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Send a letter to the editor to P.O. Box 1600, Dawsonville, GA 30534; fax (706) 265-3276; or email to editor@dawsonnews.com.
DawsonOpinion
WEDNESDAY, June 13, 2018
This is a page of opinion — ours, yours and
others. Signed columns and cartoons are the
opinions of the writers and artists, and they
may not reflect our views.
Would it really
pay you to move
to Vermont?
My daddy used to say we were wasting
money in Georgia painting a center line
down our highways. Nobody ever went
north. They all came down here to live so
they could make fun of how we talk. Well,
thanks to the state of Vermont, that may be
changing.
Vermont, which is located somewhere up
around Canada, recently passed a law that
would pay folks up to $10,000 over two
years to move
there. They say
there are too
many old people
in Vermont,
their tax base is
shrinking and
they want to get
younger people
there before all
the old geezers die off.
According to a report by the Vermont
Housing Finance Agency, predictions are
that one quarter of the state’s population
will be 65 or older by 2030; a 13 percent
jump from 2006.
“The only solution is to bring more peo
ple here, because through natural childbirth
we won’t get there,” says Adam Grinold,
executive director of the Brattleboro
Development Credit Corporation. It is a
known fact that geezers are generally past
their prime when it comes to making babies
and I assume the current crop of Vermont
pre-geezers would rather spend their time
skiing.
The new law has $125,000 in the budget
for 2019, increases to $250,000 in 2020 and
then back to $125,000 in 2021.
There are strings attached, of course,
beyond being able to find the place on the
map. Vermont is very tiny, about 9,600
square miles. By contrast, the Great State of
Georgia — the largest state east of the
Mississippi River — is roughly 58,000
square miles. I don’t know this for a fact
but I suspect we have farms in south
Georgia that are larger than Vermont.
In order to qualify for the money, you
must be a full-time employee of an out-of-
state company and work from home or a
co-located space in Vermont. You also must
also become a full-time resident of the state
after January 2019, and you must take
Bernie Sanders seriously. (Not even for
$10,000 could I do that.) According to
Vermont officials, no more than 25 people
will be able to receive the grant in 2019.
Looking of the positive side, 25 people
would be a nice uptick for Vermont. It is the
second smallest populated state in the coun
try with some 630,000 people. Even Rhode
Island has more people than that. I would
think it would be embarrassing to get beat
en by Rhode Island.
The Great State of Georgia is the nation’s
eighth largest state with some 10.5 million
residents. That is because we have a lot of
pre-geezers in Georgia who would rather
make babies than ski and we don’t have to
pay people to move here. A lot come unin
vited because it doesn’t snow 10 months a
year here and all of our buildings aren’t
rusted.
Before you start getting excited about
moving to Vermont, you need to know this:
The University of Vermont does not field a
football team. Can you imagine not sitting
with 100,000 of your closest friends on a
cool, crisp Saturday afternoon in the
Classic City of the South, Athens, Georgia,
home of the oldest state-chartered universi
ty in the nation, cheering on our beloved
Red-and-Black? What are you going to do
in Vermont on a Saturday afternoon in the
fall? Look at red and orange leaves all day?
Gag me with a spoon.
While Vermont has so few souls that they
are trying to pay people to live there,
Georgia has a bunch we could give them for
free. For example, if you can’t pronounce
Taliaferro County correctly, you don’t
belong here. Same with Houston County,
Vienna and Cairo. If you don’t know the
difference between a Sweet Vidalia onion
and an ordinary Allium cepa, you are not
one of us.
If you don’t get downright teary-eyed
when you hear Ray Charles Robinson, of
Albany, Georgia, sing our sacred state song,
“Georgia on my Mind,” you came from
someplace else and should go back there
pronto.
If “y’all” sounds like a sailing vessel to
you and you think “fixing to” means you
are about to repair something instead of
preparing to do something, you could go
back where you came from and not be
missed. Bless your heart.
I wish little Vermont much luck in their
efforts to financially induce people to live
there. As for me, I am Georgia-born and
Georgia-bred. And you sure don’t have to
pay me to live here. Being a Georgian is
priceless.
You can reach Dick Yarbrough atdick@dickyar-
brough.com; at P.O. Box 725373, Atlanta, GA
31139; online at dickyarbrough.com or on
Facebook at www.facebook.com/dickyarb.
"You know, I miss Deal already."
Post legislative session update:
Combatting opioid epidemic
According to the Centers
for Disease Control and
Prevention (CDC), there is an
epidemic that has claimed
more than 630,000 lives from
1999 to 2016. While your
immediate thought might be
that this epidemic is referring
to vehicle accidents, cancer,
heart disease or another type
of health condition, you
would be wrong. The grow
ing epidemic the CDC is
referring to is drug overdoses
from illicit drugs and pre
scription opioids.
In 2016 alone there were
more than 63,600 drag over
dose deaths and opioids con
tributed to 66 percent of
those. According to the CDC,
this means that on average
“115 Americans die every
day from an opioid over
dose.”
Drug overdoses in Georgia
in 2016, including illicit
drugs and prescription opi
oids, totaled more than 1,400
according to the Georgia
Department of Health data. In
comparison, 10 years earlier
in 2006, the number of drag
overdose deaths was approxi
mately 767. Georgia’s rate of
opioid overdoses rose 10.5
percent from 2014-2015, cat
egorizing our state as a “sig
nificant” increase in overdos
es.
While some may argue
about the causes of opioid
addiction and why overdose
rates have grown so drastical-
STEVE GOOCH
Columnist
ly, the fact of the matter is
that it is killing Georgians at
an alarming rate. This is an
epidemic that will require a
combined effort by our
national and local elected
officials, law enforcement
community, health profes
sionals and our citizens to
end.
During the 2018 session,
we focused on appropriating
funds to combat the opioid
epidemic in Georgia. We
appropriated around $2.3 mil
lion in the Fiscal Year 2019
(FY19) budget for 11 posi
tions to expand drug enforce
ment task forces statewide.
Additionally, $4 million was
appropriated to the
Department of Behavioral
Health and Developmental
Disabilities to provide sub
stance abuse recovery pro
grams and the Department of
Community Health will
receive $244,317 to support
annual inspection of narcotic
treatment programs. These
are just a few of the high
lights of the over $11 million
that was appropriated in the
FY19 budget to address the
opioid epidemic.
In addition to what was
appropriated in the FY19
budget, the legislation below
was passed during the 2018
session:
• Senate Bill 407: This leg
islation gives Department of
Public Health (DPH) the
authority to share prescription
information, if the program or
system contains safeguards
that meet security require
ments of DPH, with a
Prescription Drug Monitoring
Program (PDMP) operated
by another state or electronic
health record system operated
by a prescriber or health care
facility. This legislation was
signed by the on Governor on
May 7, 2018, and will
become effective on July 1,
2018.
• Senate Resolution 832:
Creates the Senate Study
Committee on Risks
Associated with Kratom
which will study the use and
risks of kratom. After con
ducting meetings around the
state with stakeholders, the
study committee will deter
mine if the state needs to take
legislative action to address
this issue.
• House Bill 701: This leg
islation adds all forms of opi
oids to be included in drag
testing for state employment.
This legislation was signed
by the Governor on May 3,
2018, and will become effec
tive on July 1,2018.
As the staggering statistics
show, drug addiction is a dis
ease that affects not only the
person who is suffering from
addiction but their families,
friends, communities and so
many more. It is a disease
that affects people from every
walk of life and doesn’t dis
criminate based on social
class, age, gender or ethnici
ties. Families of those who
lost the battle are left with
years of grief and unanswered
questions. We know this epi
demic is not something we
can cure in a one-step solu
tion but I believe positive
strides were made this past
session.
If you have any questions
about anything related to
appropriations or legislation
aimed at combatting the opi
oid epidemic or other legisla
tion passed this session,
please do not hesitate to reach
out. I will continue to update
you over the course of the
next few weeks on other leg
islation that passed during the
2018 session. Remember, I
am always here to help if I
can be of service in any way.
Sen. Steve Gooch serves as
the Senate Majority Whip. He
represents the 51st Senate
District which includes
Dawson, Fannin, Gilmer,
Lumpkin, Union and White
counties and portions of
Forsyth and Pickens coun
ties. He may be reached at
(404) 656-9221 or via email at
steve.gooch@senate.ga.gov.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
That is enough
If you read my letters you know that I
don’t particularly like President Trump’s
TV show host approach to the presiden
cy. But I strongly agree with most of his
policies. He is working on trying to fix
the major problems facing the country
and he is having some success. The fed
eral judges, the swamp and the
Democrats are not helping at all.
I voted for Jimmy Carter. I voted for
Bill Clinton his first term and attended
his inauguration. I voted for Barack
Obama his first term. I am generally a
Republican but not always. I have
learned my hard lesson. Perhaps you
have too.
Here is what I am now certain about.
The Democratic Party at the national
level has become the party of obstruc
tion. The Democratic Party is the party
of socialism if not communism. The
Democratic Party is the purveyor of con
ventional wisdom, which is to say they
enforce the world views of globalization,
political correctness, encouragement for
Islam, marginalization of Christians,
open borders, confiscation of private
wealth for transfer to their supporters
and a weakened defense for the USA.
They are the enemy of local law enforce
ment.
And worst of all they are the champi
ons of their universal theory of victim
ization caused by white male European
Christian colonialists. They see no value
in western civilization and are ashamed
of it. They teach our children that all the
wisdom of the last 5,000 years should be
discarded. They must believe that chival
ry, civility and modesty are worthless
virtues. They are vulgar and mean and
cruel to anyone who dares disagree.
They claim to champion diversity but
allow no diverse voices to their core
ideas.
It is becoming clear to me the
Democrats must be resisted in every
legal way possible. If left unchecked
they will put the rest of us in re-educa
tion camps. They will use the tools of
power to have their way all of the time
and they will cheat to do it.
The Republican Party, my party most
of the time, also bears close watching.
They have their own problems. But the
national Democrats, as now revealed for
all of us to see must be resisted, sup
pressed, opposed, turned from office,
confronted and challenged. That con
frontation can no longer be quiet. We
are beyond that point. We must politely
and loudly point out their errors and
hope that they will return to their roots as
a party.
Gary Pichon
Marble Hill
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