Letters to the Editor | July 13, 2025

Halfway through my recent bicycle trip, I sensed air leaving my back tire. I pedaled to a gas station and asked the attendant if he had air for my tire. He pointed to the machine that required coins. I said I had no money. He smiled and said in hesitant English, “You don’t need worry.” He went to his old car, pulled out his bicycle pump, and smiling, handed it to me and offered me water. I thanked him profusely and pedaled homeward.

I then thought of my immigrant grandfather who came to America searching for a better life in the early 1900s. He could barely speak English, but found employment in a copper factory where he worked hard all his life, raising eight children, one of whom gave me life. No masked men had ever approached him, handcuffed him, and sent him to a foreign prison. Instead, good Americans helped this stranger in need prosper, which also made our community stronger.

We have lost sight of what my new immigrant friend so clearly understands. What makes America truly great is helping fellow humans in need. Acting morally makes us all stronger together.

What have we devolved to? I don’t recognize this icy, cruel America.

Steve Cickay, Newtown

Yes, the trash situation in the city after the District Council 33 strike is abhorrent, but what can we learn from these mountains of bags and debris?

Do we overconsume? Yes.

Are many of us indifferent to how we treat our environment? Yes.

How can we change this?

One answer: Be more thoughtful in our purchasing of everything.

We throw out more food than we consume.

We have more clothing than we truly need. (How many pairs of jeans is “enough”?)

How many kitchen gadgets just sit in the drawer after purchase?

We can take a lesson from some of the smaller cities in Europe — they recycle, compost, and reuse most everything. Bragging rights go to those whose households have less than one bag of trash a year.

They use their reusable bags for groceries, their bottles to refill purified water sold in groceries, and they buy what they need — in terms of both clothing and food for their families — nothing more.

The mayor can use the events of the last weeks as a way to help Philadelphia pivot to a more environmentally aware city.

Nancy Gordon, Philadelphia

With the close of the District Council 33 strike, Cherelle L. Parker’s term as mayor has yet another chapter of failure. In this episode alone, she has refused vital workers a well-earned raise despite persistently low wages, filled the streets with trash after promising “Clean and Green,” and turned what should have been diplomatic contract negotiations into an ego-filled public humiliation.

Mayor Parker has lots of experience with the sort of punching down and betrayal witnessed in the strike. She sold out Chinatown during the 76ers stadium debacle, restricted lifesaving support for the homeless, targeted access to SEPTA for residents in poverty, and abandoned immigrants and the city’s sanctuary status. Meanwhile, her allies get raises, and she plasters her brand across the city using public funds.

It has become apparent that Mayor Parker has no backbone to stand for anyone other than herself, and our city deserves a better mayor than that.

Delilah Del Valle, Philadelphia

“Government has a responsibility to help those who are too old, too sick, too young, too poor, too hungry, and too weak to help themselves.” This has been my mantra through 38 years of teaching social studies. How sad it is to see that the social safety net is now being shredded by the president and Congress.

Howard Brouda, Garnet Valley

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