Rehab unit closing a ‘sad commentary’
What ever happened to care in the Catholic Health Initiatives?
We, the participants in the cardiac rehab program at Memorial’s North Park location since 2000, were recently informed that the program was to be shut down and we had no say-so.
This program has about the same number of participants as the same program at the main hospital. So we are apparently paying our way.
We were also told that Memorial will increase valet parking at the main hospital. This is quite a reward for the inconvenience and added cost to people who are on a fixed income.
Using the health condition of a group of people to manipulate them is deplorable. To be deprived of a voice approximates insult.
It is a sad commentary when a renowned health care facility resorts to such tactics.
Rev. Walter Ruby
Pit bull hysteria makes for poor lawmaking
In response to the Monday story “Jasper board moves toward tighter rules on pit bull ownership” and the corresponding online poll which favored the measure 6-4, I was amazed at the support and time spent to misplace this concern.
The National Safety Council lists the odds of dying by dog attack or strike as one in 112,400. To put that in perspective, the odds of dying by legal execution is relatively similar at one in 119,012. On the same day this story ran, it was reported that two people were struck by a vehicle on Main Street, and a drunken man let his little toddler walk into traffic. There are laws against both. The odds of dying by pedestrian incident are one in 647.
Creating laws to appease misplaced feelings created by overpublicized stories is not going to help anyone. When’s the last time anyone saw a story on the news of a German shepherd biting someone? How about boxers? Do you really think they don’t bite either? The media loves to pick on pit bulls and people love to pick on them because many are in lower-income neighborhoods.
Justin Newman
East Brainerd
New approach needed for schools leadership
The recent editorial “Little Leadership Shown in Schools Budget Workshop” noted that 40 percent of third-graders do not read on grade level (the Chattanooga 2.0 report states 60 percent).
I am not a career educator nor do I hold a Ph.D., but I do have a question for those supposedly leading the system: Why are these students promoted/passed to the fourth grade?
Am I alone to wonder why these kids get frustrated and often become disruptive as the curriculum rolls past them?
I submit that these students are destined to fail because our “leadership” has placed them and their teachers in a no-win situation.
The editorial also cites that manufacturers have 15,000 jobs they can’t fill because our graduates aren’t job-ready.
Isn’t it time to stop this circus and take a really hard look at what we are doing? Career educators have been at the helm since the city and county systems merged in 1997.
How’s that worked? Seems the school board should look for someone with a different background.
What’s that saying about doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results?
Speaking for this taxpayer, I’m tired of funding failure.
Bob Kincaid
Ooltewah