Breaking News

Opinion

An alternative approach to spending county’s fund balance

Local Commentaries

Money is a funny thing. When you don’t have enough, we grumble. When we have too much, folks argue what to do with it. So, it seems to be true with our County Legislature. I’ve read the various articles and comments in the PJ and Observer for the last few months and it is becoming clear that there are differences of opinion as to how to use the $20 million overage in the fund balance. This is money that is not used in the annual budget but a separate account for emergencies or future projects. As a School Superintendent, this was a common practice. We never knew when a boiler might ...

How aware are you post-9/11?

Local Commentaries

How prepared were we for the surprise attack on the morning of September 11, 2001? Neither was America prepared for it on December 7, 1941. Today it’s not like it was in 1966, 25 years after Pearl Harbor. Imperial Japan was defeated and its threat ended. Is Islam defeated or even in retreat? Are you aware that since 9/11, nearly 50,000 acts of Islamic terror have struck worldwide? In 1966 roughly 300 mosques were in America. Are you aware that nearly 3000 mosques occupy America in 2026? “Death to America” isn’t just heard from the Middle East; it’s being shouted from ...

We need to do better than ‘a room and a key’

In Our Opinion

By now, everyone in Chautauqua County should know that changes are needed in the way we deal with the homeless - both those we see outdoors and those who are being housed temporarily in hotels. For those who don’t, consider something Karen Lippowiths, a documentary photographer from Detroit who has been on a mission to document housing insecurity and homelessness across the Appalachian region, said after staying in what is now known as the Falconer Hotel recently. The hotel, she added, also had a more institutionalized sense to it as well, in that people have ranges of need when ...

Of What Use is a Fine House?

Local Commentaries

Chautauqua County and much of the rest of Western New York is blessed with beautiful, healthy natural resources. Things aren’t perfect, there are scars, but overall our forests, fields, streams, and lakes are a huge asset. It was Henry Thoreau who said, “Of what use is a fine house if you haven’t a tolerable planet to put it on?” Thoreau is questioning the value of human material possessions, like a luxurious house, if the natural environment around us is ruined. A local example is the fine houses surrounding Chautauqua Lake that are suffering the consequences of past and current ...

The Surreal Republican Convention in Dallas

Local Commentaries

“Surreal” is a subjective term describing something that is beyond normal reality...like something out of a dream. That is the way it seemed with the special Republican Convention called by President Donald Trump last week in Dallas. It wasn’t a serious political convention with any real substance. It was a Trump pep rally—a call to the MAGA troops not to look at the price of gasoline or the ongoing war in Iran...but to think about all of the good things going on like the new ballroom at the White House, a new arch near the Potomac, or the U.S. getting oil from Venezuela as ...

Lavish, placid Republican legislators may be on hot seat

Editor's Corner

Right as the controversial data center issue began to ramp up in the spring, our newspaper received a communication from a fired-up individual. As part of the impassioned discussion, the caller made it clear what she was going to say would be important to the Brocton-Portland community. Why ...