Page 4 - Mid Valley Times 4-16-20 E-edition

Serving the Readers of the Reedley Exponent, Dimuba Sentinel and Sanger Herald.
A Mid Valley Publishing Newspaper
Founded March 26, 1891, in a two-story building on the corner of 11th and F streets, by A.S. Jones
Fred Hall — Publisher
In my OPINION Country's economy needs a
shot of hydroxychloroquine
One can only hope, at this point, that there is an equivalent of hydroxy- chloroquine for the private economic sector in this country!
Scholar Athlete winners show great maturity in handling COVID-19 crisis
Rick Curiel — Sanger Editor Jon Earnest — Reedley Editor Dick Sheppard — Editor Emeritus
Thursday, April 16, 2020 | A4 | Mid Valley TiMes Editorial & Opinions
For some inexplicable reason be-
ing in the newspaper business seems
to make anyone a cynic, but this time
I am really concerned for the welfare
of this country. And, it seems to me
to be for very good reasons. Since we
were very young, there has been more than a linger- ing doubt about the performance of the public officials whom we elect to run our country. I know that they are advertised and promoted as the best and brightest among us but it just seems to me that we've placed more in their incompetent little hands this time than they are capable of handling!
At stake is the economic well-being of more than 300 million people. Think about the fiscal, physical and mental damage which is being inflicted on Americans and their inherently strong work ethic. This leaves a bad taste, like an introduction to socialism.
We're barely into this Wizard of Oz-style stimulus package and can already see signs of an implosion. The guy behind the curtain seems to have the best of intentions but completely lacks the wherewithal and know-how to get it done — forget about it being done efficiently. According to anecdotal evidence, even the banks were poorly prepared for the flood of SBA ap- plications which should have been anticipated.
Anything these folks do in political haste has the ground speed of a turtle. I have yet to hear from any- one who might have received their individual “rebate on our taxes” which was to a part of that stimulus. Their handling of catastrophic events can often be one of those situations where the perceived cure just may be worse than the original problem.
We've survived tough times before — which includ- ed economic stress and health-threatening situations — but we've never voluntarily shut down the entire economic engine that is America. Another month of this absolutely could be devastating to the smaller business- es in our communities. I hear people say that business should have been better capitalized than that, but one must remember these are the same people struggling after the staggering recession that struck America in 2008. Barack Obama then gave us eight of the slow- est years of recovery in our history, marked mainly by an expansion of government and all the new rules and regulations which accompanies such an upheaval.
Despite battling the media, subpoenas, Democrat investigative committees and a biased deep state Jus- tice Department, President Donald Trump had lit a fire beneath an economy which was beginning to roar. Changes for the good, like this, always seem to reach the Central Valley of California later than everyone else because Sacramento cares so very little about such a small number of votes which we represent. We're treated like the proverbial red-headed stepchild by our self-serving representatives.
Further exacerbating the ills of small town retailers was, and is, an ever-growing rate of taxation to satisfy an ever-expanding wish to take care of those among us who won't take care of themselves or assume responsi- bility. Government seems to effectively turned its head the other way in terms of the negative impact being dealt to brick-and-mortar stores by mega-internet op- erations, such as Amazon, being turned loose to run roughshod over competitors.
Just one other thought before ending this. How can the media continue to blame the president when gover- nors are in charge of their local programs? The presi- dent seems to have “moved mountains” to address this Chinese mess.
But, as always, that's only one man's opinion.
Many of us likely are con- cerned with young students — in particular high school seniors — and the unfortunate position they find themselves dealing with when it comes to the CO- VID-19 crisis. The likelihood of not having a timely, live gradu- ation to complete their 13-year educational journey for these young people is at best discour- aging and can rise to the level of heartbreaking.
But based on the reactions of two Reedley High School seniors — Abby Delport and Augie Villarreal — the future of our society is bright. Abby and Augie brought some great publicity to the school by re- cently being selected as CIF Central Section Scholar Ath- letes to represent the North Yosemite League. Both have grade point averages above 3.7 and excelled in multiple sports (Abby in water polo, basket- ball and swimming, Augie in basketball and tennis).
More important, they showed calm and measured responses to the unpleasant hands they were dealt when
it came to the home stretch of their high school experience. Both praised the instruction and guidance they have re- ceived from the teachers while doing coursework and home- work assignments through Google Classroom. And nei- ther dwelled on the negative world events.
"I mean, there are so many things that we looked forward to. Especially with my core group of friends, we were su- per excited," Abby said. "Be- cause the last three months of your senior year is when all the fun stuff starts happening. Then it all comes busting down, and you're like 'wow, this is it.' And it kind of stinks that we're missing out on all of it.
"But I'd just like to think that there's a reason behind all of this, and in the long run our best intentions are being kept at heart. And I'm just trying to stay positive, and we're hoping that this all comes to an end soon."
Abby said she hopes the school has the opportunity to hold a live graduation, even
if it's likely
later in the
summer. "It's
so symbolic
and it's such a
memorable ex-
perience and I
would not want
to miss out on
it, no matter how long I have to wait," she said. "I really do hope that there is one."
Augie also was accepting the circumstances, saying "it is what it is." He admitted it was strange not seeing his long- time friends and classmates on a daily basis, but kept in touch with texts and by video.
"You go back to it and think about it, it's still not that bad," he said. "We're here and this is how we're supposed to fight the virus, being at home. You think about the people coming out of high school who had to be drafted into war. If you put it into perspective, it's just not that bad."
Great words for us all to remember.
Jon Earnest is Reedley edi- tor for The Times.
Fred Hall
QUOTE
“The trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you very often succeed.”
— C. S. Lewis (1898-1963)
Jon Earnest
It’s your tax dollars,
not theirs
The Sanger City Council,
after many months, appointed new members to the Measure S Sales Tax Citizens “Oversight” Committee. The long delay was to avoid the strongest appli- cant, Mr. Vincent Wall, a patent attorney with strong education and professional experience who serves on the Planning Commission. He was the only applicant with any policy or committee experience.
Compare applications from the April 2 council agenda H-1. The mayor and City Coun- cil state they do not want the same person serving on more than one committee that can af- fect vacancies. No, they would rather have multiple cancelled oversight committee meetings and vacancies for prolonged periods to stifle real “over- sight.” For them, less (over- sight) is more.
Mayor Frank Gonzalez and council members Daniel Mar- tinez, Humberto Garza and Esmeralda Hurtado appointed Mayra Campa, a part-time employee in after school pro- grams who is an undergradu- ate student with little experi- ence (compare applications). Financial oversight of millions of our sales tax dollars is not an internship. They claim her
sister, who works for the fire department, is not a conflict of interest. Maybe not a fi- nancial benefit to her, but we cannot exclude the potential af- fects for her sister housed in a department that requests new costly expenses from Measure S tax funds. Conflict of interest or nepotism, it’s not clean.
A conflict of interest occurs when an individual's personal interests — family, friendships, financial, or social factors — could compromise his or her judgment. That is relevant.
This “oversight” commit- tee and City Council approved $1,659,850 for a new fire lad- der truck when Reedley’s new fire ladder truck cost $925,000. Even worse, this same “over- sight” committee slashed fund- ing to community gang preven- tion and intervention programs for youth by thousands of dol- lars after it was used to push for an extension to voters in 2016. Remember that?
Mary Gonzalez Sanger
Saluting a longtime
SHS teacher
I have written about sever-
al teachers in the past, I have many more yet to interview. These teachers deserve recog- nition for their contribution to our youth.
There is a lady that has ded- icated her life to betterment of our children. Her name is Au- drey Bonomi she is a Clovis High School graduate. She went on to graduate Fresno State. She student taught at Kerman High and also Sierra High. She went to work at Sanger High School in 1998, and has been at the school for 22 years.
Audrey became the Ag De- partment head at Sanger High in 2012. She specializes in plant and animal science. She over- sees projects coaches’ teams and leadership contest, she is actively involved at the Fres- no Fair and is a leader of the FFA. I have had the pleasure of working with Audrey for many years, we started a nonprofit organization in 2004 called SAFE Sanger Agriculturist Foundation for Education. We have accomplished many goals and support the FFA, the lady has excellent work ethics and is self-driven. She is adored by her kids and is highly respect- ed at Sanger Unified School District.
We have come a long way since she came on board, I’m proud to say that she is my friend. We are very blessed to have her in our school system. She is the salt of the earth.
Bill Boos Sanger
Letters from readers