Please ask your congressman to oppose HR 3824, Congressman Richard Pombo's "Threatened and Endangered Species Recovery Act," which will remove protections for our most vulnerable plants and animals.

Some may say, "It's only a spotted owl. Only a Karner Blue Butterfly. Only a timber rattlesnake. Only a spotted salamander." But each species plays a vital role, and we can't keep thoughtlessly pulling them out and discarding them as if they did not matter. One day, our entire ecosystem may collapse, because we dismantled it bug by bird by mammal.

We can not continue to weaken laws that protect our plants and animals if we wish to have a healthy, sustainable, balanced life here on earth.

Please write or call Sen. John Sununu at (202) 224-2841, 111 Russell Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510 and Sen. Judd Gregg at 225-7115, 125 North Main St., Concord, NH 03301.

Thank you for taking this important action now!

Judith Lindsey
Candia

After an agreement with them to cancel a contract, they gave me a check which I learned five days later from my bank that it was returned for insufficient funds. The cost to me was $10, plus the original amount of the deposit, $200.

After I learned this, I called the number I had for the offending business and left the message that I was going to call the police.

I did call the police and officer Jay Defina came to my home, took a report and advised me of my choices in any effort to recover my money. In the event that some phone calls and persuasion did not work, I would have to prove that the person who signed the check was really a person and did approve giving me the check.

Officer Defina went to a known address of the offending party and left messages with a person on the premises that the offending party was in breach of the law and would be subject to prosecution if the money was not returned.

He returned to my home where the paperwork was completed and advised me to call the station and have him paged if the offending party showed up, in order to defuse any incident which might have occurred or any damage to me or my property at the time.

As a senior citizen, 75 years of age, and with a heart condition, I appreciated his efforts on my behalf and agreed to the plan to call if they showed up. On Sunday morning, the next day, Sept. 24 at 8:30 a.m., a member of the offending business called and said they would return the money that afternoon. I said to bring it now.

I then called the station and Officer Defina called me, and said he was coming over. The party showed up, and, during the time they were here, Officer Defina called me again and said that his supervisor did not think it necessary for him to be there since it was now called a “civil matter.”

He was embarrassed, and I was concerned. Assuming that the bad check writing was indeed a criminal act, how was the potential danger to me and my property simply a “civil matter” that did not warrant the protection of the Hooksett Police of a citizen of the town?

I would like to have the Hooksett Police explain to me what good a cruiser at the entrance to the park would have done for me, had an incident occurred, putting me in jeopardy from people known to the Hooksett Police and who are familiar with their practices.

Norma Conyngham
Hooksett

This year's town report tops them all. Most of it is fairly useless information compiled in a confusing manner, probably on purpose. The pictures are nice, but too much of it seems outdated and incorrect. The numbers seem to have the flavor of being well-cooked or simply made-up. Some aren't even there. Get a copy of this report, you paid for it, see for yourself.

It is rendered virtually worthless by the auditor's report. Each year, the auditor's report gets less reassuring. This year, it is an indictment, if you ask me. Allow me to quote:

"For the year ending June 30, 2004. Management has not provided government-wide financial statements to display the financial position and changes in financial position of its governmental activities and business- type activities. The financial statements do not contain any information on capital assets because the government has not maintained historical cost records of such assets. Management has not presented a management's discussion and analysis as required. Therefore we do not express an opinion on the accompanying combining and individual fund statements and schedules." Dated: Sept. 10, 2004!

The report itself was a waste of your money!

So, nothing is really known. They handle millions of dollars and they basically tell us to **** in our hats when we ask questions. We only get the shakedown and the boot. Where is the money? Nobody can, nor will, say for certain apparently. How much is spent and to whom is it given, ditto. If this were your company, what would you do, just before calling the FBI? Me, I'd fire everyone and change the locks and codes immediately. Better to be an idle fool than a working fool.

I don't know about you, but if something isn't shaken up and out real soon, I intend to divest myself of my shares in this Corporation of Hooksett. Yes, I'm ready to pull up my stakes. If it quacks like a duck, walks like a duck and looks like one, it probably is a duck.

David Ross
Hooksett

He has appointed judges to the federal courts who share his judicial philosophy, and his appointees have been rated the best qualified of any recent administration by the American Bar Association.

No nominee to the federal courts of appeals had ever been filibustered prior to the Bush Administration, but a minority of Senate Democrats has conspired to filibuster 10 of Bush's judicial nominees. President Bush will continue his efforts to end this obstructionist behavior.

Richard A. Bloom
Hooksett