Letters to the Editors

We need to train more teachers, not more lawyers

© St. Petersburg Times, published May 4, 2000

Re: Medical, law schools racing to floor votes, April 26.

I hear that America will need a million new teachers in the very near future. The Times, in this front-page story, has told us that the Legislature is about to fund two new law schools. It is very evident that the funds would be better spent on two, four or six teacher colleges.

Today, more than half the lawyers on the face of the Earth reside right here in the good old U.S. of A. Every 436th American has a law degree. I would really like someone to explain why we need more lawyers.

If I were making career choices, it seems that the law provides the greatest monetary reward, but teaching would give me the greatest satisfaction. We must make teaching a more chosen field for our best and brightest. A good way to start is to:

Make teaching a year-round career with a year-round salary equal to how we value our children and their future.

Allow teachers to teach and not just babysit.

Remove those in the profession who cannot or will not teach and are in the classroom for only a paycheck. Our children know the difference.

Reward the very best with just compensation and as an example to others that we value their effort.

We don't need lawyers every day, but our children need a quality education more today than ever before. Doesn't our future and our children's future deserve the best Florida can provide?
-- Arthur Samuels, Tarpon Springs

An exceptional learning experience

Re: An Exceptional Performance., April 29.

Thank you so much for your coverage of this story. As a parent of one of the "mainstream" children in this story, I give a heartfelt "thank you" to Mrs. Linda Clark for giving my daughter and the other students the opportunity to work with and help these exceptional students. It gives the children a chance to be educated about the disorders these children have and to understand that they are thinking, feeling, "normal" human beings just as they are.

I truly agree with Mrs. Clark when she said that if these kids are our future, we have nothing to fear. She is to be commended for her efforts in bringing these children together to learn, share and grow.
-- Liz Wood, St. Petersburg

Quit whining about teacher pay

I could not believe all the "whining" from the teachers in the April 28 letters about Lucy Morgan's article on teacher pay (Ah, 2000: such a good vintage for fine whine, April 22).

This issue is very simple: Who is forcing these teachers to teach? Who's twisting their arms? Didn't they have any idea of what they were getting into, salarywise, before they got their degrees? If not, then they received no "education" and wasted four years in college.

But surely they knew what faced them in the work environment. Just how stupid do these writers feel we, the public, are? I've yet to see any studies showing that increases in teacher salary equate to smarter kids. Money is not a motivator. Never has been. Never will be. All it does is ensure that teachers who are interested in a retirement check will "coast" along doing their "jobs."

Good teachers are motivated by the challenge of their jobs, by the intrinsic good they provide society, by their love of children and the chance to make a difference in a child's life. They get disillusioned for reasons other than money: dissatisfaction with their leadership; lack of parental involvement; micro-management; obnoxious, abusive kids; intrusion of big government in their jobs, etc.

Quit whining, teachers. This is America. You have a choice. You made yours. Live with it and don't blame anyone else for any perceived disparity in wages.

The argument that your bachelor's degree should merit a higher salary commensurate with other bachelor's degrees is hollow. Because this is America, the markets control prices, wages and earnings. So my advice is this: Either do the best you can or get out and seek another career.
-- Vilmar Tavares, Spring Hill

Politics endangers the environment

Re: Death of a forest, by Craig Pittman, and Republican Legislature is a danger to our state, by Philip Gailey, April 30.

It hurts to care about the environment in beautiful, fragile Florida, and articles like these don't provide a painkiller. But they are necessary in order to point out bad things that could get worse.

There are laws to prevent the type of destruction occurring in the swamps near the Myakka River from agricultural runoff. But Swiftmud is reluctant to enforce them, hoping that consensus-building will offer a solution. I am all for this approach, too -- if it works. But it is not working here, at least not well enough to save or repair what is left of the area. Perhaps Swiftmud's desire for compromise at all costs comes from the example set by our governor in his recent "compromise" allowing a cement plant to be built near pristine Ichetucknee Springs.

Enter the governor's chummy Republican friends in the current Florida Legislature, who have a slate so reeking of vendetta and payback, so bizarre, that they will probably be featured in Carl Hiaasen's next novel! It's not enough that many protective laws already in place are routinely ignored. Now this group seems ready to weaken or eliminate some laws whose demise would only benefit (surprise!) the state's timber, cattle, development and corporate farming interests, at the considerable expense of Florida's environment.

Unfortunately, as Gailey suggests, the Democratic minority in its present state can't be counted on to provide an effective counterbalance to the potentially harmful outcomes of this session.

Bill Maxwell recently wrote that Al Gore makes him sick but George W. Bush makes him sicker. Sadly, that kind of statement, adjusted to the state level, seems appropriate here.
-- Mary E. Parrott, Palm Harbor

Refine rules for payday advances

Many families still live paycheck to paycheck, even in today's booming economy. Most are extremely adept at managing their money and sticking to a budget, but all it takes is one unexpected expense -- a medical emergency or car repair -- to throw family finances into a tailspin.

Many people utilize a payday advance service when these unexpected situations occur. Unlike credit-card payments, which can extend for several months, a payday advance can be a short-term solution for an occasional financial bind. Consumers have begun to use the service more frequently as the costs associated with late payments and bounced checks have become more expensive than a payday advance. When someone bounces a check, he may pay fees of up to $50 to the merchant and bank. In Florida, banks charge an average of $29 per bounced check, which makes a bargain of the $10 fee plus $5 administrative charge for a payday advance of $100. Banks and many credit unions do not offer short-term loans under $500. Obviously, consumers are free to use any credit sources available to them. Payday advances are simply one option.

The payday advance has often been compared to a title loan, but they are very different transactions. When a customer writes a check for a payday advance, that piece of paper is the only negotiable instrument a store-owner has, unlike an auto title loan where the customer's car is the collateral. Forcibly taking away a person's car is a far cry from holding his check. If a check does bounce, we are legally forced to take action.

We are currently asking the Legislature to protect consumers by restricting the industry's ability to resort to criminal charges against a customer for a bounced check to instances where a forgery has occurred. This allows consumers more protection against prosecution for a bounced check than any other industry. In addition, we have agreed to accept the legislative proposal to allow consumers 60 days before we pursue civil action on bounced checks.

These are just a few examples of the regulations that are on the table in Tallahassee. We agree that the current landscape of regulation for the payday-advance industry needs to be refined. With unscrupulous operators in the industry, such as those who allow rollovers and trap consumers into a never-ending cycle of debt, clear state-level regulation is sorely needed to protect the consumer as well as the industry.

With statewide regulations, customers will enjoy uniformity throughout Florida when using a payday-advance service. Enforcement of laws will be easier for officials if there is a common standard throughout the state. Most important, however, consumers will have better protection from the unscrupulous operators who are charging excessive fees and operating outside of the law. We share a commitment to put these predatory lenders out of business -- and that is why statewide industry regulation is needed now.
-- Joseph M. Doyle, chairman, Financial Service Centers of Florida, Miami

A disreputable roost

Re: The Don Wright cartoon on April 28, showing the political vultures waiting to take advantage of the Elian Gonzalez case.

This scene has been going on for almost eight years with most of the same players. I just wish they would pay as much attention to Social Security, education, and most of all, donations to the Republican and Democratic parties.

They should stop taking money from big business and start thinking about us, the constituents, for a change and not themselves. Florida government, this includes you, too.
-- Tony Alatis, Clearwater

Republicans are the ones who care

Countless thousands of people must be feeling shocked and frustrated after seeing the brutal kidnapping of Elian Gonzalez. I suggest they do what I did and change to the Republican Party.

I only regret that it took me 48 years to discover which party really cares about the rights and feelings of all human beings.
-- Donald B. Sogge, St. Petersburg

Dangerous stereotyping

Re: We see no evidence, but still he waits, Bill Maxwell's column, April 26.

Bill Maxwell speaks of "area anti-Muslim forces" suspicious of WISE, the so-called think tank at the University of South Florida from which came Ramadan Shallah, present leader of the Islamic Jihad.

Had Maxwell wished to be accurate rather than to propagandize, he'd have said "anti-terrorist individuals and groups." People can of course be anti-terrorist and not anti-Muslim.

One would hope that Maxwell, of all people, would be more sensitive to the dangers of stereotyping.
-- Gilbert Kushner, Tampa

Beer ads leave a bad taste

It was most surprising to read in the April 19 St. Petersburg Times that Molson Canadian beer is featuring an anti-American TV commercial across Canada. A Molson spokesman indicated the public response has been very favorable.

Molson sells a lot of beer in the United States. If I were a beer drinker, I would refuse to buy a product produced by Molson or any company that trashed America. We deserve respect from our northern neighbors just as they deserve our respect. Maybe the folks at Molson have been drinking too much of their own brew.
-- Bill Crutchfield, New Port Richey

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