By Jennifer Sherer President, Iowa City Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO For music fans and literature lovers flocking to Iowa City’s Englert Theatre during this year’s Mission Creek Festival, there’s a new reason to celebrate the historic, beloved Englert’s role in sustaining a vibrant, community-supported music and performance scene. Englert production technicians and stagehands who work […]
letters to the editor
Posted inLetters
Letter to the editor: New traffic cameras around Iowa City spark concern
By Kyle Nilson, Iowa City Over the past few weeks, citizens of Iowa City have noticed new cameras watching our roads. These cameras, made by Flock Safety, are advertised to capture license plates and other details that Flock saves to construct a “Vehicle Fingerprint.” These capabilities are used to track vehicles in real time, notifying […]
Posted inLetters
Letter to the editor: No one can afford to be apolitical when education is under threat
By Jason Agne, Iowa City There are those who acknowledge that if enough people come together, they can create just about anything. But there are also those who acknowledge that if enough people come together, they can destroy just about anything. Sadly, the latter requires substantially fewer people. And, because no one actually likes it […]
Posted inLetters
Letter to the editor: HF3 creates more barriers for hungry families in Iowa
By Diane Duncan-Goldsmith, Iowa City I was Director of Nutrition Services for the Iowa City Community School District when, for the 2008-09 school year, direct certification was implemented. This process automatically certified eligible children for free meals based on families receiving SNAP (food stamp) benefits; all that was needed was to download a file containing […]
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Letter from the ICCSD Board of Directors: Whose choice really?
Submitted by J.P. Claussen on behalf of the Iowa City Community School District school board In the debate over private school vouchers, Governor Reynolds and her supporters are attempting to frame the decision to funnel millions of dollars away from Iowa’s public schools as “parental choice.” One problem with this argument is that it isn’t […]
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Letter to the editor: Is education in Iowa a zero sum game?
By Syndy Conger, Iowa City A zero-sum game is a mathematical representation in parlor games and economic theory of a situation that involves two sides, where the result is an advantage for one side and an equivalent loss for the other. As a result, they are fiercely competitive. Examples of games include poker, chess, and […]
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Letter to the editor: Grad students need a living wage to succeed
By Stephen Voyce, Iowa City A response to Adria Carpenter’s article, “Use of the UI food pantry is up, with international students disproportionately relying on the support” For the past three years I’ve served as the Director of Graduate Studies in the English department at the University of Iowa. During this time, our department was […]
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Letter from Joe Bolkcom: Reynolds not keeping Iowans safe
The toxic fire, explosion and the hospitalization of 10-15 workers at 6C-Zero in Marengo was a completely preventable disaster. That is if Governor Reynolds were not calling all the shots on how and when to regulate unsafe, polluting businesses in our state. The safety of the 30 workers, dozens of emergency responders and the entire […]
Posted inCommunity/News
The 10 most-read letters to the editor from 2022
In the nearly 75 letters to the editor published by Little Village over the past 12 months, readers from across the state took aim at the policies of Sen. Chuck Grassley, Gov. Kim Reynolds and other Iowa leaders seeking reelection; endorsed their favorite candidates; bemoaned the behavior of some of their neighbors; advocated for gun […]
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Letter to the editor: We have lost our moral compass if we allow ventilation shutdown
By Lynn Gallagher, Solon With industrial animal agriculture, animal husbandry has been replaced by animal science. The animals are treated like machines. From the moment they are born, until they die, we take from these animals everything that would make their lives worth living. Their existence is nothing but misery. Ruth Harrison, author of Animal […]
Posted inStatewide
“The Caretaker”: A Christmas story by Tom Gingerich
Story by Tom Gingerich, Kalona The old man was on his knees busily mulching one of Oakland’s expansive flower beds when he noticed the SUV approaching in the brisk, early November air. Slowly negotiating the narrow, winding roads traversing the hillside, it pulled up near him. A young man emerged, a leather-bound notebook in his […]
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Letter to the editor: Dangerous rail merger threatens rural Iowa
By Justin Hollinrake, Ames If you ask folks in the Quad Cities about the proposed Canadian Pacific-Kansas City Southern railroad merger, they’ll likely cite worries about disrupting downtown areas or holding up rush hour traffic. But the proposed merger, currently going through the regulatory process, matters for rural Iowa, too. And as the midterms fall […]
