Letters to the Editor | Aug. 20, 2025

Frank Kummer’s article on the looming disaster in Pennsylvania’s forests is alarming, foretelling a disaster that is more than just potential.

Growing up in Lancaster, my family spent many summer weekends picnicking on the state game lands, reveling in the green cover overhead and the streams below.

Later, my husband and I took our children from the suburbs to Valley Forge National Historical Park, and even later, multifamily pre-Thanksgiving dinner hikes there.

Any drive across Pennsylvania reveals an Eden of parks, game lands, and natural cover for wild animals. (Try it in late fall for a rainbow of leaves.)

None of these walks, hikes, or picnics cost us anything but time and gas for the cars.

It would be a sin not to fund whatever cost must be paid to save our forests.

Anne Slater, Ardmore

Previous letter writers have noted the threat to democracy posed by state legislatures that draw voting district lines to favor one party or the other. But readers might not be aware that in recent history, Pennsylvania was considered the third most “gerrymandered” state in the country, and subsequent to that distinction, the Pennsylvania legislature drew a map so gerrymandered that it was ruled unconstitutional by the state Supreme Court and was ordered to be redrawn under the direction of an approved moderator.

In an effort to ward off subsequent attempts to disenfranchise voters of one party or the other, Fair Districts PA, a grassroots citizen organization, is advocating for a change in the state constitution that would authorize an independent citizens’ commission to handle the job of redistricting, leaving politicians and their allies out of the process. Legislation has been introduced in the House and Senate — House Bill 31 and Senate Bill 131 — with several dozen cosponsors. Without legislative protection, Pennsylvania and many other states are vulnerable to what is currently happening in Texas.

Norma Van Dyke, Philadelphia, nvandyke121@gmail.com

Just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, it gets worse. By order of cult leader Donald Trump, Texas is attempting to rig the 2026 midterms. Due to his poll numbers tanking, Trump is rightly afraid of losing the GOP hold on Congress. So Texas decides to stack the deck by redrawing the voting map to flip what would otherwise be five Democratic seats.

Currently, Texas has 25 GOP members and 12 Democrats (plus one vacancy) in Congress. The GOP has an 88-62 majority in the Texas House of Representatives. How is this possible when voter registration in Texas is 46% Democrat and 37% Republican? This does not pass the smell test by any measure. So is our U.S. attorney general looking into this blatant attempt to further disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of Texas voters? Of course not. They’re investigating the New York attorney general to see if the civil rights of their cult leader were violated.

Certainly, the possibility that the civil rights of a white billionaire who’s been accused of cheating on his taxes big time outweighs the voting rights of the thousands of Black and brown Texans who are getting boat raced by the dictatorship of the minority that rules in Texas. Stop this ride — I wanna get off.

Jim Lynch, Collegeville

Vladimir Putin will not stop the war unless there are disastrous consequences for Russia. And Donald Trump should’ve put them in place long before the meeting in Alaska. After that meeting, and previous ones, Putin thumbed his nose at Trump by stepping up the attacks on Ukraine. Putin hates Ukrainians and wants to bring that country, and the others that were under the Soviet Union‘s control, back under Putin‘s jurisdiction. That’s his only goal.

Trump should have put sanctions, tariffs, financial controls, etc., against Russia in place first instead of waiting. Because we see that asking Putin for a ceasefire, or to end the war outright, got us nowhere. We have to be tough and firm, or Putin will keep on bombarding Ukraine, just like he has since he flew back to Moscow from Alaska.

If we let any aggressor get away with invading another country without cause, we are not solving any problem; we are just creating more in the near future. Without any consequences, what’s going to stop Putin from trying this with another country?

China is watching. So is it going to invade Taiwan and say: Well, you let Putin have the territory he wanted in Ukraine, why can’t we take Taiwan?

We should all be concerned that this is gonna turn out like the 1938 Munich Agreement, with Trump being Neville Chamberlain, and Putin being Adolf Hitler. The result? World War III.

Michael Miller Jr., Philadelphia, michamille@comcast.net

Given that differences between small town and large metropolitan area legislators help to explain the current state budget impasse, why would three Republican state senators from Southeastern Pennsylvania — Frank Farry, Tracy Pennycuick, and Joe Picozzi — side with their rural counterparts in refusing to finance SEPTA and provide court-ordered monies to underfunded school districts?

All service on the Trenton Regional Rail line is scheduled for elimination starting in January, while the West Trenton line will see service reductions. Both of these lines run through Farry’s district. Meanwhile, underfunded school districts represented by State Sen. Farry — Bensalem, Bristol Borough, Bristol Township, and Neshaminy School Districts — will lose $4.4 million.

Pennycuick’s votes would assure that underfunded districts she represents — Boyertown, Pottstown, and Pottsgrove — would lose a combined $4 million, while SEPTA would cut service on the 93 bus through her district by 20%.

Finally, Picozzi’s district in Northeast Philadelphia encompasses several stops on the Fox Chase line, which is scheduled for service reductions, while the one school district he represents — Philadelphia — stands to lose $136 million in court-ordered funding.

As manifested by their recent votes, party loyalty is more important to these three state senators than the needs of their constituents, and it will take more than cultural differences to explain the reason why.

Coleman Poses, Philadelphia

Joe Pittman and Senate Republicans would cut off their noses to spite their own faces if they thought it would hurt the Democratic-leaning Southeastern Pennsylvania. There are great towns and areas throughout the commonwealth, but Philadelphia and the collar counties are the economic engine for the state. Not adequately funding SEPTA will slow down the economy in Southeastern Pennsylvania and will result in less tax revenue for the state overall (wage tax, sales tax, etc.), as well as drive up the need for funds for other social programs. This is an example of someone trying to be powerful, but actually being penny-wise and pound-foolish — with Pennsylvania taxpayers’ money.

Kent Kingan, Malvern

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