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RT07232015

for breaking news visit www.timesnewsweekly.com JULY 23, 2015 • times 13 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT www.couriersun.com JULY 23, 2015 • THE COURIER SUN 23 oped  Fast-food wage hike A LOOK BACK a look back could harm New York health care industry By CHARLES HOUSTON G o v e r n o r Cuomo has established Long before the Washington Nationals returned to the big leagues in 2005, a different Nationals team was part of the Queens Alliance league during the 1940s and played in Brooklyn and Queens. The 1946 Nationals, which played their home games at Highland Park, captured the league championship that year. En route to their triumph, they bested rivals including the Ridgewood Dodgers, which had an affiliation with the then-Brooklyn Dodgers. Have a picture of Queens from long ago that you’d like to share with us? Email it to editorial@queenscourier.com. letters TrusT, verify, and verify again on iran deal The agreement that the U.S. and four other major nations signed with Iran regarding control of its nuclear program must be carefully monitored, so that there will be no cheating by Iran. Also, our allies in the Middle East must be given assurances that this deal will not threaten their security. The bottom line is that President Obama needs to make sure that the Iranian regime is held accountable. This country still calls our country the Great Satan and is still calling for Israel’s destruction. Does it really want peace? John Amato, Fresh Meadows ParenTs musT share resPonsibiliTy of Teaching sTudenTs Schools Chancellor Carmen Farina was spot on when she said “Schools need to have the right leadership, the right teachers, and the right school staff to raise student achievement.” But in the midst of making that statement, she added, “Schools also need to have the right students and the right parental support.” Teachers must always do the best they can. They must make the most of the hand they are dealt. And they accept this responsibility willingly. There can be no education hospice. No giving up. No palliative care for “lost cases.” There are no lost cases. But the most heroic and gifted teacher cannot make up for parents who do not parent or students who will do nothing to help themselves. This does mean that teachers should make excuses for lack of progress. It is their professional duty to mitigate against any handicaps or disadvantages no matter under whose control they may or may not be. Chancellor Farina has arguably yet to ace that challenge, but another formidable challenge may await her next year. According to the State Education Department, a number of New York City schools may be put under receivership as though they were a floundering restaurant chain. If that happens, the Chancellor would select an individual or group for this hostile takeover, which has those who lobby for privatizing education licking their chops already. How she confronts this omen may clinch her legacy. Ron Isaac, Fresh Meadows PresidenTial ‘candidaTe’ oPens mouTh, inserTs ego It’s hard to believe that Donald Trump leads the Republican polls on who they favor for the next president, but he does. The only ones answering the poll must be the angry rightwing voters, the same ones who hate everything that has to do with equality, progress or Obama. Trump is making a lot of noise shooting his mouth off at whoever gets in his way with outrageous statements about Hillary Clinton, when he supported her a couple of years ago, condemning the Mexican immigrants, and now he just said that he likes war veterans who haven’t been captured when talking about John McCain. The best way to beat Trump is to let him talk. Every time he opens his mouth he makes outrageous, bigoted statements, and it’s only a matter of time until he alienates almost everybody. The Republicans are already shaking in their boots because of his big mouth and the damage he’s doing to their party brand. But like so many other Republican candidates, there’s nothing beneath their fiery rhetoric. I say give Trump the microphone and let his dig his own demise. The way he’s going, he’ll be toast by Labor Day. Tyler Cassell, Flushing a wage board within the state Department of Labor to consider raising wages of workers in the fast-food industry to $15 per hour. Hearings held by the wage board have included compelling testimony from fastfood workers about how difficult it is to survive on the earnings typical of that industry. As executive director of Queens Centers for Progress (QCP), a nonprofit providing a comprehensive range of services to children and adults with developmental disabilities for 65 years, I have firsthand knowledge of another group of people whose earnings make it difficult to-impossible to make ends meet: our direct care staff. More than 400 of QCP’s 600 staff members have direct, hands-on responsibilities for the people we serve. They dress, feed, bathe, toilet and provide daily care to people with significant disabling conditions. As part of their jobs they must go through background checks and extensive training. There are thousands of similar staff doing similar work across New York State. The salaries we are able to pay staff are determined, and limited, by the operating rates available through our government funding sources, primarily Medicaid. We cannot raise the price of a product or service to generate more income. Our starting salaries for direct care staff are several dollars per hour less than the $15 target being discussed for fast food workers. We already have difficulty filling direct care openings, and these positions turn over at a high rate. Many staff who find this work rewarding are forced to choose other jobs for purely economic reasons, thereby depriving the people in our programs, who have come to know and depend on them, of a familiar, caring presence. Increasing the wages of fast food workers alone to $15 would only make this situation worse. However deserved it may be, a significant increase in wages for fast-food workers, while ignoring other hardworking but low-paid employees in the developmental disabilities field, would have a terribly negative impact on services to some of New York State’s most vulnerable citizens. It would increase the likelihood that someone considering a direct care job would not take it in the first place. It would increase the likelihood that existing staff would leave their job for a fast-food position because the wage difference was too great to ignore. It would truly be a case of unintended consequences, where something done in a desire to help one group of people would make matters worse for others. This is not sound public policy.


RT07232015
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