Wednesday’s report in the Valley News that the New Hampshire Department of Transportation is prepared to issue a 10-year lease with New England Central Railroad for the former Westboro Rail Yard site is another slap in the face for West Lebanon residents and taxpayers (“Firm eyes 10 more years by rail yard,” Jan. 20). This is a potential Trojan horse that allows the “blast zone” propane facility to reopen without any city input or involvement.
Our neighborhood and downtown central business district suffers real safety concerns and detrimental financial impacts from that facility that are well-documented by our fire chief. More importantly, West Lebanon needs the blight of the Westboro Rail Yard removed so that economic revitalization can begin after 40 years of neglect.
The Executive Council should delay approval of this lease until West Lebanon residents and businesses can be heard directly and included in the consideration of this matter.
It is reprehensible that the taxpayers of Lebanon are expected to suffer the continued negative impacts of the facility and effectively subsidize the operations of a Canada-based energy company so the Railroad Division of the NHDOT can receive $20,000 annually in rent. The city of Lebanon would be well advised to offer a higher annual rent instead of loaning the state money to tear down former historic buildings that the NHDOT has neglected to protect for years. That not only sets a bad precedent, it ignores the decades of work that have led up to this point.
It would be nice if the Executive Council would seek input from West Lebanon residents and businesses before it cements us into another 10-20 years of undesirable and potentially dangerous uses in our downtown.
DAVID CLEM
West Lebanon
I am urging my executive councilor, Joe Kenney, to question Gordon MacDonald, New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu’s pick for chief justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court, about his position on abortion rights (“Sununu renominates AG MacDonald for NH Supreme Court,” Jan. 7).
MacDonald was rejected by the Executive Council in 2019, in part because of his concerning record of representing anti-abortion interests. At the time, he failed to make the majority of councilors confident that he would protect reproductive rights.
The only difference this time is that the U.S. Supreme Court is now stacked with a 6-3 majority of justices, including Amy Coney Barrett, who have animosity toward abortion. If the U.S. Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade or further weakens it, it will be up to the state courts to uphold abortion rights.
One thing that makes me proud of our state is our support for individual liberty, including bodily autonomy and the right to make one’s own health care decisions. MacDonald’s concerning history threatens our liberties — and our health.
Kenney is in a unique position to be able to question MacDonald on this issue to get him to clarify his position. If MacDonald is unable to clearly state that he will uphold these fundamental rights, I believe Kenney should vote against this nomination.
LIZA DRAPER
Claremont
I refer to the recent article about New Hampshire House Speaker Sherman Packard’s decision to remove Rep. Rosemarie Rung from her committee assignments because of her tweet about Troy, N.H., Police Chief David Ellis (“Democrat loses seats over post-riot tweet,” Jan. 20).
While I do not agree with Packard’s reasoning for taking this action, I do recognize that it is his right to do so. However, the article notes that Republican state representatives did not face equal consequences for their recent anti-Semitic and racist tweets.
In these complicated times, I hope we can all agree that it is important to work together despite our differences and behave in a nonpartisan manner to accomplish good for every one. I think New Hampshire residents deserve an explanation for why Rep. Rung would merit this treatment but her colleagues with their arguably more egregious behavior did not.
JENNY BENT
Lyme
Your paper has gotten skimpier and skimpier recently. I wonder how you’ll keep it going when The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post don’t have Donald Trump to disparage anymore.
Maybe your paper can foster local news now, which is the reason I have continued my subscription. Small-town local happenings is what I need, not political bias.
JUDITH FINSTERBUSCH
Enfield
Like so many Americans, I feel a sense of overwhelming relief — relief that the very words “the president” no longer clench my jaw or twist my stomach in knots. I was deeply inspired by the inauguration, most of all by poet Amanda Gorman.
However, in a sense, our work is just beginning. We must work hard to rebuild our democracy. We must show the American people that government can be a force for good in the world. We will not do this with half-measures and watered-down “compromises” with Republicans who have been doing their best over the last 40 years to prove that government is bad.
I hear President Joe Biden’s calls for unity, and of course he is right. But unity will not be found with Republican lawmakers; they have proven that over and over and over again. Unity must be found among the American people. Senate Democrats, including New Hampshire’s Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan, have the power to create that unity by making people’s lives better. Get the vaccine into arms and cash into people’s pockets as soon as possible, even if that means doing away with the filibuster. Improve health care, infrastructure and the economy, and the people will follow — and eventually Republican lawmakers will follow the voters.
Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., now the Senate minority leader, has had a stranglehold on this country — as much or more so than Donald Trump — for the last six years. He must not be allowed to continue to do so.
LAURA MITCHELL
Grantham
A whole nation of us knew Jan. 6 was coming, but not all of us handled it in the same way. There were three basic groups.
Those in the first group recognized Donald Trump’s incitements to violence, his dismissal of the rule of law, his lack of character and his furtherance of white grievance politics. We believed him when his actions told us, “I sow chaos and division because it benefits me.” As poet and prophet Maya Angelou told us years ago, when someone shows you who they are, believe them. This first group believed Trump when he showed us who he was and we historically impeached him — twice in his one term — the second time for inciting an insurrection.
Those in the second group heard and saw everything the first group did — Trump’s attempted dismantling of our institutions — but did not believe him. They said he was “just joking, being sarcastic, just making fun, doing it his way.” The further he eroded the norms of our democratic republic, the more they enabled him.
And those in the third group heard and saw everything the first two groups did, and they did not care. They were just as much authoritarians as Trump is, and had lots of axes to grind, mainly imagined from far-right wing conspiracy theories. This large, loud group was willing to turn into a screaming mob and, at Trump’s invitation, break into our nation’s Capitol, chanting their intention to “hang” Vice President Mike Pence. A Capitol Police officer was killed in the attack.
Teddy Roosevelt once said, “Patriotism means to stand with the country. It does not mean to stand with the president.” Kings want allegiance sworn to them. So do tyrants, dictators and autocrats.
And in case you’ve not looked up “insurrection” lately, it means rebellion, revolt, uprising, revolution, sedition, anarchy, fighting in the streets. Insurrection is an act or instance of revolting against civil authority or established government.
And millions of us voted for him twice.
ROBERT ROUDEBUSH
North Haverhill