is a good day for the rule of law and our justice system. No one is above the law. To maintain our democracy, vote on Nov. 5, 2024, for the candidate who supports this. Donald Trump, immediately after conviction launched a raging attack against the principles on which the U.S. is founded. Is this the leadership we want for our Country? VOTE!
• Poland
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