In Defense of Robert Moses
Lena Groeger says that Robert Moses designed public work projects to exclude and isolate specific groups of people [“Discrimination by Design: From health care to toilets to Snapchat; life is designed to benefit certain people,” Sept. 22-28, 2016]. Maybe he did, but he also gave them fantastic beach parks, amazing parkways and inner city playgrounds. I grew up in Manhattan and enjoyed the beaches in the summer. I never saw a bus stuck under a highway. I was one of the poor folk who moved out to the middle of Long Island for a few years. It was easy. Lots of people from Brooklyn did that. I never saw a low bridge in New York. I lived near the George Washington and the Triborough. No low bridges, I promise. Getting around New York City can be complicated if you’re not familiar with it, but it’s easy if you know the place. He wasn’t perfect, but he was amazing. Give him credit.
Nadine Gallo
Hadley
Making Amends with the LGBTQ Community
Editor’s Note: This letter is in response to “Coming Out to Your Husband: ‘Old Lesbians’ share personal stories of life before Pride,” Sept. 22-28, 2016. In the article, Edie Daly says that when she and her former partner came out to their husbands as gay in the 1970s, she was concerned her partner wouldn’t be able to see her children anymore because she was a foster parent through a Jewish Child Care Association program.
Edie Daly’s historic connection to the Jewish Child Care Association and the role our organization played in exacerbating what must have been an incredibly stressful and vulnerable time for her is something we deeply regret.
Today, JCCA has evolved and one might say is at the forefront of progressive care of LGBTQ foster children and families. Two of our LGBT clinical staff were honored recently for their work with LGBTQ youth. Our newly appointed (May 2015) CEO, Judge Ronald E. Richter, is an openly gay, married man and the father of a six year old daughter. We’ve come a long way from what was no doubt a very different organization in the 1970s.
Ron would very much like to thank Edie and Jackie for their contribution to lesbian life in America and for their efforts to archive the important stories of their peers. Just as importantly, on behalf of our board and the entire JCCA community, Ron would like to apologize for any suffering our predecessors at the agency may have contributed to their brave journey.
Thom Hamill
Jewish Child Care Association, New York, NY
We’re Already Paying for Trump
Trump is anti-Trump. He rails against businesses moving overseas, but yet sends his own manufacturing to both China and Mexico. Will he really put that high tariff on his own goods?
He complains about illegal immigrants taking American jobs, but he’s worked with traffickers to bring in undocumented immigrants for him to exploit. Will he stop himself from this practice?
He says he will create jobs and help workers and small businesses. But he has stiffed small businesses, causing many of them to fold and jobs to be lost. Will he be less greedy and pay what he owes? Not likely!
He complains that the military is in disrepair even though we spend more per capita on military than the next 10 countries combined. He says he will build it up (much like Hitler) but that takes tax money. In several years ’77-’79, ’82, ’87 — when he had to release his tax returns — it was found that he paid no federal tax. He says that makes him “smart.” That also makes the rest of us suckers.
Will he stop taking advantage of us and the loopholes that the super rich have put into law? Not likely! He has been sued 3,500 times by people he has wronged and some are class action lawsuits.
He certainly uses the court system as well as the infrastructure, all our public institutions, such as fire, police, K-12 education for his workers, etc., and pays nothing in support of our country. Hardly patriotic!
Malita Brown
Wilbraham
