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“Don’t tell me what you value. Show me your budget and I’ll tell you what you value,” former vice president Joe Biden, quoting his father, knew that a budget reflected the values and priorities of our nation. Each April our country funds its priorities. Ultimately, as the Rev. Jim Wallis has said, “Budgets are moral documents.” Each year Physicians for Social Responsibility Los Angeles calculates how much money the United States spends on nuclear weapons programs for the current tax year. The Nuclear Weapons Community C...
Earth Day, birthday. Kinda’ rhymes doesn’t it? Come to find out I was born on Earth Day, or since I first appeared in the world April 22, 1953 and Earth Day was hatched in 1970, it must be the other way around. I’ll blame my confusion over the celebration of the environment on two things: 1960s “new math” and nuns with rulers. I realized well after the first Earth Day — initially organized in 1968 by the U.S. Public Health Service as a conference for students to hear from s...
Among other things, April is recognized as “National Child Abuse Prevention Month” across the United States. The annual observance, which began in 1983, focuses on preventing child abuse and neglect in all of its forms and ensuring kids grow up in a safe and loving environment. The Revised Code of Washington defines abuse and neglect “as injury, sexual abuse, sexual exploitation, negligent treatment or maltreatment of a child by any person under circumstances which indicate that the child’s health, welfare and safety is harm...
Oh the hypocrisy of it all. Our President Donald Trump and his great unflinching supporter, our Congressional Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, promote repeal and replace Obamacare with a bill that would throw millions of American families, including babies, off their healthcare and give tax breaks to the rich. In addition, they want to prevent Syrian refugees, which include babies, from entering the country without extreme vetting on top of already stringent vetting. However, Trump points his finger at (Syrian President Bashar)...
American entrepreneurs’ ability to invent, create and bring products and services to market makes our nation great. Their success generates the tax revenue which fund our schools and puts people to work. Many “big businesses” started in the imaginations of immigrants who came to our country – a place of boundless possibilities. America is a land where your station in life doesn’t matter and where hard work, innovation and perseverance are the keys to success. The story of...
We recently exited quite a winter. It was snowy, cold and long. In some ways it lingers. From a celestial standpoint, winter began Dec. 21, 2016, but some might argue it was earlier, on Nov. 9. Regardless, the past 100 or so days have combined to produce an outbreak of “cabin fever” that has been hard to break, and for many reasons. According to the National Weather Service, the first snow arrived on Dec. 9 and never left until George Washington’s Birthday, Feb. 22, a total of 76 long days. Through April 1 we were bless...
Saturday evening my wife and I attended the Stage West Production of “Miracle on South Division Street.” We thoroughly enjoyed the humorous, well-acted play presented by a delightful cast. We feel it’s important to support our local theater; in return we were well rewarded. Ralph Laws Cheney...
Driving east along State Route 14 these days, you see water pouring out of Columbia River dams. It is already a high water year with much of the runoff from our heavy mountain snowpack yet to come. It is part of our “feast or famine” weather cycle. As you pop over the hilltop near the historic Maryhill Museum, you look down to see John Day Dam with its floodgates open spilling massive amounts of water. Then you see remains of the razed Goldendale Aluminum Company smelter nex...
The long — and some would argue pointless — war against Planned Parenthood continues. On March 30, Vice President Mike Pence was the tiebreaking vote on a Senate-proposed bill that would give states permission to withhold more than $200 million in Title X federal family planning funds from abortion providers, including Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood is a non-profit organization that provides reproductive health, maternal and child health services. The organization, which has been around since 1921, is often the tar...
The U.S. Supreme Court recently handed out a ruling that legally entitles special needs students across the country the opportunity to make progress in public schools In the recent Endrew F. v. Douglas County School District case in Colorado, the parents of an autistic child were seeking reimbursement from the school district for sending their son to a private school. Like all special needs children in the United States, Endrew is entitled to free appropriate public education from schools that take certain federal funds, as...
The owners of a mid-sized manufacturing plant in a nearby small town were ready to retire, but no one in the next generation was interested in taking over. The plant was sold to an out-of-state buyer with no local ties. The business was profitable, but the new owners chose to merge operations and close the local plant. The story is familiar in small towns. Is there an alternative? I think so. Worker-owned co-ops and employee stock ownership plans could offer another path forward for these businesses. Rural people have a long...
Please make a point of attending our latest production Miracle on South Division Street by Tom Duzick, and directed by myself, Kay Byron-Pacheco. We had an outstanding first weekend and there are only two weekends, or five shows left. Our stars are Kathryn Schafer from Ritzville, Russia Demetro, and Jamie Javorsky from Spokane Valley and Mark Sheldon from Cheney, and of course the Virgin Mother Mary, who is present throughout, or is she? This story is a comedic view of a mother and her grown children living and believing in...
Most people have never heard of Hogar Seguro Virgen de la Asunción. It was recently in the news, but relegated to the inside pages, despite what happened there. Not a lot of follow up either, likely because it’s located on the outskirts of Guatemala City and not many people in this country care what happens in that country. The “USA Today” version is that Virgen de la Asunción is a state-run home for minors, and not necessarily homeless or orphaned minors. According to a March 19 story in The New Yorker, simply put, it’s ha...
We understand the financial and physical burden public records requests put on employees at local, regional and state agencies. Especially large requests, which are time consuming, as the city of Cheney found out not long ago. But we have doubts and concerns about whether two pieces of legislation moving through Olympia carry the answers to this problem. Both bills have passed the House and are now in Senate committees. House Bill 1594 would provide $25,000 for a study by a consultant picked by the state archivist to...
I would like to thank ALL the voters in the Feb. 14 Cheney School District Bond. The school board in their ads, in the Cheney Free Press and the general mailing (‘Connections”), chose to thank only those who voted approval instead of ALL the taxpayers. We ALL have to pay for the $52 million bond, property owners, renters and businesses. Of the just over 19,000 ballots sent out, 4,041 voted to approve. That is about 21 percent of the total registered voters. I can’t help but wonder, if that 21 percent had to pay for all of th...
There is a growing issue in our community surrounding abandoned cats that requires our thoughtful consideration. Every year, after Eastern Washington University’s spring quarter ends, when students go back to their homes, pets are left behind to fend for themselves. These animals are forced to seek food from kind homeowners or they try to feed from garbage cans and dumpsters. These animals have not been spayed or neutered, resulting in more animals and this cycle continues unabated. Most of us have seen these animals in o...
Bernie Sanders was our favorite candidate. He championed the working class, unjustly left behind by huge wealth inequality, by parroting policies that originally solved this problem while facilitating 1930s Great Depression recovery. But Donald Trump is dangerous, as shown by his continual attacks on our fundamental democratic institutions. Also, distrust of his purported working class advocacy has proven justified. So we naturally voted for Hillary Clinton, displaying “Hillary for America” bumper stickers to be removed sho...
As he tells a doctor that things look good, that it’s time to “close up,” and unmasks, it is discovered that the person in the ad is “Not Dr. Stewart.” To which the actor replies, “No, but I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night.” He leaves the room populated with people shaking their heads in wonder and puzzlement. It was the perfect segue to have some discussion, and maybe offer a few thoughts on treatment of the latest strain of “Presidential Derangement Syn...
There is a bill currently in the Legislature that would change the duration and some of the procedures when it comes to sexual assault protection orders issued in Washington state. House Bill 1384 would allow courts to issue permanent protection orders for victims of sexual assault. In cases where a permanent protection order is not issued, the bill allows courts to renew the order unless the perpetrator can prove they will not attempt to contact the victim after the order expires. The third part of the bill establishes...
Our state representatives Jeff Holy and Mike Volz of the 6th District, both Republicans, held a town hall meeting in Spokane on March 11. The majority of the questions were posed by articulate and enthusiastic teachers in the area, many from Cheney and Medical Lake. Our representatives assured the attendees that the authority of the federal Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, would not impact education in Washington State. Volz said in response to a question about vouchers undermining public education, “What they do at t...
President Donald Trump likes to be known for his deal-making, and now he has the opportunity to make deals that can impact world peace and security, not just real estate or other business deals for his profit. North Korea would be a great place to start. Former President Barack Obama described North Korea’s nuclear weapons and missile programs as the most pressing international security problem when he briefed Trump just before leaving office. Obama, who scored impressive diplomatic successes with the Iran nuclear a...
In 2003, Gov. Gary Locke (D) faced a 10 percent revenue hole in the state’s budget. He also stared at a sluggish economy still reeling from the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. People were reluctant to fly and airlines stopped buying Boeing jets. Locke faced either recommending substantial tax increases or finding a new way to allocate state tax revenues. He turned to Minnesota’s former commissioner of finance, Peter Hutchinson, who helped his governor balance the budget by...
Sometimes things come to your attention that you feel the need to comment on, but don’t want to say too much. To provide a means of expressing these sentiments, whether it’s a good job to somebody or a “Come on man” as the popular ESPN segment goes, the Cheney Free Press has started a “Cheers and Jeers” space on our Opinion pages. It’s pretty simple to use, and we encourage you to do so. It can be something or someone who you feel should get a little community recognition for doing something positive. It can be the same thing...
By the time this column hits newsstands or your mailbox, I will have celebrated my 32nd birthday. Turning 32 years old isn’t as grand as hitting the 16-, 18-, 21-, or 30-year-old milestones, but I like to think of every birthday as a special occasion to celebrate with friends over some good food and adult beverages. It’s also a time where I like to reflect on the changes — good and bad — that have come my way over the years and look back at how my perception has changed on certain issues. As the late, great Muhammad Ali sai...
Two bills pertaining to alcohol consumption while driving are weaving their way down the highway in the Washington State Legislature. Senate Bill 5037 would drop from five to four the number of driving under the influence infractions to finally be charged with a felony. And House Bill 1874 lowers the legal blood alcohol limit from the current .08 to .05. At last check SB 5037 had moved to the House for consideration and HB 1874 never made it out of committee and its future for this session is uncertain. The Cheney Free Press...
