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"Editor:
"To the people who volunteered
for the Special Olympic Booth at
the Luzerne County Fair, I wish to
‘thank you for volunteering your
time and apologize for any
inconveniences to you due to a last
minute decision by “Area P” Special
Olympics manager. The Luzerne
County Committee will not be
staffing the booth.
I hope when Luzerne County
has been accredited by the state, I
Special Olympics thanks fair volunteers
can count on you to volunteer and
support us again.
Again my sincere thank you for
the consideration that you gave by
contacting me in the endeavor.
Susan Stephens.
By GRACE R. DOVE
Post Staff
The Jackson Township
supervisors hope to finally take
official possession of the municipal
building - after nearly a year of
attempts to have renovations
completed.
According to supervisor Joe
~Stager, the bonding company,
Gc, offered the township
remaining work finished under the
866 to pay to have the
supervision of the township's
‘ aif@itect, Harry Seargeant.
+. +She supervisors voted at their
September 14 meeting to accept
USF&G's offer under the condition
«that Jackson Township will not be
held responsible for paying the
,subcontractors whom the now-
defunct contractor, Tri-City of
Allentown, never paid for their
services.
The township and the unpaid
contractors will be paid by the
bonding company, the supervisors
said.
In related business, the
supervisors directed secretary
Henry Zbick and solicitor Blythe
Evans to contact Representatives
Hasay and Jarolin and Senator
Lemmond for help in obtaining
grants to clear stumps from the
recreation area behind the
municipal building, pay some of
the contaminated waste cleanup
costs and possibly purchase a new
police cruiser.
In other business, an open
burning ordinance and a pave cut
ordinance were unanimously
adopted.
Evans reported that the state
has hired Vibra-Tech to conduct
noise tests at homes near the pump
house for the new water line to
Chase Prison. Neighbors are
concerned that the pump house's
two 75-horsepower and two 35-
Jickson will finally move into building
horsepower pumps operating
simultaneously up to six hours per
day will generate large amounts of
noise.
Although neighbors may have
to contend with noise, the
supervisors went on record
supporting the prison's use of the
water line rather than its
continuing reliance on three wells
in the Chase section.
Pennsylvania Department of
Corrections will advertise for bids
for a $40,000 hydrological study of
wells within a mile radius of Chase
Prison. Last year’s drought caused
several families’ wells to" go dry,
generating concern that the
prison’s reliance on wells for its
water could further draw down the
water table.
Zoning hearings on the pumping
station and a fence around
American Asphalt’s quarry will be
held Monday, September 28.
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JW.J
No room for censorship in free country
By J.W. JOHNSON
Censorship has no place in a
free society.
You've heard that in this column
before. And if a new report is even
close to being accurate, you can't
hear it often enough.
According to the 10th annual
report for People for the American
Way, a group dedicated to
monitoring attempts at banning
text and library books, censorship
is exploding particularly in public
schools.
The group reported 348
censorship attempts in 44 states
during the 1991-92 school year.
The most frequent complaint was
that materials were Satanic or anti-
Christian. The second most
common complaint was profanity,
followed by complaints about
sexual content.
For example, one of the books
most frequently targeted was John
Steinbeck’'s Of Mice and Men,
because of its allegedly ‘anti-
Christian’ content, and its
profanity.
Let me repeat that censorship
has no place in a free society. Our
elected officials have no right to
prescribe what you or I can read,
or see.
Parents obviously have the right
to decide what their children will
use in schools, but it is not in the
interest of parents or childrenwhen
a few individuals seek to deny all
students access to materials which
do not fit some narrowly construed
criteria for political or moral
correctness.
This whole idea of the free flow of
information and ideas seems
simple enough, doesn't it? And it
was John Milton who said: “Give
me the liberty to know, to utter and
to argue freely according to
Senior citizens
Senior citizens on a fixed in-
come can now obtain dental care
at a reduced cost through the
Pennsylvania Dental Association's
(PDA) Access to Care Program,
according to Senator Chalres D.
Lemmond (R-20).
Senator Lemmond said that
since 1984, nearly 35,000 senior
citizens have taken advantage of
the program, which makes dental
care more affordable for people age
65 and over who meet income
conscience, above all other
liberties.”
Milton uttered those words more
than 100 years ago before this
nation’s Declaration of
Independence and its subsequent
Constitution. As such, he must
have envisaged the most important
element in that constitution, the
First Amendment.
The First Amendment, and the
right of free expression contained
therein, is the most basic freedom
that we enjoy in this nation. All
other freedoms are the progeny of
this right, without which we would
be subjects and not citizens.
In addition to the newspaper
you are reading, and the radio and
television you will hear and see
later, the other bulwark which
preserves you as a free citizen is
the public library.
There you can be informed, take
flights of fancy, sit and sip wisdom
from the ages, while formulating
your own contributions, and
crystalizing your own plans and
dreams.
Most notably for the young, but
certainly for all ages, the public
library is, in fact, the crucible for a
free and independent mind.
Still there are those who say:
“I'm sick and tired of hearing that
the First Amendment should be
used to protect every perversion in
our society. And the reason it was
written was to protect political
speech, and not to protect every
Adam and Steve who comes along
and wants to photograph his lover's
genitals. And I'm sure that our
forefathers are turning over in their
graves knowing how the First
Amendment was being twisted.”
I wonder if the person who says
this means the same founding
fathers, many of whom were
avowed atheists; at best, Thomas
Jefferson was agnostic. | :
And while many Americans |
would agree that, for example,
pornography is bad, the
disagreement comes about ‘in
defining what exactly is |
pornographic become reconciled
with First Amendment guarantees?
The Supreme Court has sought
to do so by saying that while you
might disagree with the contents
of a book, play, movie, or |
photographic exhibit, and might
find the contents of same to be
offensive, immoral or whatever, the
U.S. Constitution does not give |
you, as a citizen, or a borough
council as a group of elected
representatives, the right todecide
the beliefs and habits of others.
Would an atheist be wrong.in
seeking to prohibit Christian
bookstores, stores that the atheist
would find offensive? Then
The atheist would say no.
The Christian would say yes:
The constitution says both have
a right to their beliefs and that
laws exist to provide for a peaceful
coexistence. Ch
This constitutional tenet is of
paramount importance. It is, in
fact, the basic tenet upon which
our forefathers founded this nation, h
and a tenet upheld by the Supreme
Court. )
What does all this have to do
with book banning in public
schools?It is through the protection
of alternatives that any Kind of
sanity prevails. .
We, in fact, define, cherishiand
promote the middle by protecting
the extremes.
And in protecting those
alternatives, we are preserving for
ourselves the right to be wrong; |
indeed, the right to be heard at all.
PE hs
Pee
s
can get low cost dental care
qualifications.
More than 1,500 dentists in
communities across the state have
agreed to participate in the pro-
gram by voluntarily reducing their
fees for dental procedures by at
least 15 percent. This includes
cleanings, extractions, denture
work and regular examinations.
To be eligible for the program,
seniors age 65 and older and may
not receive federal, state or other
dental health assistance or have
private dental insurance. In addi- |
tion, the total annual household |
income must be less than $13,000
for a single person or $16,200 for
a married couple. ak
For more information, senior
citizens may call the Pennsylvania
Dental Association toll-free at 1-
800-692-7256 (M-F,9a.m.-3p.m.
The PDA will refer patients to a
dentist in their area who partici-
pates in the Access to Care 'Pro-
gram. SAIN oe
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