Opinions
First and foremost, I would like to extend my heartfelt gratitude for electing me to serve as your State Representative for the 155th District. I am committed to doing everything within my power to support our district and the wonderful citizens who reside here. If you require any assistance or...
This week, a press release written through artificial intelligence (AI) was submitted to me. I had not thought that it would come to Willow Springs so soon, but it has. We have never had an AI policy before – but here it is.
There will never be AI-generated content in this newspaper while...
It seems to me that there is a lot of negativity in the news lately. I thought that it was time to express my appreciation of something that happened at the Senior Center Christmas Dinner today. Two businesses paid all expenses for the supplies for the meal. The Willow Springs Middle School...
Upon reading last week's critical review of a personal opinion that you previously printed, I was reminded this Christmas season of the old movie classic "It's a Wonderful Life," where the miserable Mr. Potter wasted his entire futile existence running roughshod over every resident of little...
The holiday season is such a strong coercer of nostalgia; who doesn’t hear Bing Crosby in the air and imagine Norman Rockwell scenes when the final month of the year comes around? Before electricity and all the distractions that come with modern life, storytelling was often the evening...
In a column in your Dec. 4 edition, you took issue with remarks I made at a public “fireside chat” program sponsored by the Lincoln School project in West Plains. As requested, I gave an assessment of the state of the news media. I said national news media failed us in coverage of the...
Every autumn of my childhood the adults in my family would sigh and declare, “Christmas will be here before you know it, then it’ll be a new year. The older you get the faster time goes!” My cousins and I would roll our eyes and respond that the school year never seemed to go very fast. As with...
We would like to take this time to say thank you to everyone who had a part in making the "Sharry Lovan Benefit" a huge success. We are so appreciative of all the hard work that went into making this possible. May God bless each and every one of you to the fullest.
My appointment as Interim Fire Chief was not a position that I applied for. Rather, I was asked to step in due to ongoing personnel issues that created an environment of distrust which eventually lead to the Fire Chief stepping down. In the past, I served as fulltime firefighter in a department...
I think that maybe the data needs to be shown of how many times mutual aid has to be called out for our fire department in Willow Springs because we don’t have enough firefighters to work versus how many volunteers are “on staff”. Volunteers can’t always make it there, and if anyone’s ever dealt...