To the editor,

Has anyone stopped to think that 90% of the people peddling the notion that “kids should play multiple sports” are the same ones that stand the most to gain from these kids devoting their extra time to multiple sports?

It’s no surprise that the majority of the time we are talking about coaches of sports that involve less specialization (football, track, etc). I wonder what these same coaches’ position is when (heaven forbid) a kid chooses to focus on academics, a part-time job, or (gasp) the arts in their extra time during the school year?

Pay close attention too, these same peddlers don’t stop there, they typically want your kid in a sport that will make them a better athlete for THEIR sport! The football coach doesn’t usually show the same level of excitement when one of their players joins the golf team in the spring season instead of track. Interesting!

Coaches, if you are pressuring your players to play multiple sports, even worse, chastising them for not, YOU are a worse problem than the one-sport athlete. Most high school league policy states that during the off-season, you should have no influence on what your players decide to participate in or not. Shame on you for thinking you are above that. Any by the way, just because you played three sports in high school (like me) doesn’t mean that it is the right thing to do for your players. If you are a coach reading this piece and are wondering if I am talking about you, I am!

John Ronstad

Prescott

Refuse to be left out in the cold

To the editor,

On a frigid Friday lunch hour last week citizens braved the cold to hold signs and wave to drivers along main streets in River Falls, Eau Claire, and 14 other communities, demanding the Wisconsin Supreme Court end gerrymandering and give us fair district maps.

People of Wisconsin—by overwhelming margins—have said, again and again, in polls, in county board resolutions, in county-wide referendums, in legislative hearings, and now by coming out in the middle of January’s arctic blasts that we want independent, nonpartisan maps. Why? Because we want a level playing field for electing our representatives.

The United States was founded on the principle of “no taxation without representation.” Riots and revolutions happen when people have no voice. Gerrymandering robs the people of our voice.

The Legislature has stopped listening to citizens because they no longer need to win voters with good ideas and smart policies. Look at what the last ten years of gerrymandering has brought Wisconsin: One of the highest prison populations in the nation, teacher shortages, folks unable to see a doctor when they are sick.

Instead of investing in our communities, politicians use gerrymandering to amass power and wealth for themselves. The state and the people lose.

Especially while Democrats and Republicans push an ever-increasing partisan division of our society, we need fair maps. We need to refuse to let anybody be left out in the cold.

Tammy Tollefson

River Falls