ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, December 12, 1996 TAG: 9612120008
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-10 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: LETTERS
AS A JUNIOR at Lord Botetourt High School, I would like to voice my opinion concerning the media coverage given to our former football coach, Andy Ward. I feel his privacy was invaded by the continued front-page newspaper articles and headliners on the nightly news broadcast.
Ward was a well-liked, well-respected teacher as well as Coach of the Season. I feel what he does in his personal life should not have jeopardized his teaching position. He's a great guy, and all the news coverage is making him sound like the worst man in the world. I do not stand alone in my opinion.
He is a human who made a mistake. I haven't lost any respect for him. He needs our support and help instead of the constant criticism. Leave him alone and go after the real criminals.
KRISTEN MAYHEW
ROANOKE
Where are the stocks pages?
NOW THAT most of the financial pages are no longer in your regular newspaper, what is the subscriber getting to replace these pages? Since we're getting less financial information and less pages, will you lower your rates?
Most progressive newspapers try to enhance their customer base by giving more information to their readers. Obviously, your newspaper isn't in that class. Your greedy attempt to force your readers to pay an additional fee for stock-market information will eventually backfire.
It's too bad your newspaper has a monopoly in the area, as many subscribers would switch to another one. USA Today is looking better. Please don't say you can get this information by phone or computer. I want to see it in the newspaper and not bother converting symbols to numbers, etc.
JOSEPH T. NORKUS
ROANOKE
Letter-writer, quit whining
IN RESPONSE to Erik Ranberg's Dec. 2 letter to the editor, ``How about a swift kick for all the whiny baby boomers?'':
As a baby boomer and regular reader of your Opinion pages, I am outraged and insulted by his rambling whine of an essay about my generation. An entire generation can never be lumped together in one pot. His letter only serves as an example of the blame-everyone-else syndrome.
Ranberg needs to knock that gigantic chip off his shoulder, do his part to make this imperfect world better and, above all, quit his whining!
BONNIE WAYBRIGHT
SALEM
Dudley's mailing is deceptive
I RECEIVED literature in the mail from Allen Dudley about Roscoe Reynolds' record on education. It's interesting that Dudley's mailing piece regarding his beliefs about the importance of education would have so many misspelled words.
The mailer states that Reynolds didn't support a bill to require higher academic standards. I researched the bill cited, House Bill 2030, and found that Reynolds helped write the legislation and co-patroned the bill.
Dudley's literature went on to state that Reynolds didn't support returning lottery funds to local schools. Once again, this is deceptive. Dudley voted to send the money to localities without requiring that it go to schools. Reynolds actually voted to require that all lottery money be used for education.
Why would Dudley be so deceptive? I can only guess that it's because he doesn't want people to know that he voted for Virginia to remain the only state in the nation that doesn't receive funds from the Goals 2000 program begun by President Bush. This would mean an additional $14 million for our schools. Instead, the money goes to other states such as California and New York. Dudley also stated that he supports charter schools, which would take money out of our public school system and give it to private schools. We need more money in our public schools, not less.
SANDRA H. LANCASTER
ROCKY MOUNT
LENGTH: Medium: 77 linesby CNB