Don’t count your Chicks…
I read the recent letter from Angie Logan of WCYK radio about the Dixie Chicks flap, in which she excoriates your newspaper for incomplete reporting and calls your credibility into question [Mailbag, May 5]. The irony here is so thick I could cut it with a knife.
Shortly after [Dixie Chicks singer] Natalie Maines made her remark about the President, I sent e-mails to Ms. Logan and her on-air partner, Bill Thomas. I asked each of them why WCYK had chosen to stop playing the Dixie Chicks, and expressed my belief that to shun them for expressing their opinion was un-American. Ms. Logan responded quickly, informing me that WCYK was not banning the Dixie Chicks. That Mr. Thomas, as Program Director, had made the decision to continue playing the Dixie Chicks and that they had made that decision because they believed, like me, that punishing the Dixie Chicks for expressing their opinions was just plain wrong.
This was most peculiar, since WCYK had, by that time, stopped playing the Dixie Chicks. The group’s music, ordinarily heard at least once an hour on WCYK, was now totally absent. In the many weeks since, I have not heard a single Dixie Chicks song on WCYK. That strikes me as rather odd, given Ms. Logan’s insistence that no ban was in effect.
I have subsequently contacted WCYK’s parent company, Clear Channel, and they told me that all programming decisions are made locally, that Clear Channel had not banned the Dixie Chicks. Somebody’s being less than truthful here, and it’s not C-VILLE. Ms. Logan needs to come clean: Are the Chicks banned or not? And if not banned, have they been exiled to the wee hours? She needs to let her listeners know why we never hear the Dixie Chicks on WCYK. If WCYK is going to support this loutish, un-American treatment of the Dixie Chicks, Ms. Logan should at least have the integrity to stand up and say so.
Alex Citron
Charlottesville
Taking into account
Regarding your piece about Bank of America charging $5 to cash checks drawn on their business accounts [“Stinging endorsement,” Ask Ace, April 29]. I just wanted to let all of the employers in the area know that Southern Financial Bank has two locations in Charlottesville, 2208 Ivy Road and 300 East Market Street. We would love to open those business payroll accounts and cash their employees’ checks at NO CHARGE!
Robin Covington
Charlottesville
The letter writer is a branch manager at Southern Financial.
Bill of plights
In response to Chris Smith’s letter correcting Ted Rall [Mailbag, April 29], I would like to correct Mr. Smith. The GI Bill was cancelled in 1975. The [current] programs for financial assistance for members of the military provide matching funds for savings by the individual. It is difficult to have a savings plan since the salaries are so low, especially for folks who support a family. The amount of savings and matching funds that a service member would accrue by the time of their discharge might well be enough to pay for tuition, but will not come close to meeting the costs of housing, food plan, books and other expenses.
Recruiters often paint a rosy picture of education benefits to lure young people into the military, but most of these young people have a tough time remaining in school until graduation unless they go into debt. Not quite what Uncle Sam described. The post-WW II GI Bill made a college education and home ownership (through low-interest loans) more accessible to low- and middle-income Americans than at any other time in history. Those days are long gone and huge Federal deficits guarantee they will never come back.
Gene Fifer
Charlottesville
Nobody’s home
One of my favorite bumper stickers is the one that says “The War on Poverty: Too Bad We Surrendered.” Local social worker Jennifer Isbister is to be commended for reminding us that there are still some soldiers out there fighting the good fight [“This space not for rent,” Fishbowl, April 29].
If only more people on the front lines of the war on poverty would follow Isbister’s example and speak out on issues like the shortage of affordable rental housing for low-income working families, maybe the City would pay greater attention to these problems. And contrary to some assertions made in your article, there is a lot more the City can be doing (even within its limited means) to address the affordable housing crisis in our community.
One simple first step would be to re-direct the funds it has been using to support middle- and upper-class housing projects toward developments that include a broader mix of incomes. After all, why should my elderly and working-class neighbors in Belmont, living on limited incomes and paying ever-escalating property taxes, have to subsidize the construction of $200,000 houses and $300,000 condominiums elsewhere in the City?
Dave Norris
Charlottesville