Letters to the Editor-9/15/2021

Don’t abuse retail staff

To the Editor:

As the community marketing partner for The Nugget, I work with businesses of all sizes in Sisters and throughout Central Oregon, especially small businesses. All are doing their level best to deliver on their key priorities of providing exceptional customer service and ensuring safety for customers and staff every day during incredibly difficult times.

As a customer of a business I buy from frequently, I recently received an email in my personal email from the CEO/president of a well-known specialty grocer in Central Oregon.

It was a very detailed explanation to all their customers on the tough challenges they are facing in hiring, not receiving product orders because of truck driver shortages, and more.

Things they can’t control, but are working hard to stabilize and find solutions for.

But the thrust of the email made me tear up when she noted that the staff has consistently been verbally abused, called derogatory names, physically struck, and even received gun threats when enforcing the State mask mandates.

Consequently, they have even had to hire security in-store for customers and staff, at huge expense.

I am so proud of each and every one of the businesses I work alongside to help grow their businesses, for their perseverance and optimistic attitudes. We all need to support each other’s businesses and keep our eyes on the horizon in the future. It is going to take time for all COVID-related challenges to settle.

I ask each of you, when you are in a business and it is taking longer to serve your needs than you might want, and your patience wanes and you are tempted to strike out verbally or physically through bullying or intimidation, to just pause. Put yourself in the shoes of the person you are about to attack. Words are hurtful and staff take those comments personally. Some even quit from the mental stress, exacerbating hiring for businesses and the level of service for all of us will only get worse.

And, most importantly, please don’t forget to lift up the spirits of those around you. A simple “Thank you, I appreciate you going the extra mile for me,” means a lot to all of us!

Vicki Curlett

Sell Post Office to Amazon

To the Editor:

UPS (United Parcel Service) and FedEx (Federal Express) make money every year but the USPS (United States Postal Service) loses billions in spite of raising prices and reducing service.

The simple solution is to sell the damn thing to Amazon. By this time next year it will be making money!

Drew Berding

Disrupting school board meeting

To the Editor:

Wednesday night’s school board meeting was shut down by a handful of arrogant, belligerent women who defied the board’s request to wear a mask or leave the meeting.

They insisted (private conversation) that their right to refuse to wear a mask supersedes their responsibility to do their best (be vaccinated, wear a mask) to protect their children and their neighbors from COVID-19.

They claimed that their children were not at risk because “the Lord” would protect them, the Lord gave them their children...and, by implication, it seems, it would be OK if the Lord took them away.

Over this last month, it is reported, 750,000 children have contracted COVID-19, over 250,000 this past week alone! Can it be hoped that these women’s peers and pastor can show them how foolish and dangerous their intransigence is? Once again, a small, ignorant minority has disrupted their neighbors’ right to oversee their children’s education! Shameful!

Donald Harner

The good ole days

To the Editor:

This past weekend, as the nation commemorated the 20th anniversary of 9/11, it was uplifting to witness the patriotism and unity expressed in sporting events. Notable were the players of West Point Academy all holding American flags as they came on to the field. Everywhere the unity and love for America was on full display. Seems sad though that it takes such a tragic event to make us realize we are deep down still one nation strong through unity. Anyone over 40 probably remembers exactly where they were the day the towers came down and the emotional impact.

Living here in Sisters, I believe we are blessed like nowhere else. A small town with big events that draw visitors from all over. It’s almost like a visit into the good ole days, void of stress and big-city problems, and life just seems simpler (think “Leave it to Beaver”). And patriotism always on display or promoted by local veterans.

A great walk back in time came for many on Sunday evening at Sisters Community Church with a salute to The Eagles band and other 1970s music. What could possibly be better than sitting under the majestic view of Three Sisters, and [being] taken back in time to “the good ole days”?

Some may say that going back in time is folly and just wishful thinking but I believe doing so may give a perspective that rushing ahead to new theoretical thoughts will be destructive.

In a recent national newspaper there was an article concerning a definition on education taken from Noah Webster’s 1828 Dictionary: “The bringing up, as of a child; instruction; formation of manners.

Education comprehends all that series of instruction and discipline, which is intended to enlighten the understanding, correct the temper, and form the manners and habits of youth, and fit them for usefulness in their future stations.

To give children a good education in manners, art, and science is important; to give them a religious education is indispensable; and an immense responsibility rest on parents and guardians who neglect these duties.”

Note what is considered “indispensable” in the old definition. The Constitution does not state “separation of church and state” as many would have you believe! The church is the conscience of the state. Which is better, old-fashioned “love your neighbor as yourself,” or “lets focus on skin color”?

Jeff Mackey