Category: Dear Editor

Letters to the editor of local newspapers.

All Children do not matter to Freitas

Nick Freitas has thrown his hat into the ring to challenge Congresswoman Spanberger. In his video he states: “My mom always said if somebody needs help, you have a personal responsibility to intervene”. But words are easy to say and harder to back up. Since the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior I looked into his voting record to see what his priorities might be. Mr. Freitas was one of only two who voted against SB423 requiring health insurance companies to cover the cost of hearing aids for children. 91 other legislators voted in favor of the bipartisan bill. Trouble hearing can be detected at a young age and even babies can be fitted with behind-the-ear aids. Children with hearing loss may have trouble developing speech, social skills, and have trouble learning. Does Mr. Freitas not understand basic child development? There is a critical period, up to age 5 where a child can develop language and after that it becomes much more difficult. Did he consult with any pediatricians before he voted? How is denying children healthcare helpful? Mr. Freitas intervened, but not on behalf of the children in need of help.

In his video he further stated “My dad really instilled in me that you have an obligation to protect people who can’t protect themselves”. Mr. Freitas was the only one who voted against requiring health insurance companies to cover the cost of diagnosis and treatment of autism (HB 1503). 97 other legislators voted in favor of the bipartisan bill. The range and severity of symptoms of autism varies greatly and early expert evaluation is necessary. Difficulty with communication, social interactions, repetitive behaviors, anxiety and sensory issues are just some of the symptoms families manage. Does Mr. Freitas not understand that autism is a lifelong condition? Common sense tells us that addressing a problem early results in a better outcome and research proves this to be true. Mr. Freitas failed to protect people who can’t protect themselves.

So who is he intervening for? Who is he protecting? These votes suggest that he is protecting for profit health insurance companies. Does he oppose services for all children with disabilities or just these two? I have spent my entire career advocating for children with disabilities and it is rare to find a politician so extreme and heartless about denying services to children who need them. I am thankful that he was overwhelmingly outvoted both times by a bipartisan legislature. Mr. Freitas does not act in accordance with his words and cannot be trusted to act in the best interest of the people.

In contrast, the incumbent, Congresswoman Spanberger has voted as she said she would. She has voted to support the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) and Medicaid expansion, both of which we have here in Virginia. She cosponsored and passed legislation to lower the costs of prescription drugs. We need a representative who works to benefit people, not health insurance corporations who earned $913 Billion in profits in 2019. Vote for all children, vote for Spanberger.

Aleta Strickland
Licensed School Psychologist

[CV]

Nick Freitas Doesn’t Want Us to Have Broadband

If you had the chance to vote to increase access to high speed Internet (broadband service) in rural areas, right here in Louisa, would you vote yes or no? Nearly everyone I know would vote YES on such a measure. They would vote for it because broadband is so important for our jobs, education, entertainment, shopping and other everyday activities

Nick Freitas had that chance and he voted NO. He was one of only 6 members of the House of Delegates to vote against House Bill 831. He has voted against broadband numerous times. It’s been made clear by his actions; Delegate Nick Freitas doesn’t think it’s important for us to have broadband.

Abigail Spanberger, our US Congresswoman, listens to her constituents and has taken every step she can to get us reliable, high-speed internet. She helped introduce the Moving America Forward Act, which includes the Accessible, Affordable Internet for All Act. She has worked tirelessly to bring funding to ReConnect, the USDA program designed to bring the Internet we need to the rural counties she serves. She recently led a successful bipartisan effort to increase that funding by 78%. Abigail Spanberger very much wants us to have high speed Internet.

Spanberger’s opponent in her run for reelection this November is Nick Freitas, who currently represents the 30th district in the Virginia General Assembly. Freitas doesn’t want us to have broadband Internet. So, I don’t want him to have a position in Congress.

Sincerely

Jim Wolf
Louisa

[CV]Frietas Doesn’t Support Broadband

Business park plan is ‘sloppy and disingenuous’

I was unaware of the Aug. 17 presentation to the Louisa County Board of Supervisors by Timmons Group on the Shannon Hill Business Park study and was glad to read The Central Virginian’s report.

Timmons expressed great confidence that the kinds of buildings they propose for the property will be in high demand in an era of increased e-commerce. Are they not aware that abandoned malls and other failed commercial sites, already complete with infrastructure and utilities, are practically begging Amazon and others to repurpose their locations for their fulfillment and data centers?

And what about costs for us to provide the same?  Along with Andy Wade, Louisa County’s economic development director, what Timmons was selling on Aug. 17 is more of the same fantasy they have sold to our county through this whole expensive fiasco.

To start, if you place the building layout published in the CV from that meeting next to a topographic map of the property, it will reveal a good bit of fantasy. The single largest building, labeled Logistics and Distribution, located far from the park entrance, is directly on top of the steepest slopes of the property, with elevation changes of at least 25 feet throughout. What will it cost to get that site flat enough for a million-square-foot building plus parking on narrow ridge terrain? The rest is not better. You wonder about the costs of working through the state Department of Environmental Quality for the dozens of large culverts and maybe a bridge or two needed to span the 25-foot-deep creek bottoms for tractor trailers.

Timmons says Louisa needs to spend $18 million to bring water from Ferncliff to a new “elevated” water tower. Water to be supplied by a source with as yet no location, no budget and no permit. The design cost for the water tower is more than a third of the total cost of Timmons’ current contract. It is nearly three times the total amount budgeted for “master planning.”

To my knowledge there has been zero outreach to the public in the development of these plans. The original contract called for two “stakeholders’ meetings.” The first included only one Louisa County person. A second was set well before the COVID-19 crisis but was canceled without notice or explanation. In the contract, Timmons was to “share results of preliminary master planning” and begin the preliminary engineering report which would be the guide for at least three alternative master plans.

Timmons has proposed only one “final master plan” as outlined on Aug. 17. No preliminary engineering report or any other report has been published, much less reviewed, by the public.

Is this because what Timmons persuaded the county to buy will be enormously expensive to develop? Under the contract, Timmons must provide “likely” professional “cost considerations” to build any project they design. The huge extent of those likely costs would have been evident to anyone who has seen the property. The contract says that the County, not Timmons, was responsible for convening and running the scheduled stakeholder meetings. They bailed.

This is not responsible leadership. It is not careful stewardship of our money, resources and credit. No one, certainly not Timmons, should be paid for work this sloppy and disingenuous.

Surely, we can do better.

William Hale

Louisa

[CV] Hale Business Park Letter

Help for Farmers

Those of us who count on the productivity of the soil for our livelihood could use some help. We want to implement practices that make our soil healthier and stave off some of the effects of the severe weather we have been having. We know that this will increase profitability by making the soil more resilient in the face of erratic rainfall and extreme temperatures, and better able to support our crops We choose the best soil conservation practices we can afford.

But that’s the catch. Many of these healthy soil practices are out of reach financially for farmers, especially those with smaller operations. Farming is already capital intensive and we often don’t have enough cash left over to do what we know is right.

A couple of weeks ago our congresswoman, Abigail Spanberger, came to Louisa County to discuss this issue. She visited a farm owned by Dustin Madison, just north of the Town of Louisa. While there, she announced a new bill to help farmers use more conservation practices. The Healthy Soil, Resilient Farmers Act of 2020 aims to ensure that FSA loans are available to all farmers who want to do what we know is the right thing.

Her opponent, Nick Freitas, courts the support of the Farm Bureau. I’m wondering what he may have actually done in his current position to deserve that. Nick talks ideology, while Abigail is out here working for us. It looks to me like Abigail is the one walking the walk. A member of the House Agriculture Committee, she is using her position to help Louisa’s farmers. I’m voting for Abigail again in November, so she can continue her good supportive work for us.

Pam Dawling

Printed previously in The Central Virginian and reprinted here with the permission of the author.

Find Somebody Better for Governor

To the editor:

Last Friday state Senator Amanda Chase attended a pep rally at a private home in Mineral. Her purpose was to hit up unsuspecting Republican donors to fund her bid for the governor’s mansion in 2021. In pictures of the event, no one is wearing a mask or social distancing. I wonder if the Covid-19 numbers will go up in our county in the next two weeks.

Our country is in an unparalleled health and economic crisis. Regardless of your political affiliation, I hope we can all agree that our leaders need to be calm and make well measured decisions. Chase’s behavior has shown that she is the polar opposite of a competent leader.

For those unfamiliar with her, she earned the moniker #parkingprincess in March 2019 when she threw a temper tantrum in the General Assembly parking lot. She tried to park in a restricted area and an officer asked her to move her car. She responded by berating the officer with racial epithets and made denigrating comments about the clerk who was allowed to park there.

When interviewed about it later, she first denied cursing and then admitted it. The scene she caused prevented schoolchildren from exiting their buses for a field trip. She exclaimed, “Don’t you know who I am?”

In May of 2019 Chase used the Capitol Police for transportation so frequently during the General Assembly session that its chief asked the House and Senate clerks to remind lawmakers about accepted procedures. Chase received more than 20 police transports during the General Assembly session—all of them outside the established protocol outlined in a Jan. 24 email from Senate Clerk Susan Clarke Schaar to senators that “the Capitol Police staff are not to be used by members or staff for personal transport.” She also utilized the Capitol Police as her personal service in the fall of 2018 when the General Assembly was not in session.

The day after her appearance in Mineral, Chase attended another fundraiser event with musician Ted Nugent, an admitted pedophile. He wrote a song entitled Jailbait with lyrics like, “Well I don’t care if you’re just 13, You look too good to be true.” He also adopted a teenager with the express purpose of having sex with her. Ted purposely soiled his pants for a week in order to avoid the Vietnam draft. Why in the world would a gubernatorial candidate associate herself with someone like this? Is she that hard up for money?

It seems that Chase is desperate for the attention that the reality TV era has made seem commonplace. But this entitled and unhinged woman is the last thing the hardworking people of Louisa need in the governor’s mansion. We need a strong, decent and hardworking leader and I sincerely hope that the Republican Party is able to field such a candidate for governor in 2021.

Aleta Strickland
Louisa

This letter was previously published in The Central Virginian and is republished here with the permission of the author.