Re: Photos: Postville Immigration Rally

Lynda Waddington — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 16:25:33 -0000

To clarify one point I've seen made in this thread: St. Bridget's Catholic Church in Postville is not raking money into their coffers. It's a very small congregation -- roughly 100 parishioners at Saturday mass -- that is spending money just as quickly as the money is taken in.

I'm sure that there is room for debate on if the church is doing the right thing by helping those who have been left in a lurch following the raid; however, it is not fair to imply that those working the ministry are using the crisis to feather their own nests. As one of the journalists who has been reporting on the ground in Postville and who has visited the church and parish several times, there is absolutely no evidence that the church leadership is doing anything improper with the monetary donations that have been collected.

Re: Study finds poor hardest hit by floods

Lynda Waddington — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 17:51:30 -0000

The Time Check and Czech Village areas are definitely older neighborhoods with many working-class families, but I'm not sure if this report completely hits the mark.

That is, I question if it is correct to judge a person's wealth based solely on his/her yearly income. Because these were older neighborhoods, my guess would be that many of the homes occupied by owner were paid for or nearly paid for. Many property owners had begun to make or had completed enhancements and improvements -- new electrical, plumbing, additions, etc. Even those still making mortgage payments were most likely making much smaller payments than those who live in newer areas of the city.

I guess what I'm trying to get at is the definition of poor and wealthy. Is the person who makes $100,000 per year and spends 80 percent of that on various payments more wealthy than the person who makes $50,000 per year and has committed only 50 percent? Is a person who makes $25,000 per year, but has lived sparingly and accumulated savings and retirement accounts considered to be poverty stricken? What about the person who makes $30,000 per year but has sacrificed for years in order to purchase his/her own home and now lives without a mortgage payment?

Instead of making this correlation between poor and wealthy, I think the information would have been much more useful -- and much more true to life -- if the group would have researched which families lost their largest investment and how difficult it will be for those families to replace or repair that investment.

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Re: Photos: Postville Immigration Rally

Re: Study finds poor hardest hit by floods