Collective bargaining
The city workers are on the verge of a historic breakthrough. The vote on the collective bargaining ordinance is an opportunity to make history.
It is no secret that — even in a wonderful city like Virginia Beach — there are inequities. It is unconscionable to think that many of the city workers who collect trash, repair sewer drains, maintain water systems, maintain the beautiful Oceanfront and parks, and perform many other vital services for the city cannot afford to live in the city.
Many of these hardworking, dedicated men and women work 40-plus hours a week but do not earn enough to support their families in this economy. They have chosen not to remain invisible and silent any longer. Their cries of anguish have risen to a fever pitch, and their voices should be heard. Our city workers should be represented at the table consistently.
April 4 marked the 56th anniversary of the infamous day in history when Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated for standing with striking sanitation workers. That change involved a better life for themselves and their posterity.
This is a matter of mutually beneficial outcomes, improved quality of life, fairness, human dignity and economic justice for the fathers, mothers, sons and daughters who perform some of the most important functions in our city. Your vote for collective bargaining says, “I don’t just care about the wages we pay them, we care about the life they can build for their families from the wages we pay them.”
Rev. Perez Gatling; Ebenezer Baptist Church; president, Virginia Beach Interdenominational Ministers Conference; Virginia Beach
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Animal testing
Re “Legislature acts to boost animal-testing transparency” (Other Views, April 20): The recent guest column by state Sen. Jennifer Boysko sheds a long-needed light on the repeated experiments on baboons that Eastern Virginia Medical School performed. Those experiments included repeatedly impregnating, injecting them with hormones and performing cesarean sections on them, all while isolating these intelligent and highly social animals. Not surprisingly, they exhibited self-injurious and anxiety behaviors.
Perhaps worst of all, despite a sanctuary offer to take four baboons that had been subjected to these repeated pregnancy experiments, giving them a much improved remainder of their lives, the experimenter killed them instead.
I am appalled that EVMS participates in such abusive experiments that are of doubtful benefit to humans, and I suspect your other readers are too.
Public outcry, legislative interest and federal officials ultimately closed the beagle factory farm Envigo in central Virginia. Hopefully, similar interest can stop these abusive experiments as well.
Dr. Christine Llewellyn, Williamsburg
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Protection
Re “Shootings” (Your Views, April 22): Another cop killing was reported on the news recently. Chicago police Officer Luis Huesca, 30, was shot and killed while driving home. By coincidence, the letter writer laments the shooting of what she described as “children.” She wrote about a 16-year-old who was shot by police and critically wounded. She suggested that although the teen was “armed and considered dangerous,” the officer should have tased him first and then “if things get bad,” shoot.
Being confronted by anyone with a gun is reason enough to skip the Taser. If I were put into this life-threatening situation, I would certainly shoot first; police officers should have this same right. Being a civilian, I will probably never face this event; a police officer probably will. Tasing involves disabling the target by causing muscles to contract tightly. This includes the muscles in one’s fingers, which could result in an unintended trigger pull with dire consequences.
The writer states that “these children are America’s future. They won’t feel protected if we keep scaring them with these incidents.” If America’s future is dependent on these people, then we need to scare them a lot more.
When an armed individual, regardless of age, confronts a police officer, he or she has brought the consequences upon himself or herself. The officer has every right to protect himself or herself with as much force as deemed necessary. It’s easy to give advice on controlling problems on the street if you’re never on the street.
Ashton Haywood, Hampton
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Best governor
Wake up, Virginia. You finally elect a great governor. He appears to care only about returning Virginia to a state that we can be proud of.
As he began to work on his agenda, the voters reelected state Sen. Louise Lucas and her liberal state House and Senate ilk and undermined him. Lucas belongs in Northern Virginia, where liberals turn out their people (a large group who feed at the public trough) to perpetuate the flow of taxpayers’ money into the trough.
If voters who live outside of the Washington, D.C., beltway voted in force, they might overcome the liberal swamp. So, please get off your butts and rescue our state.
Dick Jones, Virginia Beach
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Constant threat
Imagine all the work that could get done in Congress if impeachment proceedings had a time limit, say two weeks from start to finish. If an impeachment process can’t be finalized within two weeks, it should be dropped for lack of substantial evidence needed to carry it through.
Robert Gregory; Knotts Island, North Carolina
