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Letters to the Editor

Medicaid Cuts: bad for states and patients

Congress is working on a proposal to cut hundreds of billions of dollars from the Medicaid program, jeopardizing people’s health insurance and healthcare. As the CEO of Thunder Bay Community Health Service, I want to remind our community that these cuts will harm our patients — maybe that’s you, a family member, a friend — and our health center. TBCHS serves nearly 20,000 patients, over 25% of whom get their health insurance through Medicaid. Patients qualify for Medicaid coverage for a variety of reasons: some are children, in foster care, making minimum wage, their job ...

APS board is micromanaging issues

A small group in the community is determined to politicize and hijack our public schools for their hate-based, ignorant beliefs. At April’s board meeting, students, teachers, and members of the community spoke on concerns about board members’ obsession with bathrooms and adopting policies on a non-existent issue. Board members are wasting time micromanaging issues that they have little knowledge of. Now they are pushing their lack of expertise in the legal arena to find opinions that fit their political agenda. Months were wasted questioning the plans for the rain garden, which ...

APS board dysfunction on full display

Once again, at the April 28 APS board meeting, the dysfunction of some APS school board members was on full agonizing display. Not for the first time, the issue was about “Bathroom Policy.” To recap: APS has a bathroom use policy that, according to students, teachers, and administrators, is working well with no reported difficulties. The policy has been evaluated (at no cost) by APS and American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) attorneys who report the policy is in alignment with the Michigan Constitution and therefore does not pose a risk for litigation. In other words, there is a ...

Start fighting for each other, not against

To Editor The Alpena News, My Name is William (Bill) Blank of 124 S. Atchison Rd. in Harrisville. I feel bad for a local presidential candidate who was on the libertarian ballot. Only because a third party doesn’t stand a chance currently, maybe in local small town elections where you really know the candidate, but NOT IN major elections. TRUMP knew this. When asked why not Trump, those who oppose him say he is a sexist. I believe MANY who say he is a sexist would display many of the same behaviors IN a bar on Friday night or IN a locker room. If it is OK for Biden/Harris ...

Too blind to see it’s morning in America

After four months in Florida, I returned to Alpena and found the same rantings of Trump-hating individuals, writing letters to the editor. One person whom I will call D.N. wrote (Trump’s four years of insanity) about all of the so-called misdeeds of our president. Most of those are the same tired talking points of the left-wing media. You are lucky, D.N., that this is a small-town paper, because if it were a mainstream news outlet, you may be looking at liable charges, what a parrot! Next, we have D.T. (Will we exist only in flames after four years), who likened Trump to a conductor ...

Protect child care and Head Start at all costs

The U.S. Congress must reject President Donald Trump’s plans to make disastrous cuts to child care and eliminate Head Start! We have witnessed a barrage of attacks on child care and Head Start by President Trump and his administration since he took office. Most recently, leaked details of Trump’s Presidential Budget revealed his reckless plans to eliminate Head Start, threatening to rip child care from over 770,000 children across our country. This, along with the Trump administration’s closure of Administration for Children and Families’ (ACF) offices serving child care ...