Letters to the Editor

The voters are watching
I voted Yes for Measure T today. I do hope that the measure
passes. Why? Because at some point, this city has to be bailed out
for its past mistakes. The problems are not going to disappear.
Continuing to point fingers and be dissatisfied alone will
accomplish nothing productive. But most of all? Because the leaders
of today, are not necessarily the leaders of 10 years ago. They
deserve this chance. They deserve our support, and confidence. With
that being said however, these leaders should know that they will
be held accountable if they mess up this opportunity to turn things
around for our community over the next few years. People will be
watching closely.
Iran White
Hollister
The voters are watching

I voted Yes for Measure T today. I do hope that the measure passes. Why? Because at some point, this city has to be bailed out for its past mistakes. The problems are not going to disappear. Continuing to point fingers and be dissatisfied alone will accomplish nothing productive. But most of all? Because the leaders of today, are not necessarily the leaders of 10 years ago. They deserve this chance. They deserve our support, and confidence. With that being said however, these leaders should know that they will be held accountable if they mess up this opportunity to turn things around for our community over the next few years. People will be watching closely.

Iran White

Hollister

Local generosity impresses

Hollister residents reaching out to our community impressed me last week.  Local residents collected cans of food for the needy.  Members and friends of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints collected an estimated 500 cans for the needy on Friday, Oct. 27.  The celebration to gather the cans was also the annual family chili cookoff.

The event included all the contributing families enjoying chili, cornbread and pie together.  Everyone seemed to enjoy reaching out to others as the cans were placed in large barrels to be delivered to the community pantry.

Lauralee Foote

San Juan Bautista

Shun the municipal ponzi scheme

I noticed the other day that Tod Dubois (chairman of the city’s planning commission) wants the RDA to make up the difference in costs for what his 60 room downtown hotel would cost to make versus what the building would be worth after it is built. It appears he wants taxpayers to subsidize his costs in the form of future revenue from taxes generated by the property. This is the best example of why not to build. I haven’t seen the occupancy of any hotel/motel in Hollister to be in short supply.

Of course the real culprit in this mess is the state government with mandates through the RDA to address blight, which of course is arbitrary. The state needs revenue, to the tune of 90 percent of all taxes generated through property tax in San Benito County, so of course they view the entire county as blighted and will only be happy if all property is taxed heavily to finance a social agenda driven by the teachers union at the state level. They are bent on destroying the concept of family under the guise of equality forced down our kindergartner’s throats like cod liver oil.

A similar situation exists for the hotel in Tres Pinos. Will the hotel in Tres Pinos provide jobs that someone could purchase a house with? Of course not. We the taxpayers will have to pay for that in the form of unaffordable housing. The elected officials and communists who refuse to sell their land to provide affordable houses want everyone but them to finance their vision of utopia (communism).

The city should extricate itself from the ponzi scheme of revenue through building houses and focus on industry and the airport. We need more than cheerleaders for representatives. It’s amazing that the direction of the city’s revenues is always dominated by developers who want to GUARANTEE a paycheck for themselves at taxpayer expense. The city and county should sell land and not be in the speculation business. Everything they do raises the price of real estate by forcing the taxpayer to subsidize their agenda.

Mark Dickson

Hollister

Independence Day when?

Over the last month I have been reading in the San Francisco Chronicle how that city would be shutting down the annual Halloween party in the Castro District, and was reminded of how the city of Hollister cancelled the Motorcycle Rally for July 4 weekend in 2006. Even without an official rally that year, numerous bikers turned out in Hollister that weekend. I suspected the city of San Francisco would have that same problem on Halloween. But according to the Nov. 1 edition of the Chronicle, the city got the quiet Halloween they hoped for, with a few protestors.

Hollister reinstated the Motorcycle Rally for 2007, but the setup of vendors instead of bikes (as in prior years) on Main Street angered a lot of the event-goers, as did the fact that the event was on July 6-8, July 4 having fallen on a Wednesday. People were no longer able to buy fireworks. Just a few days I did a search on Google on the Rally for 2008, and according to this link: http://www.horsepowerpromotions.com/bikes/upcomingevents.htm the 2008 Motorcycle Rally is scheduled for July 11-13. What? Is this true? A week after Independence Day weekend? What is the reason for this?

Back to the San Francisco Halloween story. San Francisco Supervisor Bevan Dufty is already aware of the fact that Halloween next year is on a Friday (2008 is a leap year) and says that there is no way to shut down a party in the city on a Friday night. July 4 will also be on a Friday next year, and does the city of Hollister plan to stop bikers from possibly showing up that day? July 4 is a legal holiday making it easier for potential rally-goers to get off work and such to come to the Rally. Are we going to face two consecutive weekends of heavy traffic next July? Who is going to celebrate July 4 a week later?

Again, what is the reason for having the Motorcycle Rally a week later next summer? Are those dates for certain?

Jamie Ghione

Hollister

The true cost of war

“You have to consider what would have happened if Saddam had stayed in powere and eventually gotten weapons of mass destruction.” So read the end of the piece. OK, what if we did not invade, Saddam stayed I power, and he got WMDs? Let’s look at that.

Looks like we would have had to go to the negotiating table with him. We would have had a very strong hand. Our military would be intact; our financial system strong, and we would have had the sympathy, understanding and cooperation of the whole world. There would be fewer terrorists now and our country would be safer.

The Iraqi people, their country, the Middle East, the world, the planet and we would be better off.

Mary Zanger

Hollister

Quality in education,

not quantity

If you look at the goals of the Hollister School District (HSD) you will find that the top priority is for the schools to meet state and federal mandates. I think the top priority should be to develop students into creative, critical and analytical thinkers and problem solvers so they can become adults who will contribute to their community.

Our school district is like many school districts around the state that are terrified of state and federal sanctions. HSD rightfully worried that its funding could be undermined if it does not reach the state imposed benchmarks. Like other districts throughout California our schools have become consumed with test scores and have developed a culture that consists of multiple ways prepare for tests.

Most teachers believe that assessments are useful if they are designed to give teachers immediate feedback on the progress of their students. But nearly all teachers agree that the current system of testing is not useful because California ‘s standardized tests are given to students in May, and the test scores are released in August. The primary purpose of standardized testing is to punish districts, teachers and students.

I find it ironic that politicians who received their education in public schools, which allowed them to become successful, are now denouncing the education system and promoting ridiculous reforms and forcing current students to take tests that previous generations of people never had to take. Also, the illogical argument that the loss of U.S. workers’ jobs to foreign nations is because they have better educated people does not paint an accurate picture. The primary reason for exporting work is not due to more educated people, but rather that people (including intellectuals) from underdeveloped nations are paid less.

It is the foreboding sense of punishments that drive education in Hollister. We are capitulating to the pressures of relying on highly scripted lesson plans that heavily impose an overload of phonics, memorization of disconnected information and drill-and-skill instruction. Now, we emphasize quantity of instruction as directed by scripts instead of quality instruction.

Teachers are under increasing pressure to be exactly the same from one classroom to the next, no matter if students have different economic, social, emotional, ethnic backgrounds, and levels of development. We used to think of teaching to the whole child, in a child-centered classroom, where ensuring mastery of subjects was the goal to teaching successful learners. Quality mattered more than quantity.

We need to stop treating children as if they were factory products and strive to develop a curriculum that treats children as human beings, who will develop the necessary academic and life skills they need to help them become productive adults who contribute to their community.

Joe Navarro

Hollister

Morality begins at home

Representative Tom Lantos has called Yahoo spineless, irresponsible, moral pygmies because Yahoo actions led to the imprisonment of one Chinese journalist, Shi Tao. What words does Lantos have for the group whose actions have caused 1,200,000+ Iraqi deaths, the wounding of 27,000+ and deaths of 3,887+  brave Americans? Yahoo looks like a moral giant when compared to our United States Congress.

Frank Crosby

Morgan Hill