I don’t claim to know a lot about politics, but what I do know is this: The mayoral candidates are all talking about the airport and Chief Tommy Moffett. Well, that’s all good and fair, but when is someone going to start talking about the young people?

Lately, young people are committing more crimes, including murder and burglary. Something needs to be done to give them something to do when they are not in school.

As a parent, I am afraid to let my 12-year-old go to the mall or the skating rink without me. We live in Vicksburg!

I know we are not immune to the sins of the world, but everybody knows everybody here. Instead of placing the blame on any particular person, we need to work together to ensure the future of this city and county moves forward and not backward. The only answer I see is for all of the city officials, whomever they may be, to get together and help the youth set, work toward and reach some kind of positive goal.

There needs to be more sports activities for young people. When I was growing up, there were plenty of things for us to do.  Now, there is next to nothing for them to do, except get into trouble. I challenge the candidates to look at the real future of Vicksburg, the youth. 

Angela Johnson

Vicksburg

Relay was too rowdy

As a family, we attended the April 24 Relay for Life events at Warren Central High School. This is a very worthwhile event that we have attended, as a family, for many years.

To say the least we were more than surprised by all of the outside distractions that were going on during the event; and especially the total lack of respect by certain groups of people during the lighting of the luminaries. I personally witnessed the Warren County Sheriff’s Department make several arrests. I appreciate what these officers did.

I have been to many events in my life — Mardi Gras seems to come to mind — where the crowd was less volatile than this crowd. Parents should be held accountable for the whereabouts of their children, and when I say children, I’m talking 15-18 -year-old thugs who should be old enough to know better, but just never received the upbringing.

I see this trend in Warren County is on the rise and think what a shame that a few are able to spoil what so many have worked so hard for. Please tell me where to mail my donation. I will mail it in next year. 

Steve Reed

Vicksburg

School violence is serious

I have an 8-year-old son and a 9-year-old daughter who, up until this year had only gone to private school. This school year the private school they went to closed and we put our children in public school. How bad can it be, right? Most of the kids in Vicksburg go to or have gone there.

Let me tell you about the state of this town’s public schools. My 9-year-old daughter has been propositioned by a 9-year-old boy, called names and hit by a boy in her class. My 8-year-old son has been called names, threatened, hit, urinated on in the bathroom and jumped by two boys who ganged up on him in the bathroom and kicked him numerous times.

Every time an incident has occurred I have gone to the teachers about it. My kids have been told to ignore it. When I insisted, the kids were made to go to the principal’s office, yet nothing has ever been done about any of it. I am not even sure if these children’s parents have been notified.

The level of violence in the elementary school astounds me. And the little of nothing that is done about it floors me even more.

My children just happen to go to Sherman Avenue Elementary but numerous other mothers I have talked to have similar problems at many other Vicksburg schools. One mother told me it gets worse in junior high, and worse yet in high school.

I am very fortunate in my life and I don’t have to work. I will be homeschooling my kids beginning in August. I feel sorry for all the parents who don’t have this luxury and have to leave their kids in those horrible situations.

If you only have one child there are several affordable private schools in this town and you won’t have to deal with this sort of thing, but when you have two kids it gets close to $900 a month to send them to private school. Public school is the only choice for so many people.

Vicksburg officials should be ashamed of the condition of the schools and the administrators of the schools need to take this child-on-child violence way more seriously before there is a lawsuit, or worse, we have a tragedy like we have seen recently in the news where boys have committed suicide after continuously being picked on at school. This is no joke.

Peggy Brister

Vicksburg

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