Remove the overseers

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Criminal cuts

My husband recently spent the morning lobbying our legislators to include funding for mental health services in the state budget. What's significant about this is that he was laid off in February, and he knows that providing money for these programs would mean an increase in our state taxes in the midst of a personal financial crisis.

As a teacher, I can provide for some of our financial needs, including college tuition for our son, but my take-home pay will be less than usual due to budget cuts and increased health care costs. In other words, our family will not go without feeling a significant financial pinch. Even though we understand what it means to live with less, we find it unacceptable to consider cuts to the most vulnerable of our North Carolina neighbors, those with debilitating mental illness.

With support these residents offer their personal talents to their neighbors and live meaningful lives. To offer them less is criminal. In the midst of these difficult times, let us rise to the challenge

Cancer hospital gets $2 million

The new cancer hospital at UNC-Chapel Hill has a little more spending money now.

The N.C. Cancer Hospital's endowment doubled Monday with a $2 million gift from the U.S. arm of Sanofi-Aventis, a global drug manufacturer with headquarters in Paris and New Jersey.

"The gift is a recognition of the very strong research being done here and our desire to work with UNC," said Chris Viehbacher, the drug company's chief executive officer. The company has previously provided funding for at least one professorship and scholarships.

Teachers first

We have a family friend enrolled in the Teaching Fellows Program at Elon University. This is a wonderful program that pays partial tuition to selected scholars. In return, the recipient agrees to teach in a North Carolina public school for four years. To our friend, who has dreamed of being a teacher ever since third grade, this was a dream come true.

Now with the budget cuts, her class of teaching fellows has been told that there will be no teaching jobs available when she graduates next year. How much has the Wake County Public School System cut from its administration budget? All one has to do is drive down Falls of the Neuse Road and see the opulent schools administration building to wonder how much money is being spent on teaching and how much funds administration.

We need our money to go where it will do the most good. I, for one, would like to see more teachers and fewer administrators.

Bond opponents float new idea

Americans for Prosperity hopes to "scratch off" millions from local school bonds.

But the Governor's Office said that idea can't win.

The group, which opposes Wake County's proposed $970 million school bond issue, said lottery proceeds could be used to build schools instead. At a news conference Tuesday, Americans for Prosperity state director Fran DeLuca argued that devoting all lottery revenue to school construction could keep property taxes from rising as quickly.

Nuclear division needs divorce

President Obama has made clean and efficient energy a top priority, and Congress has obliged with more than $32 billion in stimulus money mostly for conservation and alternative energy technologies like wind, solar and biofuel. Sadly, the Energy Department is too weighed down by nuclear energy programs to devote itself to bringing about the revolution Obama envisions.

Today, the department's main task is managing the thousands of facilities involved in producing nuclear weapons during the Cold War, and the associated cleanup of dozens of contaminated sites. Approximately two-thirds of its annual budget, which is roughly $27 billion, is spent on these activities, while only 15 percent is allocated for all energy programs, including managing the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and researching and developing new technologies.

The department, after all, has nuclear weapons in its DNA. It is essentially an offshoot of the Atomic Energy Commission, a civilian-run agency established in 1946 to continue the work of