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Editorials

License plate maintenance is important

Approximately 200 vehicle owners responded to state Rep. Jesse Topper’s “Hard-to-Read License Plate Event” in June in the parking lot adjacent to his office in Bedford. As with a similar event held in suburban Johnstown last August by state Rep. Jim Rigby and the Richland Township Police Department, Topper’s event was aimed at getting deteriorated or damaged plates off vehicles — plates that in fact can pose a danger to police trying to carry out their duties. Bedford Borough and state police participated in Topper’s replacement program, which saved the 200 vehicle owners ...

Sunshine Act abuse shouldn’t be tolerated

Citizens should know what issues their school boards, borough councils and other government agencies plan to deliberate and/or vote on at public meetings. Call this commonsense requirement what it is: The law in Pennsylvania. Since 2021, the Sunshine Act, or state open-meetings law, requires that a government agency make its meeting agenda available at least 24 hours in advance of a public meeting. The agency must post the agenda on its publicly accessible internet website, if it has one, as well as at the agency office and at the location of the meeting. In addition, copies of ...

Important decision faces Tyrone chamber

It is not uncommon for a small organization to be reluctant to join forces — merge — with a larger one because of fear over possibly giving up its individual identity. Mirror reporter Walt Frank’s Aug. 7 article “Tyrone chamber considers merger” provided hints of such reluctance amid that organization’s interest in obtaining information from and about the Blair County Chamber of Commerce. Joe Hurd and Steve McKnight, leaders of the Blair chamber and Altoona Blair County Development Corporation, will be addressing the Tyrone Chamber of Commerce Breakfast Club on Wednesday ...

More urgency needed in NS cleanup efforts

Norfolk Southern apparently is nowhere close to completing the cleanup and legal consequences associated with the Feb. 3 fiery East Palestine, Ohio, derailment, just west of Ohio’s border with Pennsylvania. The derailment and all that has happened in its aftermath have spawned intense public interest, especially in railroad communities such as Altoona and Johnstown. But the news in recent days that the derailment’s cost had reached $803 million — double initial estimates and with significantly bigger damage numbers believed yet to come — was met with a sense of surprise and ...

Principal shortage concerning

The idea of being sent to the principal’s office has caused chills to go up the spine of many a student over the years. No one wants to go to there. It turns out, according to a newly released Penn State study, that as much as students don’t want to be in the principal’s office, a number of principals aren’t exactly happy there either. In the 2022-23 school year, 15.4% of principals in Pennsylvania schools left their jobs for other opportunities, according to the survey from the university’s Department of Education Policy Studies. That’s an increase of a little more ...

Stormwater discussion necessary

The term “unfunded mandate” has been around for a long time, and Blair County municipalities have not been strangers to the practice of railing against such requirements. For the benefit of readers unfamiliar with the term, the mandates in question usually are orders from upper levels of government — the state or federal government, for example — that necessitate spending by smaller governmental units — spending that is not reimbursed by the entity issuing the mandatory order. There are times when such orders undermine even the best-prepared annual municipal budgets, ...