To the editor:

Your news brief “Sullivan Gets a `D’ for Tobacco Spending” (Feb. 20-26) is intriguing but lacks one critical detail: What county department received the $1.5 million tobacco funds in 2002? I wonder if Sullivan County District Attorney Stephen Lungen or Sullivan County Court Judge Frank Labuda are involved with that department’s decisions. Concerned citizens might want to know who is accountable when so much money is apparently sitting around not being used for its intended purpose.

Sue J. Lowe
Closter, NJ

To the editor:

“What is Right with Kids Today”?

It is 8:00 a.m. We are picking up soup and desserts prepared on campus by the Culinary I students. Off we go to 42 South Main Street, Liberty, NY. Our first stop is Continental Cleaners, a family-owned business that donates the cleaning and pressing of our uniforms.

We dress quickly. The coffee is perking, onions sautéing as our team prepares a light breakfast and a heavy lunch for our customers. We all have our daily assignments that mirror owning and operating a restaurant business.

In comes William “Rube” Smith, Assistant Fire Chief in Liberty, a staunch supporter of our learning center. He exchanges conversation with us, eats breakfast, reads the paper and asks if there is anything he can do to help us. We look forward to his support, as he is a very important person in the community, and is always helping others.

We continue to work quickly so that all the food is prepared for lunch before we catch the bus to our home schools to attend afternoon classes.

It is around 12:00 p.m. The second team arrives to serve and cater to the lunch crowd. At 12:15 p.m. Gladys Walker, Executive Director of CACHE and her staff arrive. She is always there for us! A standard menu item is named for one of her staff members (Kathy), because for two years she eats the same lunch everyday. We greet, serve, clean and get ready for tomorrow’s business.

When we read in the newspapers and see all the bad press about teens, we wish they had all the same opportunities as us and think that if they did maybe the world could be different for them. We are preparing for our futures experiencing teamwork, employability skills and academics at the same time. Serendipity is finding good fortune by chance. With the support of our community, we look forward to a very successful future.

Culinary II Students
Sullivan County Career & Tech Center at BOCES
Liberty, NY

To the editor:

President Bush recently outlined an economic growth and jobs creation package that would bolster economic growth and create millions of jobs for Americans. The plan would immediately give a boost to our economy and facilitate long-term economic growth. I urge you to support the President’s proposal.

Americans will win with a plan that accelerates the tax cuts passed in 2001. By lowering the income tax burden on Americans, they will have more resources to save for their family, invest for their future, and spend for their comfort. Moreover, a growth plan that eliminates the double taxation of dividends is not only fair but would allow individuals to invest more capital into successful companies.  Importantly, President Bush understands that a driving force for the American economy is our small, medium, and family businesses.  Enabling business owners to expense thousands of dollars more per year will provide considerable resources to spend on capital improvements or to hire more employees.

Other features of the plan will contribute to economic growth as well. It will increase the child tax credit and alleviate the marriage tax that affects millions of couples. These provisions should be included in a final bill for the President’s signature. It’s time to enact policies that grow our economy and create more jobs for Americans.

I hope you will fully support the President’s plan.

George E. Barthel, Jr., Member
Citizen for a Sound Economy
Pleasant Valley, NY

To the editor:

Robert Kunis and James Carnell Jr., representatives of the Town of Thompson, reportedly oppose importing garbage, yet, paradoxically, they voted to expand the landfill. This would appear to make it clear, again, that the legislature is willing to balance the county’s books on the misery of a hapless few, rather than spreading the burden fairly. They also casually coughed-up $3.7 million for the additional 36 acres and made some land speculators very happy. Appropriating land for a fair, but more economical price, through eminent domain, was much discussed when the county imagined taking over the Woodstock site but such considerations seemed absent regarding the landfill expansion. The wrong toes to step on? And understand, many more than those who live in the vicinity will be impacted by the fleets of garbage trucks clotting Monticello for the next half century or so. While politics are local, the fall-out is not.

Lee Karr
Forestburgh, NY

To the editor:

It is interesting in the Village of Liberty that rumors surface regarding things that go on that the average citizen is not aware of until after the fact. Apparently, the old number two firehouse on Darbee Lane in the center of the village is considered surplus property and is up for sale. No legal notice has been given to the public, but a few friends of certain members of the board have made offers.

One of the offers was from a poultry plant operator who wants to process and pack poultry. This has been recommended by his consultant who has been a farmer and consultant for many years and is certainly knowledgeable on agriculture matters. But I wonder if he would want such an operation in the center of his residence if it were in the middle of the business and residential area of where he lives?

It seems to me it is grossly inappropriate for the Mayor of Liberty to privately consider offers for the property and to have the offers discussed at private meetings, when other bona fide and qualified persons have not been given the same opportunity.

This reeks of pure politics and is probably not legal. If this is surplus, as has been alleged, then it should be sold to the highest bidder or a public auction and not to a smelly operation in the middle of a small village.

Phil Mullen
Liberty, NY

To the editor:

Goodhearted Sullivan County residents have a long history of being conned by fast buck artists promising them the moon.

I can remember the late Ted Weber of Hankins telling me the story of the so-called inventor of a perpetual motion machine who came to the Callicoon area many decades ago and got some of the more prominent residents to invest in this get rich quick project.

For years afterward, Ted Weber’s relatives would gently rib the victims by asking how the great invention was coming.

“Oh, he’s working on it,” the hapless victims would say and quickly change the subject.

Then there is Hortonville’s Frederick Cook whose uncorroborated claim to have discovered the North Pole is still hotly disputed by professional historians and geographers. Cook later served time in a federal penitentiary for mail fraud in an oil scheme.

Narrowsburg residents opened their hearts and their wallets to Richard Castellano who promised to make an important motion picture in the town and start an annual film festival that would soon rival Cannes. We are still waiting.

In the 1980s, Delaware Valley Central School board members hired a man for the position of Superintendent of Schools based on his claim that he had an earned a doctorate from a major institution of higher learning. When I uncovered the fact that the phony degree was purchased from a Springfield, Missouri diploma mill for $150 and required no work, many of the people involved obstinately refused to accept the truth.

Even when the FBI publicly gave me credit for bringing the matter to the attention of federal authorities, thus precipitating Operation Diploma Scam, the simultaneous raid on 19 diploma mills across the country by the FBI, the IRS and the Postal Service, the people who hired this gentleman would not admit they had been scammed.

In 1999, Sullivan West residents who truly wanted to believe the state government was Santa Claus were conned into voting for a three-way school merger by the false promise of 95 percent state aid and a virtually free high school with “soaring architecture” that was cynically repudiated within days of the last merger vote.

Now we watch fast-talking promoters with big promises for rejuvenating Sullivan County’s virtually defunct hotel industry being wined and dined by local politicians and community leaders. Warehouses, mushroom farms and other dubious schemes are also uncritically being touted as a quick fix for Sullivan County’s long-term economic and employment problems.

Yet something always happens and the proposed projects and jobs either never materialize or in fact turn out to be much smaller and less important than originally promised.

The latest craze is gambling casinos. For 30 years these promised projects have always been just around the corner, but they never seem to come to fruition.

There is nothing wrong with legalized gambling if it ever comes. But local residents must be prepared to ask the hard questions about such enterprises or they will inevitably confront disastrous social consequences ranging from major traffic jams on Route 17 to organized crime, personal bankruptcies, prostitution and drug dealing. We also face the unpleasant prospect of some susceptible local residents being turned into virtual slaves who work for the casinos and then fritter away their paychecks at the slots or the roulette wheels. Is this the lifestyle we want?

Small business owners had better understand that casinos will supply everything from meals to consumer goods for their own customers cheaper than our retail establishments can. Remember, the goal of a casino is to keep its customers on site and extract every dollar possible from their wallets. There may be very little tourist revenue left for the rest of the county when that happens.

Instead of falling once again for phony boosterism, pipedreams and false promises, it is time for Sullivan County residents to be skeptical about these proposed projects and their ultimate social costs. After all, you don’t buy a used car without kicking the tires first.

We need alert citizens with higher order critical thinking skills checking into these proposals, not professional yes men.

If local folks don’t ask the right questions and demand answers, they will be scammed once again.

Never forget that there is no such thing as a free lunch.

Noel van Swol
Long Eddy