My Two Cents Worth

Even though I've never been offered "a penny for my thoughts"...

here they are anyway

:-)





Docs On School Property
It appears a bunch of people in the Easton Area are upset with Easton Hospital's plan to house a clinic in one of their schools next year. It's seems to me with the elimination of school nurses because of the costs, I'd think they'd be onboard. The hospital plans include numerous rotating specialists enclosed in a separate entrance area. And it won't cost taxpayers one thin dime. I'll admit I'm as NIMBY as the next person, but objections to this is NIMBYISM carried to extreme.

Critics Germaphobes are citing concerns over the spreading of germs into the school from the clinic Here's my thoughts on that. My daughter, along with hundreds of other mothers & fathers in the medical field work in area hospitals and medical buildings. If they all thought like you guys...


Jesus.. The Meaning Of Easter, Forgiveness.. Not For this Lady
Another story that took wings is the Bethlehem chocolate shop owner who didn't choose wisely her response on social media to a customer's very public complaint. There's a couple of thoughts here. I think it's a really bad idea for any business to use Facebook. Over the last several months several businesses made this same fatal mistake. In those instances were threatened and driven out of business in other areas of this country. Why oh why wouldn't a business take advantage of several providers' free offerings for websites where comments would have to be preapproved is beyond me.

The store owner's complaint was why she shouldn't be allowed to defend herself when people bad mouthed her business. Well she was allowed. She just did a lousy job of it. Then there's the person herself who first complained. Both exhibited knee-jerk reactions Such is the nature of social media Hence why Facebook is a lousy choice. Just as easily as Facebook can build your business it can take it out in a flash. Poor choices all the way around.


The Latest On Obamacare
Yeah it still hasn't been voted out. So how's it going? Not too bad really. According to the AP, "an official study released Thursday... the measure more than pays for itself."

The study was put out by the Congressional Budget Office. In part it says, "Compared with the projection made by CBO and JCT in March 2010, just before the ACA was enacted, the current estimate of the net cost of the insurance coverage provisions over the 2016–2019 period (the final years of the 10-year budget window used in the original report) is lower by $157 billion, or 25 percent."

Some will always hate Obamacare. Some will always like it. While arguments remain being either for or against, this new information should eliminate those which are based on the financing of it.


How We Can Fix The Refuge Crisis
I'm certain nearly 100% won't bother watching the following eighteen minute video where Alexander Betts offers four solutions. So let me give you a few of the highlights.(1) Give Them Something To Do In These Camps: "They're human beings with skills, talents, aspirations, with the ability to make contributions — if we let them."

(2) Create Economic Zones: One camp is 15 minutes away from a where government in one country spent $100 million to create an 'economic zone'. Yet lacks labor to make it work. Why can't refugees be shuttled to and from so they can support their families? These are the job skills that will be needed to rebuild their countries when they eventually go home.

(3) Preference Matching: Which country would a refugee wish to go matched up with a country which lacks their particular skills along with those businesses applying for employment of them.

(4) Humanitarian Visas: Rather then refugees fleeing dangerously all willy nilly into countries, why not a processing center in these receiving camps? In short let's get organized.




Hat Tip To Police In The Lehigh Valley
We all bellyache about drugs and shootings. One thing I've noticed over the last few months is most of these perpetrators were caught in less then 48 hours. The latest shooting in South Allentown was solved and the shooter(s) caught in less then 24 hours. There's been numerous successful drug raids as well.

I'm not certain if it's because citizens are getting involved more then they have in the past. Whether police are getting better at it or there's so much more crime creating these greater number of arrests. One thing is for certain, the time between a crime being reported and the apprehensions for them has gotten shorter. This is a hopeful sign.


A Few Thoughts About Allentown In General
I was born here. Raised her and spent my whole life in Allentown. Here are a few things I've observed * Nearly every mill and factory building is abandoned, unsellable and ready to crumble. These were places where once thousands in Allentown worked. If they been around for over 20 years and remained empty they need to go. They're expensive relics to a bygone era. We're kidding ourselves if anyone thinks federal or state funds can entice developers lo these many years later. The only purpose they serve is enable tax supported planners to make a bunch of money over their promises for the future. Indeed, they need to go as well!

* Year after year and excuse after excuse is made for the reasons why many of the homes block after block looks like they do. It's not impossible for a city to follow up on citations then move to foreclose on owners for unpaid penalties or repairs. Same goes for unpaid property taxes. What Allentown did instead is tear down business properties along Hamilton for the NIZ which were up to code and paying their property taxes. Had we focused on the already abandoned 'Riverfront' area perhaps we'd still have enough revenue coming in from the former Hamilton Street properties to do something about the crappy housing situation nor consider leasing the water department. In my eyes what we've done instead is create more problems just so we have more problems to solve. I see little sense in that!

* Trains to/from Allentown, another example of inventing a problem that doesn't need solving. Pave over all the tracks spending $100,000 of taxpayers' money for the trails then bitch about needing them. This is some really crazy stuff. First off we need to understand how the rail system got started. People either needed to be transported or goods on them. Shares were offered on the open market due to the demand. Many profited. Some became extremely wealthy off of them. What we're seeing today is billions of dollars spent for trains that in no possible way pay for themselves. There are over 5.6 million who ride New York's subways every day. Yet the MTA's Debt Is Greater Than Combined Debt Of 30 Other Nations' ($34.1 billion as of 02/2015).

* There are a few ways Allentown's appearance can be improved even if it's faking it a just a bit. This should take about 1/100th of the cost spent on the NIZ (around a million dollars). Round up a bunch of workers who need jobs to go around cleaning up the streets, alleyways and sidewalks on a regular basis. A crew of painters to paint over these abandoned factory buildings and even the outside of houses of home owners who can't afford or refuse to do it for themselves. Perhaps too some citizen crime watchers keeping an eye on things.

I realize people should be doing these things for themselves, but that's not working out so well no matter how much we may yell and scream Sometimes it's better to take care of these things rather then frustrate ourselves trying to force other people who will never ever change into taking care of the things that frustrate us. Either that or we can continue to bang our heads complaining about things that will never ever change no matter how much we may wish things would.