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Lunch shaming has no place in our schools

June is the month when Pennsylvania public school districts finalize work on their budgets for the new fiscal year that begins July 1. It’s a busy time consisting of trying to grasp the best possible final estimates of incoming and outgoing revenue for the new fiscal calendar, settling on tax rates for the upcoming 12 months and identifying and implementing internal funds moves to ensure that, at least on paper, the budget has the semblance of balance. It’s also a time for reflecting on the fiscal/school year ending and the one that will be getting underway. Amid that exercise, ...

E-bike crackdown welcome

The June 12 Mirror front-page headline “E-bikes, vandalism spurring concerns in Duncansville” was an appropriate Page 1 introduction to the article to which it referred. However, the appropriate headline for an opinion page editorial related to that article requires more bluntness: “E-bikes, vandalism demanding persistent action in Duncansville” — and, actually, in every other community experiencing the same problems. If the proverbial blind eye is employed in relation to the problems in question, in Blair or anywhere else, the problems have the likelihood of worsening. ...

Insurance holders should read fine print

Thousands of insurance policies are bought each day in America, and the people who have purchased those policies usually feel some semblance of peace of mind, believing they will be protected if they are victimized by an event such as an accident, fire or weather disaster, including a hurricane or flood. After completing the purchase, most of the new policyholders most likely tuck away the policy in a safe place, determined that they’ll read it “when they have the opportunity to sit down with it” — an opportunity window that, for many, never becomes available amid the hustle ...

GOOD Act should be on Trump’s desk

The Las Vegas Review-Journal The Trump administration has made strides in chopping away at the corpulent federal administrative state. Nevertheless, the Competitive Enterprise Institute estimates government regulations still pile $2 trillion in annual costs on American consumers, or nearly $16,000 per household. “Businesses and citizens spend too much time and money trying to comply with rules and edicts imposed by Washington,” Wayne Crews, the institute’s Fred L. Smith Jr. fellow in regulatory studies, noted last month, “and those costs mean higher prices, lost jobs and ...

College grads may need a future ‘pivot’

Each year many thousands of America’s college students complete their studies and embark on professional careers, believing that the sky’s the limit, especially if they’ve worked hard to prepare for what lies before them. After all, again, this is America, the country with boundless opportunities for those dedicated to making those opportunities produce the optimum benefits available on their behalf. What else can be more clear on Graduation Day. Then, more quickly than most of those graduates can imagine, one year’s work experience has turned into two, then three, then four ...

Billing abuse for autism aid unconscionable

Most people cannot imagine the challenges autism poses to families caring for someone afflicted with the developmental disorder. But when those challenges are exacerbated by unscrupulous individuals and companies, people need to take notice and not be shy about projecting their disgust and calls for remedial legal action and stiff penalties, criminal as well as civil. Those who would try to take advantage of the families in question — and, in the process, the victims of the disorder themselves — don’t deserve any leniency in any court of law. Meanwhile, there should be no ...