Letters: KC readers discuss JCCC adjuncts, states’ COVID-19 duties, Apple Market charge
Adjunct inequity
Know anyone who must wait a month-and-half to two months to get paid?
Know any employee forbidden to serve on in-company committees?
Know anyone forbidden to communicate with co-workers for fear they will organize?
You do if you know any Johnson County Community College adjunct professors. I was one.
Over the last five years, the administration has systematically limited adjunct faculty rights, increasing pressure to keep adjuncts from communicating about the many abuses they have endured at this supposedly liberal institution.
The constant threat of being terminated for speaking out against administrators or college policy leads to untold stresses that undoubtedly affect the education provided by such dedicated faculty members, not to mention the health and well-being of the professors themselves.
As a Johnson County or Kansas taxpayer, or as a parent or spouse of a JCCC student, you should be concerned about the oppression happening right here.
- Ruth J. Heflin, Leavenworth
Local decisions
This country is divided between the left and right. We have the same problem our forefathers had: One side wanted a strong federal government while the other wanted strong state governments.
The Constitution gives the federal government only those powers it lists and leaves the rest to the states. The Bill of Rights spells out the rights of the people.
The states have the responsibility of making the rules for the people to follow to fight the coronavirus. Each state is different, and the response should be controlled by governors and mayors close to the people who know where the virus is.
The Constitution should be taught more in school.
- Paul Earles, Liberty
Defund? Re-fund
The term “defund the police” is truly taken out of context. What is needed is to “re-fund” all the programs for mental health and other social services that we have defunded since the 1980s. We discontinued so many vital services. We closed institutions that could have been reformed and made useful to our communities.
Many of our homeless suffer from mental illness and addiction. They are left to wander our cities and flood our emergency departments seeking shelter. People do not choose to be mentally ill. A child does not choose poverty, abuse and violence. Nothing is ever so simplistic in this world. Re-funding will require discernment and not fear.
Police are on the front lines. All societies need those who put their lives on the line to protect and serve. Lack of adequate funding for needed programming only makes their jobs more dangerous and difficult.
Next time we hear “defund the police,” think instead: Re-fund vital services to our communities. Joe Biden has never said defunding the police is on the Democratic platform. However, social and racial justice is. Don’t confuse the two.
- Rev. Catherine Bogue, Independence
A party lost
Watching the Republican National Convention, it’s clear that Republicans live in an alternate reality. In their reality, Joe Biden is a radical Democrat who will “disarm you, empty the prisons, lock you in your home and invite MS-13 to live next door,” as U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida claimed at the convention. They also claim that Biden is a socialist who supports the Green New Deal and free health care for all.
None of these claims is based in reality.
Biden will not take your guns away. He has not advocated emptying prisons. And while he supports smarter environmental policies, he won’t enact the Green New Deal or free health care for all.
It’s sad that so many in the GOP fall for these lies. They have been brainwashed by Fox News, and their party has been remade in President Donald Trump’s image, even though many of his policies fly in the face of traditional conservative values.
There is no Republican Party anymore. All that’s left is a fear-mongering cult that worships Donald Trump.
- Tyler Allen, Kansas City
Justice at last
I want to thank all those involved in the investigation that led to a charge in the killing of Ray Ninemire in 2003. (Aug. 28, 1A, “Man already in prison charged with murder in 2003 Westwood shooting”) I shopped at Apple Market and remember Ninemire — his kindness and the signs he created to promote the produce department. I was also on the Westwood City Council at the time, and I know the concern everyone involved with the city had when the years went by with no arrest.
I am thankful that Ninemire’s family has closure, and I know I speak for many in Westwood when I say that we are thankful for all the work done at the time and for the recent cold case work resulting in the murder charge.
- Karen I. Johnson, Westwood