Public schools need to open

What do the library, post office, police department and public schools have in common? They are all owned by the citizens. All are open for business except, of course, schools. Schools in particular were built using funds collected from taxes that all of us paid. All of the expenses to run these institutions along with teacher’s salaries are paid by us as well.

Are the taxpayers getting a break or refund due to these public institutions being closed? Of course not.

The library is open to the public; the police station is open to the public, as well as the post office.

Even with strong scientific evidence that children under the age of 18 are of no risk (for COVID-19) to themselves or their community with a 99.9 percent survival rate along with a 98 percent survivable rate for those above the age 18, the schools remain closed. Does this make any sense?

During their closure the teachers continue to be paid by us. Is the public supposed to just sit back and let this happen? Isn’t education an essential element to the human experience? If a store clerk can continue to work and the many malls and grocery outlets operate while being fully populated with all age groups, why can’t a school operate with kids and a single adult?

Frankly, in my opinion, the teachers unions are to blame for this outrageous behavior. If the teachers were out of work and not getting paid, you can bet that they would be advocating for the school reopenings with great enthusiasm. Why aren’t these unions promoting vaccinations for all of the members so they can get back to work?

Again, are they not essential or as essential as a caregiver? If your boss called to advise you that the business you were employed at was temporarily closing and to stay home with full pay, what would you do? Would you be writing letters or voicing your opposing opinion on the matter? Probably not.

In the meantime, families are being ripped apart (and) kids are having great difficulty coping with the stresses of learning from a laptop with no human interaction all for absolutely no intelligent, logical, scientific reason. Are we all just supposed to sit down, shut up and stay quiet?

I propose that we take control of the situation, begin the recruiting process to hire nonunion teachers and administrators and take over the school buildings that belong to us and get down to the business of educating our children. If our past President Ronald Reagan can boot out striking air traffic controllers, we can certainly boot out these miserable teachers unions.

The opinions expressed above belong solely to the author and do not represent the views of the Boulder City Review. They have been edited solely for grammar, spelling and style, and have not been checked for accuracy of the viewpoints.

G. Kevin Savord is currently a professional pilot and former small business owner. He can be reached at gksavord@gmail.com.