Kip Currier: Post to X from my Bloomsbury editor regarding my 10/9/25 library-themed Letter to the Editor:
Thank you, @BloomsburyLU author Kip Currier, for your reasoned and passionate defense of libraries in 2 PA newspapers. Libraries are the bedrock of healthy, equitable communities, and we couldn't be more proud to support libraries and library workers. https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/8750699042164055722/5219361931786295174
I am sharing a copy of my library-themed 10/9/25 Letter to the Editor that was published in the print versions and the digital versions of the Oil City (PA) paper The Derrick and the Franklin (PA) Times-Union newspapers in Venango County, Pennsylvania. The two newspapers share the same Monday-Saturday content under their own banners for each city. I wrote my letter in response to a 9/26/25 Letter to the Editor written by a Cranberry (Township) resident (not to be confused with the Cranberry in Butler County); I've copied the writer's letter below, after mine. Note: The typo at the start of the newspapers' copy of my letter was the fault of the paper and was not in the letter I emailed to them.
Editor,
This is in response to the Sept. 26 letter to the editor titled “Tax proposal needs to ‘die’ with the library” by Betty M. Hepler.
The author could not be more wrong or misinformed about the state of American libraries and the value they contribute to our lives and communities: libraries are vital necessities and community anchors in towns and cities throughout this nation. See www.pewresearch.org.
1. Libraries provide information and resources that help to educate citizens at all levels of our communities — from blue collar to white collar workplaces and everything in between. See www.ala.org.
2. Research studies demonstrate that libraries economically benefit businesses that are located nearby. See www.imls.gov.
3. Research data also show that libraries are a good “return on investment” (ROI): for every dollar of support to a library, library users are able to save hundreds of dollars by checking out thousands of books, movies, video games, and more, at no charge. See https://slol.libguides.com.
4. Today’s libraries offer all kinds of life-enhancing activities and services — story time for kids, book discussion groups for teens and seniors, access to free WiFi and computers, and classes and webinars on topics like “where to find jobs,” “starting your own business” and “how to use AI chatbots.” See https://action.everylibrary.org.
5. Libraries have been a foundational part of human life and history for thousands of years. They are essential tools and places that can benefit our lives; enable us to think, learn, and grow from our yesterdays; and fuel our hopes and dreams for better todays and tomorrows.
Libraries continue to change and evolve to better suit and meet our needs, just as humans and societies must change, adapt and evolve in order to survive and thrive.
Each of us knows that we need to take good care of ourselves to live the best lives we can. Let’s take good care of the libraries that support and serve us too. See https://www.ala.org.
Long live the library!
— Kip Currier,
Emlenton
Editor,
I am amazed that we are trying to keep alive a mostly dead memory — the library. We have been propping them up for decades.
The Encyclopedia salesman has lost his job; books are not being sold at the same rate as before, being available on tape or kindle now; libraries and bookstores have fallen to the side of the road.
Wake up! Most things have a time to shine but lose out to progress. Now we are trying to keep alive something that needs to admit its death.
The overburdened taxpayers of this country are having the blame and responsibility thrown on their shoulders.
On the front side, one may think it is a charge of $12.50. But my understanding is the cost is $12.50 per every $50,000 in assessment. All properties, for the most part, have seen a dramatic rise in their assessment; so this is a lot of money for something that is dead.
Let it die!
Turn it into a museum. No more taxes.
— Betty M. Hepler,
Cranberry
KRIS B. MAMULA, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette ; Pennsylvania’s internet connection plan submitted to feds: ‘It’s bonkers’
"The federal government announced in June 2023 that Pennsylvania was in line for $1.16 billion in broadband expansion grants, with priority given to fiber optic cable connections, which are considered the gold standard for the internet. But in a pivot, the Trump administration dropped the fiber cable preference in March, opening the door to satellite broadband service, which researchers, including Mr. Meinrath and the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, a Wilmette, Ill.-based research nonprofit, have found lacking.
After the shift in acceptable technologies by the Trump administration, 65% of the federal Broadband Equity Access & Deployment Program funding will now pay for fiber optic connections in Pennsylvania, 18% for satellite. Fiber optic had a much larger share of the connections under previous plans.
The balance of Pennsylvania addresses will get fixed wireless connections — 13% — or hybrid fiber coaxial, 4%, thanks to BEAD funding...
“There’s a lot of roadblocks in rural America,” said Greene County Commissioners Chair Jared Edgreen. “We struggle with infrastructure throughout the county, getting the basic amenities to our communities,” including internet."
Carl Hulse , The New York Times; Ethics Panel Rebukes Congressman for Wife’s Stock Trade in Firm He Helped
"The House Ethics Committee on Friday rebuked a Republican congressman from Pennsylvania and urged him and his wife to sell their holdings in a steel company in his district after a four-year investigation into a stock trade found that he had violated the House’s official code of conduct.
In its report, the committee cited Representative Mike Kelly, a member of the Ways and Means Committee, for a “lack of candor” in its inquiry into 2020 trades by his wife, Victoria, involving a local steel company that was seeking government intervention to prevent layoffs or the closure of its plant in Butler, Pa., in Mr. Kelly’s district.
Mr. Kelly was actively lobbying the Trump administration for trade protections for the plant, newly purchased by the company Cleveland-Cliffs, and learned that the Commerce Department was going to intervene in favor of the firm. The next day — five days before the Commerce action was made public — his wife purchased 5,000 shares of Cleveland-Cliffs stock. She later sold the stock at a nearly $65,000 profit, a roughly 285-percent gain.
Members of Congress are prohibited from using confidential information for financial benefit and must disclose transactions by them or close family members valued at more than $1,000, but efforts to tighten those rules or bar lawmakers from trading stocks altogether have so far been unsuccessful. That has created an environment rife with potential conflicts of interest, in which many lawmakers who are active in the stock market have unique insight into or influence over companies whose shares they are buying and selling."
Jack Reinhard, WFMZ ; Proposed Pa. bill would prohibit law enforcement from wearing masks, would require identifiable uniforms
"State Rep. Joshua Siegel is co-signing a Pennsylvania bill that if passed, would prohibit law enforcement from wearing masks and require identifiable uniforms or clothing.
"We have a right to know who's in our community and what they're doing," said Siegel.
A memo for the bill said this comes following Homeland Security and U.S. Border Patrol allowing agents to conceal their faces."
Charlotte Keith of Spotlight PA via ABC27 , ABC27; Trump admin tells Pennsylvania, other states to shift broadband focus to cheaper options like Elon Musk’s Starlink
[Kip Currier: Consider how ill-advised and short-sighted this Trump 2.0 policy maneuver is; a gambit with concerning ramifications for Internet access throughout the U.S.:
First, as part of his DEI purges, Trump terminates the Digital Equity Act of 2021 on May 9, 2025 with an executive order, claiming that the bi-partisan law, signed by Joe Biden, for expanding high speed Internet access to millions of Americans (especially rural Americans) was unconstitutional and "racist".
Now, in June 2025 Trump encourages states to sign on to billionaire Elon Musk's Starlink satellite service. Musk's DOGE cuts have decimated government services.
As the nonpartisan, nonprofit newsroom Spotlight PA points out in this article, too, Musk's Starlink Internet access and other carriers being pushed by the Trump administration rely on less reliable WiFi and satellite service, rather than "the internet via fiber optic cables, widely considered the gold standard for speed and reliability."
Given Musk's recent tantrum during his early June dust-up with Trump in which Musk threatened to discontinue making his SpaceX Dragon spacecraft available to the U.S., does it seem like a well-advised policy decision to give Musk the power to control the Internet access of hundreds of thousands if not millions of Americans?]
[Excerpt]
"Sweeping changes are coming to a massive program that aims to bring high-speed internet to everyone in the U.S., after the Trump administration rejected one of the initiative’s key policy goals.
The new rules for the $42.5 billion program change the way states will evaluate competing proposals, which areas are eligible for funding, and how long states have to award the grants. The announcement in early June upended months of planning and left Pennsylvania officials scrambling as they race to meet a newly accelerated timeline for getting the money out.
The changes likely will result in fewer Pennsylvanians in remote and rural areas being connected to the internet via fiber optic cables, widely considered the gold standard for speed and reliability. The program originally prioritized fiber projects, but under the new rules, states must select winners based on the lowest cost. The change will make applications from wireless and satellite internet providers, including Elon Musk’s Starlink, more competitive."
Praveena Somasundaram, The Washington Post; A GOP operative accused a monastery of voter fraud. Nuns fought back.
"The day before, a Republican operative in the battleground state falsely suggested to his nearly 58,000 followers on X that no one lived at the monastery and that mail ballots cast from there would be “illegal votes.” Cliff Maloney, who hired 120 people to go door-to-door across Pennsylvania urging Republican voters to return their mail ballots, wrote on X that one of those workers had “discovered” an Erie address where 53 people were registered to vote but “NO ONE lives there.”
The address Maloney posted belonged to the Benedictine Sisters of Erie, where Schmidt and 54 other sisters live full time. And the Catholic order, known for its engagement in social justice issues, was alarmed by the accusations.
“To be unjustly accused of voter fraud is just really disgusting, ugly,” Schmidt, the prioress, told The Washington Post.
“To be unjustly accused of voter fraud is just really disgusting, ugly,” Schmidt, the prioress, told The Washington Post...
The Benedictine Sisters are planning to take legal action. Ahead of Nov. 5, just like in homes across the country, “there’s a lot of angst about the upcoming election in our house,” Schmidt said."
Julie Kay , WCNC; York County Libraries halt new purchases of books with sexual content for 17 and under
"York County Library Board of Trustees has decided to halt purchasing any books for minors that include any sexual content.
The decision, made in a heated special meeting Wednesday night, is a change from their original statement.
Board Chair Anne Witte previously posted that they would halt purchasing all books for children, until "further clarification and guidance is received from the state regarding Proviso 27.1 and until the Attorney General makes a ruling providing libraries with guidance for collection development.""
Adam Gabbatt, The Guardian; An attack of the vapours: Tennessee bill endorses chemtrails conspiracy theory
"Proponents of the debunked chemtrails idea believe that the cloudy white lines created by airplane emissions are chemicals being released into the atmosphere. The idea is that the government, or shadowy private organizations, are pumping out toxic chemicals, with the aim being anything from modifying the weather to controlling a population’s minds.
This is not happening, scientists say.
“There’s no such thing as chemtrails,” said Alan Robock, a climate science professor at Rutgers university...
Numerous debunkings of the chemtrails concept have not succeeded in quieting those fearful of airplane condensation trails. A YouGov/Statista survey conducted in 2019 found that 8% of Americans “strongly believe” that “the government is using chemicals to control the population (chemtrails)”. (A further 11% said they “somewhat believe” in the theory.)...
Karen Douglas, a professor of social psychology at the University of Kent, said people are drawn to various conspiracy theories because “a simple explanation is often not very attractive”.
“People assume that there must somehow be a bigger explanation, or more going on than people know about. The simple explanations often seem too mundane and not satisfying enough,” Douglas said."
JACK PANYARD , Lancaster Online; Olympian Johnny Weir funds Quarryville library after Fulton Twp. cuts gift over LGBTQ+ content
"When figure skating icon and Quarryville native Johnny Weir heard Fulton Township supervisors were defunding the borough’s library because it offers materials about LGBTQ+ life and culture, he decided to step in.
Weir, an avid supporter of both his hometown and LGBTQ+ causes, announced over social media Saturday that he would cover the township’s annual $1,000 allocation to the library for as long as he could, saying via Instagram that he wanted to “help save a community that raised me and to make sure the library represents everyone, not just the few.”
Weir’s generosity has become contagious."
George Stockburger, Sarah Willson, WABC27; Governor Shapiro announces ethics rules, training for employees
Shapiro also announced an executive order regarding the solicitation or acceptance of gifts for executive branch employees. The rule includes “a total prohibition on gifts, discounts, services or any other items or other benefits of any value received from a lobbyist or lobbying firm.”...
The moves were part of a three-part ethics package announced by the Governor’s office on Friday."
Maddie Hanna, The Philadelphia Inquirer; Central Bucks is proposing a library policy that targets ‘sexualized content.’ Here’s why people are concerned.
"Facing a packed room of vocal community members Thursday night, the Central Bucks School Board sought to tamp down criticism of a proposed library policy that has spurred fears of censorship and attracted the attention of the American Civil Liberties Union.
The board’s policy committee did end up striking provisions that would have required all new books to gain its approval before they could be added to school libraries, a standard that some called burdensome and that would cede too much power to the board. And although critics said policy language targeting “sexualized content” would encompass too broad a swath of books, the board’s president promised the classics would remain, and there would still be “some discretion.”
But both the ACLU and Education Law Center, which are closely following the district’s actions, said Friday the policy advanced by the committee was still problematic.
“They’re playing with fire here,” said Vic Walczak, legal director for the ACLU of Pennsylvania."
Ryan Deto, Pittsburgh City Paper; Pennsylvania GOP official on Toomey: “We did not send him there to ‘do the right thing’”
"We did not send him there to vote his conscience,” said Ball during the TV interview. “We did not send him there to ‘do the right thing’ or whatever he said he was doing. We sent him there to represent us.”"
"The data currently available on OpenDataPA supports Gov. Tom Wolf’s three governing objectives -- education, employment and government services -- includes prison population numbers, school performance profiles and summary information on well inspections. The state also plans to release datasets from other state agencies on the site... The administration’s main goals for releasing this data is three-fold: accountability, modernization and innovation. The portal will allow citizens to keep track of government projects, find this information in one place and use if to “make data-driven decisions.”"
"County officials in recent days have rolled out new online tools to make certain types of public information more accessible. Controller Chelsa Wagner on Thursday debuted alleghenycounty.opengov.com, which features graphs, charts and sortable data about spending, vendors, employees, salaries and benefits. She also introduced allegheny.openbookportal.com, providing instant access to contracts with vendors... Local governments are getting better at providing basic financial and vendor information to the public, and some officials, such as city Controller Michael Lamb, take pride in providing easy access to public information... Across the state, however, access to public documents is uneven, and obtaining anything beyond routine documents, such as annual budgets, often involves a cumbersome right-to-know process in which the government agency drags its feet and attempts to keep secret anything potentially embarrassing or controversial. Incremental progress on openness should be applauded, but it is important to remember that the larger battle is far from won."
"Senate legislation intended to require more public disclosure by Pennsylvania’s four state-related universities would, as currently written, enable those schools to shield from the public many of their largest employee salaries — figures they currently release. Senate Bill 412, introduced this month by state Sen. John Blake, D-Lackawanna, is part of an ongoing effort to revamp Pennsylvania’s Right-to-Know Law that has been working its way through the Legislature for two years. Mr. Blake said his bill’s intent is to give the public greater insight into the workings of the University of Pittsburgh, Penn State University and Temple and Lincoln universities, which receive hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars each year but are largely exempt from Right-to-Know requirements. Indeed, his bill (explore below) would create free accessible online databases with extensive budgetary information, non-personal employee and enrollment data, and would compel the four universities to list vendor contracts above $5,000 and maintain a 20-year archive of minutes from school trustee meetings. But in one key area of disclosure — individual salaries — the bill’s language appears to be at least a partial retreat."
