Arenas, Budgets and Pools! Oh My!
“That’s a pie crust promise. Easily made, easily broken,” said Mary Poppins. The arena debate in St. Catharines lends itself to that quote. I am referring to the promise of closing down the aging and crumbling Gatorade Garden City Complex. The proposed budget for 2015 was recently released. The city of St. Catharines is looking at a 3.99 percent increase which includes harsh cuts across the board. Do not worry, the decaying, vermin-infested, albeit beloved, Gatorade Garden City Jack Gatecliff Rex Stimers Arena, which costs you and me nearly $1,000,000 per year to operate, will remain open. City council instead will close five outdoor pools, the Canal Centre and Museum, the Fairview Golf Course and cancel vital repairs and improvements across the...
Politics
Dear Mr. Prime Minister,
Thank you for coming to America. I am just a grandma from Goleta who can no longer stand idly by. I can see that the world today is a dangerous place and I fear for my children and grandchildren. It is apparent that we are on the brink of another World War, and yet, the U.S. is somnolent, lulled into an easy, yet unrestful sleep having been soothed by the deceptions of a narcissistic president who prefers to indulge in fantasies rather than lead, as you are doing. He has tarnished the reputation of our once great nation.
America has suffered more than its share of foolish ideologies and misguided leaders, but these times are different, with decisions that will not only change the future, but determine whether or not there is a future at all. That is why, as...
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Dear Comrades,
We write to express our solidarity with you in these trying times. Your country is burying a hundred or so dead, demonstrators and policemen, and hundreds more wounded are still in its hospitals. The specter of a civil war has not yet left Ukraine. While not the defeated party, most of you cannot partake in the joys of the victors. Euromaidan was hardly the ideal terrain for your struggle. Its contradictions divided you and those who did participate, were outsized by the Right Sector. We don’t say this in reproach: with a few exceptions such as the former Yugoslavia, Greece, and Turkey, the East European left is everywhere small, and everywhere divided over those strange but powerful social movement that have swept our countries in recent years, expressing the just...
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Dear Sir,
RECONSTITUTION OF THE NATIONAL YOUTH AUTHORITY ( NYA) BOARD
On behalf of the entire students and the youth of Ghana we write to your office to take a second look at the delay in reconstituting the NYA Board and to humbly impress upon you to do so in the interest of the youth of Ghana.
His Excellency President John Dramani Mahama, we wish to bring to your notice that your further delay in this subject matter will subtly undermine your much tauted commitment to youth development.
Since 2012 that the tenure of the current NYA Board expired, as per the NYA Act 1974 (NRCD 241) and as amended by (NRCD 300), no new Board has been formed with reference to section (3) of the NYA Act. Hence the Board as it in existence is an illegal entity; in spite of it claims as a caretaker...
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Dear Mr Mayor,
I am writing to encourage you to bring the issue of future port reclamation back to the Auckland Council table.
I have yet to change my vote. But like others I am calling for these matters to be formally revisited by the Governing Body in a calm and collected way with all the information new and old presented without fear or favour. Given the significant level of public interest, we at least owe that to Aucklanders.
Like other councillors, I always do my best to represent the public while balancing the economic interests of our city and region. And I thought I was doing the right thing by supporting tightening up the old reclamation rules, but it's clear that's still not going far enough to reflect the wishes of the wider Auckland community.
I supported...
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Dear Secretary-General,
In the coming weeks negotiations to finalise the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for eradicating poverty will begin. We urge you to champion the cause of economic growth as the foundation stone for achieving long term poverty reduction.
No country has succeeded in significantly reducing poverty without sustained economic growth. The current SDG proposals list a wide variety of noble ambitions including securing food, health, education, and energy. Yet, poor attainment in these areas is in large measure a consequence of poverty and a lack of growth. There is a risk that presenting the SDGs as if they could be directly delivered by public action inadvertently casts ordinary people in the passive role of recipients of government largesse. Without...
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Dear friends,
In the past two months we have all been in a turbulence of violence, uncertainty, and clash of values and beliefs. After 14 years of rockets falling on civilian communities, on men, women, and children, the Israeli Government decided to act.
Whether the actions were the right ones, and whether the rockets will stop – we are still in the midst of the operation and only time will tell. But, I have decided to write to you now, so you can feel a little bit of what we feel here.
I was drafted on the first day of Operation Protective Edge. At 19:00 in the evening, I got home, put all the gear in my usual Miluuim backpack, gave a big hug to my wife and two children, and started my way towards my unit which sits in the center of Israel.
After a night of gearing up and making...
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Dear Nashville mayoral candidates:
First, congratulations on your decision to run for mayor. Nashville needs strong, decisive, effective leadership to continue the great momentum our city currently has. I look forward to learning more about the issues you feel are important and your identified priorities.
With the recent announcement from Mayor Dean not to pursue funding for the Amp in the last year of his term, I am interested in your thoughts on whether the city should continue expending dollars for planning, design and public relations on this project or if we should step back until new leadership is in place to review the entire mass transit plan.
Here is a brief history to get you up to date: First, in June 2013, the Metro Council authorized the appropriation of up to $7.5...
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Dear Sen. Paul,
We agree with you that Congress should obey the Constitution. We should never engage in foreign wars without a congressional declaration of war, a restraint on military action put in place by our Founding Fathers to ensure lawmakers never send our troops to war without deliberation.
But a constitutional war in the Middle East is just as bloody, destructive, and likely to incite terrorism as an unconstitutional war.
Our half-century of interventions in the Middle East have been a colossal failure. We have provided arms, military training, and subsidies to virtually every country in the region, inciting continual war and unrest. This has created a breeding ground for international terrorists that pose a real danger to our country and the world — one that would not...
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Dear Mr. President,
First, I wish to express my deep condolences over the killing of innocent citizens in the recent terror attacks in Paris.
Second, I want to apologize to Your Excellency for not revealing my true identity. After you read my letter, you will realize why people like me are afraid to reveal their real identity.
I decided to write to you this letter after hearing my president, Mahmoud Abbas, declare that you had invited him to attend the anti-terror rally in Paris earlier this week.
Like many Palestinians, I see President Abbas's participation in a rally against terrorism and assaults on freedom of speech as an act of hypocrisy -- a condition that is not alien to Palestinian Authority leaders.
In fact, many Palestinians nearly fell off their chairs upon...
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