Dear Editor: This is a response to Sonny Cheatham’s Sept 26, letter pertaining to police officer’s pay.

I was baseball crazy in the spring of 1966. The Braves of Milwaukee would soon begin their first season in Atlanta. Already, I knew their players, Felipe Alou, Hank Aaron, Rico Carty and Eddie Matthews. I had the season’s schedule cut out of the Atlanta newspaper with the first-ever Sunday d…

Dear Editor: Well, once again I had to labor through two pages of rants against Trump and his supporters.

Dear Editor: I was one of around 30 people who recently attended the second annual Citizens Law Enforcement Academy done by the Jackson County Sheriff's Office.

The recent revelations about the Atlanta Public Schools superintendent and her contract not being renewed amply illustrates a big weakness of the state’s open meetings and open records laws.

Dear Editor:  I am thankful for a newspaper which prints political opinions from different perspectives. Jim Kinney’s editorial opinion in the September 4 Jackson Herald gives an interesting insight into how Trump supporters think — I appreciate his sharing.

Dear Editor: A member of the Georgia House recently asked a constituent this question: “What’s wrong with the system of redistricting Georgia’s electoral districts?”

Dear Editor: The Rome Statue which created the International Criminal Court provides the most recent and expansive list of specified criminal acts that may constitute crimes against humanity.

Last month, I received an invitation to a reunion of our 1971 Gainesville Junior College basketball team. Sorry to say, but I had lost track with all but one of them since my wedding day in 1974.

My current heroes are the protesters in Hong Kong. While the rest of the world is upside down from misplaced populism and a massive amount of propaganda, the protesters in Hong Kong are about the only people with clarity in our world today.

I was 11 years old, and she was 13. She was friendly, quick to smile, showing her perfect white teeth. She learned my name, and I learned hers. For several weeks that summer she came in almost daily to my uncle’s store down in Middle Georgia. We always spoke to one another – by name.

Dear Editor: The August 28 issue of The Jackson Herald had a discussion on the proposed 5G cell towers installations and the legislature's mandate that preempts local governments have any say in the matter.

This is the time of millage rates. Local government entities are setting them for the fiscal year 2020.

If our society is to heal the divides we currently face, two things must happen. First we must begin to learn to listen and secondly, we must be willing to acknowledge not all of our opinions/positions are without error.

For two years, James Fulton Foster remained in prison, convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of Charlie Drake, gunned down in his home. James Horace Wood and my father, Floyd G. Hoard, were his attorneys filing the appeals and pushing for a new trial, all in an effort to keep him alive.

Rep. Rashida Tlaib, Rep. Ilhan Omar and President Donald Trump all have something in common: All three have trotted out anti-Semitic rhetoric in recent weeks to further their own political agendas.

Dear Editor:  Nowadays, someone would have to live under a rock not to know that a violent crime wave has Americans concerned about their safety. Voices of rage in the anti-gun movement would have us believe that gun manufacturers, licensed gun dealers, law-abiding gun owners and the NRA are…

Recently, Chris Stirewalt of Fox News commented that after the 2018 election results, the Tea Party movement has lost its relevance.

Seven weeks after Jefferson merchant Charles Drake was gunned down in his home, a visiting judge appointed Horace Wood and my father, Floyd Hoard, to defend James Fulton Foster, accused of Drake’s murder. They were given six days to prepare the case.

Some interesting things have occurred at local government meetings recently.

Dear Editor:  I am not opposed to planned, sensible economic growth because I realize that type of growth will enhance our county, however planners should commence these types of studies before approving rezoning annexations of new subdivisions.

Money is on the table in the City of Jefferson, but the game isn't poker. Instead, Jefferson leaders are playing another round of small town Monopoly — "how much money can we hoard."

James Fulton Foster was in the wrong place at the wrong time – yet again. A couple of years earlier, after drinking one beer – and maybe two – too many, he had driven a friend to commit a robbery. Foster, who claimed that he thought the friend was kidding, spent 14 months in a Florida chain …

Foremost in many if not most Americans’ minds these past few days has been concern over the escalating gun violence that has taken so many innocent lives and rocked our news headlines recently.

Dear Editor:  All Americans should be horrified with our epidemic of mass shootings. What will it take to bring these to an end?

We might as well pass a law to leave the American flag at half-mast all the time.

Dear Editor:  Two million American soldiers fought in WWII to defeat Nazism. Out of 140 million Americans, 16 million wore the uniform for our great country.

Dear Editor: I cannot resist further critique of The Jackson Herald. Mike Buffington's recent editorial about standardized testing in Jackson County was informative, explanatory and provocative.

A few weeks ago, I dreamed that it was the first day of school, and I was living in Jefferson again, but coaching football at Banks County High School.

The political battle currently embraced by the left and their PR supporters in the media seems to include the “righteous” concept that diversity is the key to maximizing positive results.

There are a bunch of local city elections coming up in November.

Dear Editor: Do you have to ask permission to name your place of business? No!

Dear Editor: I see our government straying farther away, almost daily, from the system which our founding fathers created.

I was 40-years-old before I performed in something other than a church play, landing the role of Elwood P. Dowd in the Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation’s production of Harvey.

The Georgia General Assembly has spent many years carefully crafting legislation to establish and refine the laws regarding using and selling fireworks in Georgia. On behalf of my constituents who have reached out to me with questions about Georgia’s current firework laws, I would like to pr…

CASTELLINA in CHIANTI, Italy – To allow you to become familiar with a signature wine tasting in the heart of Italy’s celebrated Chianti Classico region, we begin with verbiage from a flyer that we came in possession of while on a trip to North Palm Beach, Fla. several months ago:

One of the more contentious education fads of the past 30 years or so could be going away – and a couple of local school systems are in the middle of it.