Letters to the Editor

Snow Plow Problems

With all the recent abundance of snow and more predicted on the way--the snow plows are vital to keep up with doing the job of trying to keep the streets clear and the homeowners, to keep their sidewalks and driveway the same way!!

Why is it--no sooner than the homeowner does the snow on their property--the city plows come by and throws it back into driveway and onto the sidewalks??

Do the drivers "get a kick" out of turning the plows toward the property and blowing it back?? I actually think the city plow drivers wait, as long as possible, until they can drive by a property and accomplish this "task"!!!

Sure seems that way to me--and it's been proven time and time again, in the 30 years I have lived @ my residence!!!

No name or address for fear of retaliation

A disgusted actual taxpayer

and also a senior citizen

History Museum Offers More

In response to a recent column by Sweeney Payne, please let your readers know that the North Tonawanda History Museum would be pleased to be a location in which residents could come and review copies of the proposed annual City budgets. We are open Tuesdays through Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. until summer when we are also open on Mondays.

Since we began in the fall of 2003, we have attempted to gather the news articles about those running for and elected to offices in North Tonawanda and also campaign materials we could for our reference library. . We have a beginning Political Graveyard Exhibit Hall also.

Thank you to the Reporter for making us a distribution point for the Reporter. Many of our members, supporters, volunteers--and visitors have asked us to offer it here for pick up when they are downtown.

Donna Zellner Neal

Executive Director

North Tonawanda History Museum

Crime Stats Need Analysis

As you know the city has released the NF police assessment for 2014. I would have liked them to have included more details such as the racial breakdown of the people arrested and also the racial breakdown of the people the cops had to use more force on.

The assessment was required due to accusations of police targeting African Americans. It would be nice to see a story on this. The NF police have this information and it most likely will take a foil request.

Who causes the most crime in Niagara Falls? The assessment shows that Niagara Falls is majority Caucasian, so can we assume they commit most of the crime?

Dan M

A Modest Proposal: Bring illegals here to boost population

We live in challenging times.

But fortunately we have incredible leaders with which to guide us through those challenges.

In Washington we have Barack Obama showing the way.

In Albany we have Andrew Cuomo clearing a path through the darkness.

At home we have the hoopster tall Mayor Dyster taking us by the hand and telling us what to think and believe.

I wish to suggest a humble proposal that will squeeze the sour lemons of our southern immigration disaster into a dynamic thirst quenching bureaucratic lemonade with which to cure the shriveled spirit of Niagara Falls while swelling its population.

I recommend that Niagara Falls pay illegal immigrants to live here. Adopt at least 60,000 illegals and re-locate them to our fair city! and pay them a stipend to live here on top of the welfare and Medicaid benefits.

This relocation program is a win-win-win. Texas gets rid of the excess illegals and for that the Lone Star state will forever be in our debt. Niagara Falls accepts the immigrants and for that our population more than doubles overnight! The incredibly shrinking Niagara Falls will go from 49,000 to 110,000.

This city hasn't seen population numbers like that since the power project when every attic room and cellar crawl space in this city was rented to laborers at exorbitant rates. .

For the past two years Community Development Director Seth Piccirillo has struggled to lure seven young colleg graduates to town - at a cost of $200,000 - through his pay college graduates to live here plan called Live Niagara Falls.

Seth and Mayor Dyster are creative thinkers who do things that leave us mere mortals shaking our heads, but moving these young illegals to Niagara Falls would instantly accomplish what Piccirillo and Dyster have only dreamt of until now.

Let me paraphrase the Mexican bandito from the classic film, Treasure of the Sierra Madre: "Sex offenders? We don't need no stinkin' sex offenders anymore, we got illegals to grow our population!"

With the illegals will surely come, courtesy of President Obama, millions of federal dollars (not city dollars, this won't cost us anything) in the form of grants, vouchers, and education funding.

I make this humble proposal today and I hand it to Mayor Paul Dyster to run with.

Mr. Dyster is a political figure with the magnetic leadership of Teddy Roosevelt, the intellectual command of Thomas Jefferson and the height of Abraham Lincoln. I know that the mayor has the innate ability to sculpt this proposal into the shape it so richly deserves. Mayor Dyster can perform endless studies coupled with an eventual implementation plan that will have the entire world shaking their heads in collective disbelief at what he has done.

Ronald D. Ralston

Parking meters bad idea

Come this summer the city will have new parking meters in the downtown area, now that the bid has been put out to install them. This won't be the first attempt by the city to put parking meters downtown. In 2006 the city entered into an agreement with company out of Vancouver Canada to install 100 parking meters. The meters were installed, but did not work properly do to power issues, the city was left with poles with no meters on them, creating an eyesore in the downtown tourism district. Will the new meters produce the same results?

After a 65,000 dollar parking study was done, it was recommended that the city again install parking meters, which is part of a much bigger plan, costing close to one million dollars paid for with CASINO MONEY. Will parking meters help business in the downtown area, or will it hurt them. Could these parking meters make developers think twice about building in the down town area, knowing all their customers will have to pay for parking to enter their business. I thought the city was open for business, with this plan they might just drive business right out of down.

Robert Ventry

Dear Ms. Howard,

Superb reporting on chairman Touma's attempted destruction of the 1st amendment. A great concern to me is that 2 school teachers voted to chip away at the 1st amendment. What is being taught in our schools?

Please Sign me, another Reason to Read the Reporter