This Independence Day weekend, we Americans celebrate and renew our commitment to the values set forth in 1776 by leaders who felt it was important to explain why our ancestors no longer wanted to live under British rule. Why? Read the preamble to the Declaration of Independence. It is a ...
Treeless for years to come. That’s the fate of a section of West Fourth Street in the Newberry neighborhood of Williamsport, where the state Department of Transportation removed 51 trees about a year ago as part of its reconstruction of West Fourth between Route 15 and Hillside ...
Sidewalks are off the slate. That’s the latest word out of City Hall about plans announced at the end of 2017 to start a sidewalk inspection program, similar to Loyalsock Township. Inspections began in April 2018 and were expected to take up to seven years. Now those inspections will be ...
Independence Day should not be celebrated without recognizing that for much of our history as a nation, many of our fellow Americans have wondered what there was for them to celebrate. During nearly a century after independence, millions of African-Americans remained enslaved, after all. ...
Nobody wants to come off sounding like they don’t have compassion. So it had to be with great difficulty that the Lycoming County commissioners decided against a request to provide $250,000 in county funds toward a move of some residents from the ManorCare Jersey Shore, which was a COVID-19 ...
Houston may have a problem, and it’s grabbed our attention. There, infectious disease expert Dr. Peter Hotez says if cases continue to accelerate, Houston could resemble COVID-19 hotspots like New York City or cities in Brazil. “Some of the models coming out of the Policy Lab at the ...
Room to grow. That’s what a county-owned building would provide the city, should the city decide to move operations there. Our question is, why does the city government need room to grow? In our view, smaller government is desirable. It seems that, as government grows, so does the ...
Some things never change. North Korean dictators’ determination to stay in power by keeping the rest of the world off balance is one of them. For a time, it seemed as if North Korean strongman Kim Jong Un might be altering course from that pursued by his father and grandfather. Kim and U.S. ...
From nearly the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak in the United States, it was clear the disease has a racial component. Black Americans have been affected far more severely than whites. Exactly why that is so has not been learned yet. Obviously, getting answers is critical. But blacks are ...
Charity begins at home, especially in safeguarding Americans from COVID-19. But we have a long, praiseworthy record of having big hearts, and now should be no exception to that. Efforts to develop new medicines to treat the symptoms of COVID-19 and to develop vaccines against it have ...
American taxpayers should not be handing out hundreds of billions of dollars in aid to businesses without having at least some idea of where our money is going. That seems obvious. However, demanding such transparency puts the U.S. Treasury Department — and some of the businesses being ...
Stay home. Stay safe. No, we’re not talking about COVID-19 this time. We’re talking about the Independence Day fireworks that will be set off in Williamsport and visible across much of the city and neighborhoods south of the river. We see it as a plus that Backyard Broadcasting will go ...
Foxes. Deer. And bears. Oh my! Anybody living in this region should not be surprised by the abundance of wildlife in Penn’s Woods — nor should they be surprised by an unexpected visitor that may show up in just about any neighborhood. The occasional skunk or opossum that may get into a ...
Millions of Americans remain unemployed as the nation struggles to get an economy stalled by COVID-19 back in gear. Some success has been seen; by this past Saturday, the U.S. unemployment rate was 13.3 percent, much better than the 14.7 percent a month before. Still, we have a long way to ...
One could perhaps forgive Gov. Tom Wolf this past Wednesday for not being in the greatest of moods. The night before, the General Assembly voted to end the governor’s emergency declaration that started in March at the outset of the COVID-19 outbreak. Does the Legislature have the power to ...
Regardless of how you lean politically, what Army Gen. Mark Milley did a few days ago was reassuring. President Donald Trump has been criticized by some — and, it needs to be noted, praised by others — for something he did after a night of civil unrest near the White House. You will have ...
Plenty of the headlines these days are Bad news with a capital “B.” What seems to be going on all around us is disheartening, to say the least. An occasional ray of sunshine breaks through, however. Consider the national spelling bee. Earlier this year, organizers of the annual Scripps ...
UPMC has seen zero positive COVID-19 cases among all of its health care facilities and senior communities, UPMC officials recently announced in one of their weekly briefings. And, many other health care providers are seeing fewer positives and more recoveries, they said. Environmental changes ...
If you are among those who have not lost their jobs because of the COVID-19 epidemic, congratulations. Perhaps you share the widespread opinion that the current “lock down” of the economy should continue, to keep everyone safe. How would you like the government to collect your share? That ...
Congratulations go out today to the members of the Class of 2020. You may be the most challenged class to graduate from our local schools. With the COVID-19 public health crisis, you were sent home from school early this year and expected to finish your classwork in a homeschooling type of ...