Editorials from around Pennsylvania

Editorials from around Pennsylvania:

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ON THIS MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. DAY, ’LET US BE DISSATISFIED,’ Jan. 15

With the rhetoric emanating out of the highest office in the land, this seems a particularly important time to consider the example of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

He championed the dignity of ordinary people around the world, particularly the poor and voiceless. Barraged by insults and threats, he maintained his own dignity always. Persecuted by bigoted federal, state and municipal officials, he remained tough and unflinching in the face of injustice. His eyes necessarily wide open to the realities of this world, he nevertheless envisioned a better future.

As we celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day today, it’s important to remember that this year is not just any year.

On April 4, we’ll mark the 50th anniversary of the day King was assassinated by a gunman on the balcony outside Room 306 at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. He was in Memphis to support that city’s striking sanitation workers.

In the years since King’s slaying, the United States has made significant progress on civil rights. African-Americans lead academic and military institutions, corporations and nonprofit organizations alike.

But according to Pew Research Center, black people working full and part time in 2015 earned 75 percent as much as white people in median hourly earnings.

Barack Obama was elected to the presidency twice. But according to Pew, the trajectory of black political leadership in the United States has been “upward yet uneven.”

“In 1965, there were no blacks in the U.S. Senate, nor were there any black governors. And only six members of the House of Representatives were black,” a 2016 Pew article noted.

The current Congress, the 115th, includes 51 black members - three of them senators. Overall, according to Pew, nonwhites (including blacks, Hispanics, Asians/Pacific Islanders and Native Americans) make up 19 percent of the current Congress. But by comparison, “nonwhite Hispanics and other racial minorities make up 38 percent of the nation’s population.”

Pennsylvania’s population is 11.8 percent African-American, according to the U.S. Census. But according to a 2016 article in The Philadelphia Tribune, a newspaper serving Philly’s African-American community, blacks made up 8 percent of the state Senate and 9.3 percent of the state House that year.

So what can we do to close the gap between what has been achieved and what King envisioned? Because make no mistake - such a gap exists. Power and access to opportunity remain unequal; racism still plagues us.

Sometimes, that racism is blatant - some examples spring readily to mind - but more often it’s a quiet, even polite, disparagement of a person or group of people. We should recognize those instances of racism and confront them plainly, however uncomfortable this may be, and whatever their source - a family member, a friend, an acquaintance.

And, if we’re part of the majority, we shouldn’t dismiss an experience of racism shared by a person of color. Defensiveness isn’t going to get us anywhere, but discussion will.

When we better understand other people’s experiences, we’ll lay the groundwork for progress. And we’ll figure out the part we need to play in attaining it.

Today, many Lancaster County residents will be following King’s example and performing acts of service. This is an excellent way to honor the man, but every day of the year, there’s something else we can do: Let’s not be satisfied with where we are.

As King said in a 1967 speech, “Let us be dissatisfied until the tragic walls that separate the outer city of wealth and comfort from the inner city of poverty and despair shall be crushed by the battering rams of the forces of justice.

“Let us be dissatisfied until those who live on the outskirts of hope are brought into the metropolis of daily security.”

Let’s “stick with love” and reject hate, as King advocated, while also seeking greater equality. And let’s not lose hope.

Said King: “When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows.

“Let us realize that the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.”

__LNP

Online: http://bit.ly/2EMUHwR

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RULING PUTS POT FACILITIES IN PROPER PERSPECTIVE, Jan. 16

A decision by Pennsylvania’s Office of Open Records clears the clouded reasoning that effectively obscured reams of information about the state’s nascent medical marijuana industry. If there was ever a case for transparency - from a state administration that supposedly champions it - this would be it.

Under a ruling from appeals officer Kyle Applegate, Gov. Tom Wolf’s Health Department is to republish applications released last year from companies seeking to operate medical marijuana production facilities and dispensaries. The department had allowed growers/processors, themselves, to “self-redact” anything they considered to be proprietary information, in addition to what the Health Department redacted, according to PennLive. Subsequently there was no telling from some of the heavily redacted applications who would manage these operations or who would fund them.

Now the state will be required to provide the names, addresses and “points of contact for all owners, financial backers and key operators of firms named in the appeal,” PennLive reports. Details on facility operations, apart from specific building and security information, are also required.

The state and affected applicants have less than 30 days to comply or appeal to Commonwealth Court. We’re talking about providing due attention to the roots of a new industry that likely will grow into a multibillion-dollar enterprise.

The level of transparency ordered should have been the rule going forward when the state signed off on these grower/processor applications.

__Tribune-Review

Online: http://bit.ly/2mLfp9L

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PAPER TARIFF THREATENS LOCAL NEWSPAPERS, Jan. 16

The viability of local newspapers, including the Erie Times-News, is being challenged by a proposed tariff on the import of newsprint from Canada - the type that is used to print this newspaper and others across this state.

Simply put, Pennsylvania’s newspapers cannot absorb the additional financial burden that this tax - based on a dubious complaint from a single paper mill - is sure to create.

If passed, the resulting hardship could lead to thousands of job losses in the U.S. newspaper publishing sector, which employs more than 175,000 people nationwide, according to the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association.

We are at an important juncture right now as a nation and in this industry. Our role of getting real news to you on a daily basis matters more than ever.

A credible news source that has a vested interest in community-based news and information is the bedrock of our principles as a free nation.

Nearly eight in 10 adults read a newspaper each week and newspapers are consistently rated as the most trusted source of news and information. Pennsylvania is home to 76 daily newspapers and more than 150 non-daily newspapers - many of which serve small, rural communities. Many of those provide the only meaningful news coverage in those small communities. This measure could put them out of business and cut off rural America from local news coverage.

Newspapers have a vital impact on the communities they serve. As the president of the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association, Mark Cohen, said, “Readers rely on newspapers to provide credible information about what matters most to them - news about local people, local government, local happenings, local businesses and important public notices that can impact a community.”

This tariff could hamper newspapers’ ongoing digital transformation. Publishers will be faced with additional costs that will delay or halt the newspaper industry’s shift to digital and accelerate the decline in both the newsprint and printed newspaper industries.

We live here and work here and care about this place we call home. We are you. We are Pennsylvania. We are local businesses.

Newspapers and newspaper associations are uniting against newsprint tariffs. This is not only a print industry concern, but could ultimately affect other business segments in the U.S. that rely on paper products.

Please help us protect the future of newspapers by contacting the Department of Commerce, Pennsylvania Sens. Bob Casey and Pat Toomey, and U.S. Reps. Mike Kelly, R-3rd Dist., and Glenn Thompson, R-5th Dist. Let them know that you oppose the proposed newsprint trade tariff.

A free press is more important than ever and newspapers, including the Erie Times-News, have always been at the forefront of serving our communities. We remain steadfast in our commitment of continuing to do so.

__Erie Times-News

Online: http://bit.ly/2mOoxKS

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WHEN POLITICS FAIL, COURTS MUST LEAD ON GERRYMANDERING, Jan. 14

Good grief. A diagram of recent court cases challenging gerrymandering in Pennsylvania and other states is itself starting to look like a badly mangled congressional district.

Recently, federal judges in Pennsylvania and North Carolina came to opposite conclusions about whether Republican attempts to perpetuate power through district map-drawing violated the Elections Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

A three-judge panel in North Carolina said “yes,” unanimously, and ordered lawmakers to draw up a new map for this year’s midterm elections. They also found the gerrymander violated the First Amendment and the Equal Protection clause.

A three-judge panel in Pennsylvania, in 2-1 decision, went the other way, saying redistricting is a partisan process that requires a political solution, not a court-ordered one.

Who’s right?

Who’s wrong?

On the weight of the evidence, both courts had reason to overturn obvious gerrymanders. In both cases, Republicans leaders freely testified they fed partisan data into sophisticated computer programs to minimize the chances of Democrats winning congressional races.

In Pennsylvania, this contributed to Republicans winning and holding 13 of 18 congressional seats, despite the fact the Democrats received many more votes overall. In North Carolina, the GOP secured 10 of 13 seats.

That’s not anyone’s idea of fairness, and it needs to be changed — hopefully in time for upcoming elections.

While we wish the Pennsylvania judges had ordered an immediate do-over, we respect the argument that judges shouldn’t be doing the jobs of legislators.

Yet that argument doesn’t hold water here — not in the way this practice has been honed and perfected in today’s crazy, uber-partisan atmosphere and frozen in place. Gerrymandering — by either party — allows legislators to choose their voters, instead of the other way around.

Gerrymandering in state legislative districts is doubly insidious. It concentrates partisan power among those who could initiate reform but have no incentive to do so as long as they’re insulated from a healthy cross-section of voters and serious election challenges.

Say what you will about judicial activism — we don’t think the people who drew up the U.S and state constitutions expected their successors to so refine the art of redistricting as to hand-pick their constituencies, right down to the street address.

The best approach would be for Pennsylvania and other states to set up independent-minded citizen commissions to oversee the process of redistricting. Bills to accomplish this are being considered in Harrisburg, but again — parties in power have no incentive to change. And they have the power to thwart reform.

We’d like to think that voters in 2018 will rise up and demand this sort of fairness. But reforming redistricting, government ethics and campaign finance is a tough sell on the street — especially among people who have been disillusioned and believe, rightfully, that the deck has been stacked against them in elections and by deep-pocketed special interests.

This court docket is crowded. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court is scheduled to hear a redistricting appeal brought by plaintiffs, based on the state constitution. (In December, a Commonwealth Court judge upheld the state’s congressional map.) Meanwhile, the U.S. Supreme Court is considering gerrymandering appeals from Wisconsin, Maryland and Texas.

It’s time to revise the rules to restore balance. If state legislatures won’t do it, the courts must order them to redraw — and redraw and redraw, if necessary — until a constitutional semblance of fairness has been met.

This isn’t the easiest thing to define. On the other hand, it’s easy to identify extreme gerrymandering when you see it — and to understand how the 21st century version of this abuse threatens one of the foundations of our democratic way of life:

The idea that one vote is equal to any other.

__The (Easton) Express-Times

Online: http://bit.ly/2mEmdoI

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OPIOIDS AND GUNS DON’T_AND SHOULDN’T_MIX IN PA.’S EMERGENCY DECLARATION, Jan. 17

If you want to spark a political fight in Pennsylvania, mention guns.

If you want to ignite agreement about a crisis we all recognize, mention opioids.

But please, let’s not mix together the issues we fight about with the issues we agree upon. That’s a recipe for inaction, a problem all too common in Harrisburg and one we simply cannot afford as an opioid crisis sweeps across the state.

Last Wednesday, State Sen. Scott Wagner offered a few backhanded compliments for Gov. Wolf’s decision that day to declare a statewide disaster emergency to deal with the opioid crisis.

Wagner, a York County Republican seeking his party’s nomination to challenge Wolf’s bid for a second term in November, said he welcomed the governor’s “decision to finally get serious” about the problem.

A day later, Wagner was back with a warning, claiming Wolf’s declaration “has infringed on the rights of any Pennsylvanians who could generally carry a firearm in public without a license.”

Wagner’s theory: A statewide disaster emergency declaration triggers laws prohibiting the open carrying of firearms on public streets or property during that declaration.

Aside from the misplaced priorities this view represents that borders on the heartless - if not clueless - there’s one big problem with that theory: The state issues emergency declarations every year - for hurricanes, windstorms, blizzards, floods and more - and Wagner can offer no examples of people being prosecuted for possessing firearms during those events

By Friday, Wagner was on a local talk-radio show, explaining how he was a co-sponsor of “pretty critical” legislation that would rewrite state laws to prevent emergency declarations from impinging on gun rights.

That legislation is so critical that it was introduced on Jan. 12, 2017 - one year and four days ago - and then immediately sent to a committee overseeing emergency preparedness. There it has sat - no hearings, no votes, no action at all - in the Republican-controlled Senate.

Wolf’s team notes that firearms can’t be confiscated during a disaster and the existing laws have no impact on people with concealed carry permits, hunters with a license or someone acting in self-defense with a firearm. The law’s punishment amounts to a citation, and Wolf’s administration said it worked in advance with law enforcement to make sure the opioid declaration didn’t impact gun rights.

“Any implication otherwise to score cheap political points around the greatest public health crisis in our lifetimes is flat-out wrong,” said Wolf spokesman J.J. Abbott.

Still, the issue lingers. State. Rep. Sheryl Delozier, a Cumberland County Republican, on Friday circulated a memo to her colleagues, asking them to co-sponsor legislation to protect gun rights during Wolf’s declaration.

Delozier also had no examples to offer of people being prosecuted for possessing firearms during an emergency declaration.

It’s our view that guns are a public health crisis, one that Harrisburg has virtually ignored. Inserting this issue into the public health crisis of opioids that is killing Pennsylvanians across the state is petty and wrong-headed. Stop looking for ways to trip up the state with a manufactured crisis when we are dealing with a true emergency in opioids.

__Philadelphia Inquirer

Online: http://bit.ly/2ERdOFL

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