To the Editor:
In this citizen's view, our city councilmen and county commissioners will be missing a 'teaching moment' during this landfill debate if they fail to re-invigorate local efforts to reduce, reuse, and recycle. Morgan County's trash will end up in a landfill someplace, so it is incumbent on all citizens, I believe, to be good stewards of the environment by reducing our waste.

Bill Mahoney
Madison
Via e- mail

To the Editor:
We do not want to live in Madison and tell our friends that we live near a landfill.  Our vision of Madison is about the historical town and the draw of tourism here to the area.  Our concerns are more about our town losing it rating as one people want to come and visit and come back to live here. There are too many negatives with a landfill here! We ask our elected officials to vote to deny the landfill!
 
Chuck & Patty Densmore
Madison
Via e-mail

To the Editor:
Education is vital to a healthy community. Education means good jobs, good business and informed voters. The quality of our school system has been an important factor in the decision of many of our residents to move here.
Children need safe, clean facilities in order to learn. They need vibrant, structured programs in order to thrive. They need mentoring in order to become responsible adults. It’s the reason so much effort has been given to start a Boys and Girls Club in Madison, to provide all our children the environment they need to succeed.
ELOST has been good for our community. It has allowed us to garner funds needed to repair and replace worn facilities. These funds would otherwise have to come from higher property taxes. It has helped us improve our children’s future.
We urge you to vote “YES” on ELOST November 3rd.

Lee Abney            Mike Conrads        James Paschal
Andrew Ainslie, III        Patricia/Wilson DuBose   
Mitzi Prochnow
Augusta/Fred M. Bell    Pat/Dick Hodgetts        Joe Reitman
Ginger/Harry Beverly    Joe Houston            Anne/Robert Trulock
Margaret/Jerry Caldwell   
Mary/Bob Lawton        Jim Winkler

To the Editor,
    The strength of our schools steams from the fact that they are run on a local level, meeting the needs of individual students and individual schools without wasting precious resources.
    The state and federal government give almost nothing to our system for buildings or repairs. They give nothing at all for technology. If that is true, then how does every class in rural Morgan County have cutting edge technology SMART Boards – something most schools in wealthy Cobb County can’t claim
    In a word: ELOST.
ELOST is a win-win situation for nearly everybody, increasing property values while decreasing property values while decreasing taxes on the property. Like HOPE, it’s been such a successful concept that every single school system uses it.
Why is it such a great program?
• It allows us to collect the majority of its funds from visiting shoppers from other counties.
• It allows us to earn money spread in tiny increments over millions of purchases instead of in thousands extra on our property taxes.
• It allows us the flexibility to plan for upcoming needs, and use that money wisely as different needs arise.
    Most people move to Morgan County because of her good schools. If you care about those schools we urge you to support ELOST. If you are unable to vote on Tuesday, November 3, early voting is underway now at the board of elections.
Thank you,
Linda and Mike Naples
Patricia and Wilson DuBose
Anne and Robert Trulock
Julie and Dan Vice
Kim Curro
Mandy and Steve Walker
Mary Ann and Devon Dartnell
Trish Jones
Kathy Lewan
Christine and Mike McSherry
Michele Hoopengardner
Lisa and Jimmy Hendrix
Jamie and Colin Campbell
Hand-delivered

To the Editor:
The two questions I received most frequently about my posting of the summary of ELOST III spending are: (1) isn’t $1,986,663 for “miscellaneous” a pretty big catch-all amount? and (2) isn’t an on-going expense of 20 percent of ELOST for technology too big? The answer to both is “I don’t know,” and therein lies the problem with ELOST IV.
We are not being taxed for specific projects. Rather, the resolution on which we will vote is very broad. The full text of the ELOST III resolution can be found in the reference. It is simply too general (and the ELOST IV resolution is no different). The school board could have saved some trees if the resolution had read, “Just give us the money, and trust us on this one.” So we end up with nearly $2 million in “miscellaneous” expenditures, and we spend $2.85 million on technology, enough to buy every student and every faculty member the laptop on which this letter is typed.
Let’s do this the right way. First, vote “no” on ELOST IV. Second, ask your board member to publish a new proposal containing specific projects with specific dollar amounts. (We can vote again in November 2010.) Third, ask that this be provided by February, well before any voting, so that you can have time to provide feedback to your school board member.
It would be nice to do this the right way, for a change.
Reference:http://mrbatten.com/SupportingDocuments1.aspx
George Batten
Madison
Via e-mail

To the Editor:
    On behalf of my mother and family, I would like to take this opportunity to thank so many of you for your prayers, concerns, cards, flowers, meals and encouragement following Mom's horrific accident. Your care and concern has uplifted us during this period and we are so very grateful to each and everyone of you. 
    A special thank you to Steven Collier and Dan Newton. These two guys happen to be in the right spot for saving her life October 17 and we can not express in words how grateful we are to the both of you.
Regards,

Jamie Youngblood-Campbell,
on behalf of Brenda Youngblood
Madison
Via e-mail