Open your eyes Joanne Stalter! Your "Locals Know Better" letter is offensive to many in the business community.

Have you looked at Canal Street lately? It has not looked this good in many years. Have you looked at downtown Monticello lately? Walmart has decimated Broadway! Whatever hope there might have been to redevelop Monticello has been crushed by blindsighted people like you.

Have you looked for underwear in Shoprite, Image, or either two of the Dollar stores? I have, and they all have underwear. Your underwear argument is not only false it's tired!

Have you looked at what the "locals" have done for Wawarsing? If they knew better than "transplants" why are they in such a hole? Seems like locals had a lot of time to accomplish nothing of great consequence.

As a "transplant" of more than 20 years I have built a thriving business locally.

As a "transplant" I have paid my school and real estate taxes on time for many years.

As a "transplant" I donate regularly to the hospital, local charities, Shadowland, and all the events sponsored by the chamber of commerce.

What gives you the right to insult people who are trying to protect their investment of time and money in "YOUR COMMUNITY"?

You tell me!

Transplant (Name withheld by request)
Ellenville

The Ellenville Playground Committee wishes to thank everyone who helped us with the build of the Ellenville Playground June 10-14. People came from across the state to help us with the five day build despite the rains.

For those of you who took time to give back to the community and help build something wonderful for the children of Ellenville we thank you however the playground is still not finished yet. We still need volunteers to help finish the playground before it can be open to the public.

Karri and I are still out at the site every day since June 14 working with volunteers who want to help finish the project.

Special thanks to Mike Mansfield of Golden Builders, Gary Hill of GH Mechanical, Nate Berg of Barefoot Landscaping, Lyle Yerkes, Earl Evans, Irish Cape Enterprise, Kimball Hose Firehouse, George from the Fire Co., the Village and Town employees, Paul Delamarter, Pamela Herlichy, Samaratan Village, Kohls, Western Union,Carpenter Union Local 19, all of the student volunteers who continue to come out in force, Tom of Quality Removal, all the people who brought us food over the build, our local restaurants and businesses, those who lent us their times and tools, the Shawangunk Journal and all of the people who have supported us over these years.

Thank you to All !!

Ellenville Playground Committee
Fawn, Karri, Tammy and Mike

Living in the "Gunks" used to be simple. People worked, worshiped, and played together. Medical care was simple. We all received our immunizations at the firehouse. We would meet, line up and get our "shots" together. We only went to the doctor if we were too sick to be treated by our parents. If necessary the doctor would come to our house. We rarely, if ever, were given a handful of prescriptions. People only went to the hospital if they were dying or sick, or they couldn't be treated at home. We went to school, unless our fever was over a 100 degrees or we were physically sick. Health insurance did not exist, so our parents had to pay the few dollars it cost to get medical attention.

Today, people go to the doctor if they sneeze. The cost is extravagant. If you go to the "doctor mill" practice they try to sock you with every test known to man (that is how they make their money). People walk out with all types of prescriptions and a week long set of appointments for "specialists". If you really do get seriously ill and end up in the hospital you most likely will never see the doctor you have been going to.

As a society, we have become paranoid. We want to live longer and will go to any extent to do so. I look back at my relatives and realize that those who went to the doctors died an average of 25 years earlier than those who stayed away. The woman (who stayed away) lived into their 90's. They may have had conditions that could have been treated, but choose not to know and live life without medical interventions. The ones who went to get treated died too early in life.

From my own experience, I have found that even when you go for medical attention the chances that you will be misdiagnosed and left dying anyway. The medical profession has you sign off that medicine is "practice". The tests they run are more dangerous to the human body than the disease they are looking for.

I long for the days when medicine was a last resort, doctors actually took the time to get to know their patients, and people just lived their lives without succumbing to the barrage of pharmaceutical adds and "new" testing procedures that will assist in the diagnosis that can be treated with over the counter drugs (like the good old days). I stay away from doctors because I want to live longer, like my ancestors.

Judith Pulver
Walker Valley