Letters to the editor June 22

Posted 6/21/17

Getting the facts straight I’m not sure it helps to exaggerate the facts. Carol Roig’s assertion that the renewable sector employs 476,000 Americans while oil, gas and coal combined …

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Letters to the editor June 22

Posted

Getting the facts straight

I’m not sure it helps to exaggerate the facts. Carol Roig’s assertion that the renewable sector employs 476,000 Americans while oil, gas and coal combined employs 187,000 is false. Only if you limit the count of oil, gas and coal jobs to extraction only, and disregard truckers, electricians, surveyors, accountants, lawyers and the multitudes of others, is this “fact” close to true. It’s like measuring total solar employment by counting installers only and disregarding the engineers, salespeople, office staff, etc. who are important too. By most counts, non-renewables still employ four times as many as renewables, with some sectors like natural gas adding jobs as quickly as the renewable sector.

But I do appreciate how Roig correctly points out a 27% reduction in carbon emissions since 2005, most of this due to the revolutionary expansion of natural gas and hydrofracturing. As predicted, natural gas is providing a low-carbon, low-cost bridge as we transition to alternative, cleaner options.

Charles Petersheim

Eldred, NY

Improving voting rights in New York

New York State is currently ranked 42nd in the country in terms of voting rights. There are currently three bills up for consideration that would change this.

First is early voting (S2950), which would allow citizens to vote for eight days before Election Day, which obviously makes voting easier and thus greatly encourages voter participation. Thirty-seven other states have it.

Second, S2788 calls for using electronic poll books, which would cut down on long voter lines by facilitating the voting process and reducing errors.

Third, New York has the most regressive change-of-party-affiliation deadline in the country (currently six months and 10 days before the election), while many states have open primaries (requiring no party affiliation to vote). The bill proposed as part of the New York Votes Act would shorten the period to 120 days, but that’s still too much. We must push to get the time down to 25 days.

Early Voting S2950 and Electronic Poll Books S2788 have passed in the Assembly but are stuck in the Senate Rules Committee.

Before these bills become law, there are two major hurdles remaining. One is Gov. Andrew Cuomo (518/474- 8350) and the other is Majority Leader John Flanagan (518/455-2071).

Call them, email them, tweet them, or show up at their offices and tell them you support these two bills and changing the deadline for changing party affiliation before an election to 25 days.

Kevin McDaniel,

Hurleyville, NY

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