Goodlett applauds votes for laptop initiative



As Charlestown City Council president, I want to commend my fellow council members for approving the one-to-one laptop computer initiative.

I will state, that contrary to misleading information, not one council member opposed the program. We did have concerns about how the mayor wanted to fund the program, but I attended several school board meetings to show my support.

I wish the school could have funded the entire project, but failing that, I prefer that the additional money come from the city’s Redevelopment Fund. In the end, the city provided the additional money from funds that would otherwise go to the school system, if not for the Tax Increment Financing District Charlestown, started in 2005.

The Indiana Department of Education informed the city on Aug. 17, 2009, that the grant had been approved, but the mayor waited until Sept. 8, 2009, council meeting to inform the council of that approval. He did so having already sent a letter to the school board indicating that the city had agreed to provide the needed additional funding.

The mayor also misled the council by stating that the grant would expire if action was not taken immediately, when, in fact, the grant was not set to expire until September 2010.

Had all the information been presented to the council in a timely and accurate fashion, the rush to make phone calls and send e-mails to council members could have been avoided.

Hopefully, in the future, the mayor will be more forthcoming in dealing with the city council.

— Mark Goodlett, Charlestown City Council president



Reader sympathizes with tenant



I just read your newspaper’s article about the young lady being evicted from her apartment at Gardenside Terrace Apartments. First of all, what kind of a person would allow such a thing to happen?

I owned my own business and I would never allow for any of my employees to do what they did. I would fire them right on the spot. I would call this intrusion breaking and entering. They should all be made to pay restitution and a public apology made to this young woman. Like she said, she has very little, so everything is precious to her.

And if Sharon Summers is the one that wrote up the eviction notice, don’t you think she should know what date the eviction notice is supposed to take effect?

I hope you will print this so Miss Rosen will know that there are people out here are behind her all the way. Maybe, someone will start up a fund for her.

I wish I had the funds to give her all she needs, but unfortunately I am one of the Medicare people that the president is trying to do away with.

— Dorothy Tolhurst, Borden



Montezuma’s revenge



The problem of Americanizing Hispanics is what has occurred is a gradual transvaluation of our nation’s language. Liberty and freedom are idealistically American, as is our national language of English, which is in jeopardy of becoming secondary or nonexistent, as was the Mayan and Inca language under the heel of the Spanish conquistadors.

It’s un-American for this great society to be coerced into establishing two languages when the first has served so well. There isn’t anything wrong with a second or third language, in keeping with the times and world events. Any choice foreign language should be taught, so long as the language remains civil and doesn’t overwhelm the host country.

The hypocrisy is that America through all good intentions has brought Montezuma’s revenge on itself. Encouraging a second language, failing to recognize abuse of privilege and like wild fire, spreading, consuming and, as late, an uncontainable language that has no boundaries.

Montezuma’s revenge encourages illegal immigration and rampant domestic crime. Montezuma’s revenge has taken hundreds of jobs, depriving legal Americans of financial support.

There is Montezuma’s revenge of Hispanic refusal to learn English, preferring instead for Americans to learn their Spanish.

Let’s not lose sight of these enduring words from F.D.R. America, as Roosevelt had said, was to ask whether this is a nation or a boarding house.

— Leroy J. Heil, Jeffersonville