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Opinion

Our opinion: Take the time to vote Tuesday

Our Opinion

Tuesday is Election Day, with thousands of Warren County residents going to the polls to cast their ballot for township, borough, city and county offices. Precisely because no federal and few state offices are on the ballot this year, today’s election affects you more directly in your day to day existence than any other. These are the levels of government that provide the services that affect you every single day in one way or another through things like police and fire department staffing in the city, handling of neighborhood issues, animal control, road maintenance - including ...

Readers Speak

Letters To Editor

Closings were ‘wrong’ Dear Editor, This is in response to the recent editorial about re-electing Mary Passinger to the school board. One huge problem is that she and her supporters don’t realize they are wrong. The support for closing schools was not unanimous. These communities did not deserve this. Your opinion says we should not look at the past but focus on the future. I say how can we confidently vote for Passinger? She has been on the board for so long and her and her buddies’ record lead to the school closings. They did nothing to avoid this even when they said it was ...

Editor's corner: More electing to participate in early voting

Our Opinion

During last year’s presidential election, nearly 25% of Pennsylvania voters cast their ballot before the traditional Election Day. This begs a question: Should the state do more to promote early voting? For now, the option is limited. Registered voters have the option of applying for a mail ...

Our opinion: COLA hike is not enough

Our Opinion

Warren County retirees will join about 53 million other senior citizens across America in welcoming the announced 2.8% average increase in their Social Security benefits, effective in January. The word “average” is important in this editorial because individual increases could be above or below the Social Security Administration’s announcement that the average monthly check next year will be $2,064, up $56 from this year. However, buried or absent among some of the increase announcements has been the fact that the standard Medicare Part B premium will be increasing by $21.50 a ...

Our opinion: Brown, Strickland ready to lead office

Our Opinion

Warren County voters have already had their say once this year in the race to be the next Warren County District Attorney after Rob Greene chose not to run for re-election. Cody Brown, the county’s first assistant district attorney, received 2,356 (55.5%) of the 4,242 ballots cast by county Republicans earlier this year while Casey Strickland, the county’s second district attorney, received 1,886 votes. The pair square off again on Tuesday after Strickland secured enough write-in votes during May’s primary to earn the Democratic Party’s line on the November election ballot. ...

I still pine for pinecones

Local Commentaries

Preparing for this weekend’s garage sale, I came across a canvas bag I hadn’t seen in years. It was filled with pinecones. Giant Sequoia pinecones. Some of these babies are almost a foot long, and my memory of first seeing them goes back to 1949. 1949? Yes, I was alive then – and out of diapers. In fact, I was out of third grade. But the huge pinecones that my mother brought home from California fascinated me for their pure size. I studied redwood trees and the giant Sequoias, and I knew I had to see them for myself someday. My mother’s first trip to California in 1944 ...