Letters to the editor »

Public school accountability vs. charter/private

Re “Bringing accountability to California’s public schools” (Jan. 19):

In this editorial it states that two ballot measures, The Education Freedom Initiative and the Educational Freedom Act, would provide $13,000 to $14,000 to families in order for their students to be sent to charter schools rather than other public schools.

Family dissatisfaction with public schools has been the main motivator for these two ballot initiatives. It goes on to state that public schools do not perform as well as charter and private schools and have much less accountability. There’s a very basic reason for all of this. Those of the public school systems have no ownership interest in their schools. Private and charter schools own their buildings, have debt, obligations and the ultimate responsibility to perform better. And if they don’t perform and are not accountable to their families then they will lose their students and go bankrupt.

This type of school has vested interest in the outcome of their students and their personal financial success is directly related to the success of their students. The school dollars are spent on efficient, effective educational processes rather than on bloated bureaucracies, administrations and union dues. For all of the above reasons students receive a much higher quality and more cost-effective education at charter and private schools.

Donald Trump

Re “Head of states conference to be held in L.A. in June” (Jan. 19):

As much as I do not support Donald Trump and fervently hope that his Svengali hold on his followers wanes, I was still appalled to read the sentence “President Donald Trump didn’t even bother to show up for the last summit, in Peru in 2018.” Doesn’t loaded language like this belong on the op-ed page and not in a “news” article? I believe that this sort of sloppy journalism does nothing to help revive the public’s flagging confidence in the mainstream media as an unbiased news source. “President Donald Trump did not attend the last summit.”

COVID variants will surge

Re “Scientist: Expect more variants after omicron” (Jan. 16):

People need to know the potential catastrophic problems that a large long-term unvaccinated group in a deadly viral pandemic can cause. The article states that when a virus like omicron surges, more opportunities for variants occur including variants that existing vaccines offer no protection against. If this happens a defenseless world would find itself back in January 2020. As the new virus surges without any way to stop it, we will again have businesses and public gatherings shut down, stay-at-home orders, schools closed and home schooling, hospitals overwhelmed, more government debt and another heartbreaking round of injury and death. Yes, a new vaccine and nationwide vaccination program in 2023 could end the surge. But the question emerges, will that same 30% to 40% of individuals refuse vaccination, again preventing herd immunity and again allow a new variant to emerge? Will we be at the mercy of this cycle year after year? It’s important for all people to step up and make their voices heard. The leaders and governments of the world must come together and agree on the necessary measures to have all people vaccinated and end this pandemic.

— Richie Locasso, Hemet

Councilman de Leon and the homeless community

Councilman Kevin de Leon is doing a good thing by trying to lessen the homeless community. Although, I find it hard to believe that activists are bribing homeless people to stay out in the streets. It just doesn’t make sense. Rather than going against the activists, Kevin de Leon should work with them to come up with more ideas of what they could do to help the homeless community. I’ve seen shelters that were only for women and children or for people coming from abusive homes. The activists and Kevin de Leon working together could create more types of shelters like the ones that I have seen. We should stop worrying about the charges and counter-charges and focus more on what we can do to help the homeless community.