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Show Thinks It's Sour Grapes When I read the news item on the front page of the July 9 issue of the Garfield County News, my reaction re-action was good, this is the way it should be. Brief, factual and to the point; however, when I read the editorial ed-itorial on page 2, my first thought 'vituperate', but I will use the term "sour grapes" to express my opinion opin-ion of this editorial. I personally feel that such an editorial was meant to be a challenge which would elicit a response so I will try to rise to the occasion. I sent the "anonymous" copy of the letter strictly as a news item and since I did not write it, I did not sign it. I informed another employee em-ployee of the paper on July 4 that I had done this and why. After the flaying the district and the three board members received during the early months of this case, I wanted to see if the attitude of the editor had changed following the final resolution of this case and I did not want it influenced by the friendly relationship I have always enjoyed with those who manage the Garfield County News. I hope this good relationship continues to exist. ex-ist. As Superintendent Vermon Barney once said following one of our heated arguments, "if two individuals indi-viduals cannot disagree, even heatedly, heat-edly, and still remain friends, then they are both in the wrong business." busi-ness." I cannot help but wonder if the writer of this editorial has ever wondered why this case never made it to open court. In my opinion, there are two good reasons for this. One, the thought of a costly lawsuit law-suit was supposed to bring a quick, out-of-court settlement; and two, all of the conditions and events that precipitated the action of the board would have become public knowledge and might have shown that the action of the board was not only correct but necessary. Could have letting it drag on until it was finally dismissed been the only way of "weaseling" out of an untenable un-tenable situation? Was this case costly and painful? Costly, yes. Most often it is costly to do what is necessary. American taxpayers have known this from the birth of our nation in 1776 down to the most recent Gulf War, but they have also learned that it can often be more costly to ignore a situation and try to repair the damage at a later time. Was it painful? I don't really know how to answer this allegation. allega-tion. It must have been painful to someone, but the question is to whom. It may have been painful to some taxpayers, but there are some things that can be more painful in the long run than spending "hard to come by" tax dollars. Our district did receive a lot of publicity, but I disagree that it was negative with the exception of that which came out in this paper and from a half dozen or so individuals. I do not recall reading any negative comments in other papers. The items were just factual and to the point, showing no bias either way. We certainly received a lot of publicity pub-licity within the educational system sys-tem and I do not recall any of it being be-ing negative. In fact, most of it could have been construed as praise for doing a distasteful job that we felt was necessary. We were a topic of conversation at every regional re-gional and state meeting and convention. con-vention. I also disagree that we acted out of character. I think everyone involved in-volved was exactly in character. We were elected to the school board and entrusted with the task of seeing that our district was managed man-aged in a manner that would provide pro-vide the greatest positive benefits for our students, our teachers, our support personnel and the taxpayer. taxpay-er. As individuals and as a board, this has always been our goal. Earl Roe Panguitch, UT |