Politics could endanger Portsmouth Farmers' Market 501c3 status: Letters

Politics could endanger Portsmouth Farmers' Market 501c3 status

July 4 − To the Editor:

We all love the Portsmouth Farmers' Market and all involved who work so hard to provide us local fresh vegetables, meat, fruit, and flowers along with other local products. It's even more important that we applaud the allowed use of SNAP by qualified market goers. SNAP allows everyone to benefit from the fresh produce and products provided. The market has long been a true Portsmouth treasure. Let's keep it around for many more years.

Out of an abundance of caution and a love of all that Seacoast Eats Local (nonprofit organizer of Several Farmers' Markets) is in charge of, it's against the law for a politician to take a up a leased space at a nonprofit event. A nonprofit (501c3) is not legally permitted to take a political stance or what may be perceived as a political opinion. This law is part of the Internal Revenue Code. That means for the safety of the nonprofit, politicians, however well intended, have no place representing the City in a leased space at a non-profit's event − the Farmers' Market.

This is meant to protect the registered nonprofit 501c3 status of Seacoast Eats Local and the Portsmouth Farmers' Market. The City of Portsmouth is also a registered Nonprofit (501c3). Neither should they be sponsoring one politician or another. Allowing one politician exposure could be perceived as taking a stance behind that single politician. We have nine City Councilors duly elected to represent all interests equally and other places for them all to have exposure. And truthfully, none should be sitting representing City government at the market. We have Market Square and Prescott Park areas for freedom of speech and politicians to make voice.

Freedom of Speech is one of the greatest liberties we have. There's a legal time and place for everything including good government. Please let's not lose the Farmers Market out of ignorance of the law. We gain too much and our farmers and artisans work too hard.

Paige Trace

Portsmouth

An invitation to our Pannaway Manor neighbors

July 4 − To the Editor:

This is an invitation to our Pannaway Manor neighbors concerned about work force housing at the Lister Academy site on Sherburne Road.

Walk through the Frank Jones Farm neighborhood where we live. Like our neighbors in Pannaway Manor, we live in what started as work force  housing for military members of past generations.

A block from our house is Betty's Dream, a supportive apartment complex for the handicapped. There are two condominium communities, Echo Hill and Heritage Hill.  There is the Woodbury Cooperative manufactured home community,  apartments in the Frank Jones Mansion, plus in at least two other multi-family units that bookend our block. Alongside these are free-standing single-family homes, like ours, ranging from modest starters to McMansions.

The streets are quiet and pretty, with no parking or traffic problems. The kids have places to play. The neighbors are friendly. And property values keep rising!

Seeing is believing.  Come, take a look!

Liz and Tom Mooney

Portsmouth

I'm skeptical of climate change prophets of doom

July 3 − To the Editor:

Personally, I have little trust for those prophets of doom who make a living off of taxpayers by predicting the end of times because of normal human activity.  Back in 2007, the UN’s former head of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said that if there was no action before 2012, then it would be “too late.”

Apparently, we have been living in the “too late” era for more than the last 50 years as these predictions of doom stretch back to the 1960’s. In 2008, climate bright light and vice president Al Gore predicted that the Arctic would be ice free by 2013, later moving the date to 2014 as he flew around the world on global warming/cooling/climate catastrophe summits in his fossil fuel guzzling private jet.

From the IPCC to the United Nations, climate negativism influencers abound and their profits and power expand by leaps and bounds as they pilfer more and more taxpayers’ dollars faster than you can yell “Cave In!” to a 12-year-old Congolese cobalt miner.

The Congo has at least 70% of the world’s known supply of heterogenite, an ore which refines into cobalt, an essential element for lithium-ion batteries necessary for your electric cars and cell phones. Child labor is used to extract the ore from small mine shafts hand dug deep underground. This mineral is not known as “Blood Cobalt” for nothing.

While you are looking, do a quick search on open pit lithium mining and the associated environmental costs. I read where the richest known hard rock lithium deposit in the world has recently been discovered a few miles northeast of the Sunday River ski slopes here in Maine. Certainly, skiing can be co-mingled with open pit mining and work force housing units designed to look like ski chalets. 

Michael Dow

York, Maine

Defend The Guard: Upholding the Constitution and protecting 0ur troops

July 3 − To the Editor:

I write today as a concerned citizen, a former NH Army National Guard Sergeant, deeply troubled by the alarming rate of suicides among our military personnel. Every day, it seems another is lost, emphasizing the urgent need for action.

In 2019, while waiting for a fire mission in my HIMARS, I stumbled upon the "Drone Papers," revealing the disturbing truth that 90 percent of those killed by drone strikes were unintended targets, often innocent civilians classified as "enemies killed in action." This revelation shook me to the core. I joined the military to protect the innocent, not to participate in misguided operations.

Some veterans were part of door-knocking raids in Iraq, where we forcibly disrupted the lives of impoverished Iraqis, who had no connection to our conflict. The guilt and weight of our actions haunt us to this day.

It is not only active-duty personnel who face these challenges; approximately 45% of all deployed units are from the National Guard. Back in 2005, during Hurricane Katrina, the Louisiana National Guard was absent, as they were deployed in Iraq.

Our solution is “Defend The Guard”. This legislation would prevent the NH National Guard from being activated for overseas combat unless Congress fulfills its constitutional duty and declares war.

Article 1, Section 8, Clause 11 of the US Constitution states that only Congress has the power to declare war. It is disheartening that we have not constitutionally declared war since 1942, straying far from the principles upon which our Republic was founded.

Let us pass the "Defend The Guard Act"(HB229), ensuring that Congress fulfills its obligations before our friends and fellow Granite Staters in uniform are sent into harm's way. It is time to uphold our Constitution, protect our troops, and restore the principles that define our great nation.

Derek Proulx

Derry

This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Politics could risk Portsmouth Farmers' Market 501c3 status: Letters