News

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

TOM DOONEY

Thank you, Anthony Chase, for organizing the [Tom Dooney] event, inviting me to be part of it, and for reading this piece on my behalf when I was unable to attend in person. And thanks, Tony, for running it in Artvoice—because when I wrote it I really had in mind not just Tom’s personal friends but younger generations of artists, activists, theater lovers, and LGBTQ folks in Buffalo who never met him but have benefited from the hard work he did before some of them were even born. One of the things I love most about this city—one of the main things that has kept me here for three decades—is its ongoing legacy of unsung heroes, like Tom, who do what they do not for fame or glory or big bucks (fat chance!) but because they care.

RON EHMKE

SAM HOYT & Central Terminal

Dear Jamie,

Thank you for your article, “Central Terminal loses as Choice for New Amtrak Station,” April 27-May 3, 2017.  Your piece of first-rate journalism, so sadly missing today, dredged up the haunting reminder of the decision for UB campus going out to Amherst instead of downtown. Sam Hoyt, like his father before him, makes politics in Buffalo  “… work done under the sun grievous to me. All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind” (Ecclesiastes 2:17).

The refurbishing of the East side’s old Central Terminal, with many possible spinoffs for local and regional infrastructure investments, was sacrificed for Sam Hoyt’s petty political pride. Elected politicians are servants that need to be supervised as wayward children, and voted out of office at the first glimmer of corruption; and without erudite journalism that’s not going to happen.

Ray Peterson, Buffalo

Mother’s Day is Not for Cows

Dear Editor,

Last week, The Washington Post published a major expose of the U.S. dairy industry concluding that mega dairies scam consumers into paying extra for “organic” milk that isn’t. The timing, a few days before Mother’s Day, is appropriate. Dairy cows, world-wide symbols of motherhood, never get to see or nurture their babies.They are torn from them at birth and turned into veal cutlets.

This Mother’s Day, let’s honor motherhood and our compassion for animals by rejecting the dairy industry’s cruelty. Let’s choose delicious cruelty-free plant-based milk and cheese products offered at our grocery store

Sincerely, Bob Lovejoy, Buffalo

FBI DIRECTOR COMEY

I am a writing to express my grave concern about President Trump and his extensive ties to Russia, which led to his firing FBI Director James Comey––reportedly because Comey was investigating those ties and had requested additional resources for this investigation.

If true, this is tantamount to our President, and possibly members of the GOP Congress, committing treason and aiding Russia in a coup to take “The People’s House.”

With Republicans in the House and Senate unwilling to put country before party, I urge every Buffalonian to contact the Department of Justice to urge Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to appoint an independent, special prosecutor to investigate this matter.

Also contact your Congresspeople, Governor Cuomo, and NY AG, Eric Schneiderman, too We are truly in a Constitutional crisis now. Will you join me in the resistance?

Best, Stacey Bowers

ALLENTOWN ART FESTIVAL EMBRACES BUSKERS!

We never understood The Allentown Village Society’s horror over buskers. For years buskers were harrassed, theatened with arrest and publically humiliated. This is a good change. Music & art are as natural as toast and jam. Allentown West Festival buskers have proved that every year.

Application for Buskers from Allentown Village Society