Beware of dropping sponsors over politics
Editor:
I am the director of a program that depends on donations. We rehab donated vehicles and provide them to low-income West Virginians to help them get off public support and get to work. Occasionally, we receive donations from businesses. We would love it if more companies and businesses donated the vehicles they no longer need for their fleet.
It has never crossed my mind to question a company's business practices when I decide whether to take the donation offered.
On March 20, the Gazette published a Russell Mokhiber commentary that encouraged performing artists and fans of Mountain Stage to sign a petition urging Larry Groce and Mountain Stage to drop Chesapeake Energy as a sponsor because Chesapeake participates in hydraulic fracturing. The letter disturbed me when I followed it to its logical conclusion.
If Chesapeake Energy or any other company offers to donate their fleet vehicles, we would take them with appreciation and without hesitation. Would that make me a supporter of hydraulic fracking? It would not. Would that help us provide more vehicles to people who need them to get to work? Yes, it would.
Many sponsors have policies that are going to be objectionable to somebody. If they try to use their sponsorship to influence public policy, that opens their donations to question. But it is a dangerous precedent to suggest that donations should be refused because their policies are controversial.
If Chesapeake Energy said, for instance that they would donate vehicles on the condition that the state of West Virginia not ban hydraulic fracking, we could not accept them. Likewise, if Chesapeake Energy threatened to withdraw its sponsorship of Mountain Stage if outspoken environmentalists like Kathy Mattea or Appalachian Voices are guests on the show. I would say drop their sponsorship in a heartbeat.
They are doing neither. Charity and arts programs need private sponsorships. The public funding is just not there or insufficient at best. We could not operate without donors.
Mountain Stage brings great live music to Charleston and broadcasts it free to the public. It could not do so without sponsorships that provide needed revenues. That is a fact of life. We need to be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Barbara Bayes
Executive director
Good News Mountaineer Garage
Beware of dropping sponsors over politics
Editor:
I am the director of a program that depends on donations. We rehab donated vehicles and provide them to low-income West Virginians to help them get off public support and get to work. Occasionally, we receive donations from businesses. We would love it if more companies and businesses donated the vehicles they no longer need for their fleet.
It has never crossed my mind to question a company's business practices when I decide whether to take the donation offered.
On March 20, the Gazette published a Russell Mokhiber commentary that encouraged performing artists and fans of Mountain Stage to sign a petition urging Larry Groce and Mountain Stage to drop Chesapeake Energy as a sponsor because Chesapeake participates in hydraulic fracturing. The letter disturbed me when I followed it to its logical conclusion.
If Chesapeake Energy or any other company offers to donate their fleet vehicles, we would take them with appreciation and without hesitation. Would that make me a supporter of hydraulic fracking? It would not. Would that help us provide more vehicles to people who need them to get to work? Yes, it would.
Many sponsors have policies that are going to be objectionable to somebody. If they try to use their sponsorship to influence public policy, that opens their donations to question. But it is a dangerous precedent to suggest that donations should be refused because their policies are controversial.
If Chesapeake Energy said, for instance that they would donate vehicles on the condition that the state of West Virginia not ban hydraulic fracking, we could not accept them. Likewise, if Chesapeake Energy threatened to withdraw its sponsorship of Mountain Stage if outspoken environmentalists like Kathy Mattea or Appalachian Voices are guests on the show. I would say drop their sponsorship in a heartbeat.
They are doing neither. Charity and arts programs need private sponsorships. The public funding is just not there or insufficient at best. We could not operate without donors.
Mountain Stage brings great live music to Charleston and broadcasts it free to the public. It could not do so without sponsorships that provide needed revenues. That is a fact of life. We need to be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Barbara Bayes
Executive director
Good News Mountaineer Garage
Charleston
What motivates 527 organizations?
Editor:
All of those 527 organizations that filter money from Republican operatives like the Koch brothers, Karl Rove's Crossroads G.P.S., The Chamber of Commerce, Republican Governors Association, American Action Network and the favorite of the Republican Party, the tea party as we all know, is funded by the Koch brothers. Well, they must have something to hide as these groups don't want to disclose who is providing the funding for them, while these same organizations attempt to influence elections all across the country.
The new section 527 organizations represent is a direct threat to the rights of voters. These organizations want to obscure their identity. The concept of democratic representation and participation isn't beneficial, due to the lack of information. Elections are held so that individuals can exercise their authority to choose their elected representative. Governments chosen in elections are legitimate and effective to the extent that citizens have the confidence that their choice matters. Disclosure is one element that ensures that the rights and duties of voters are respected and the political system reflects well-informed and well-considered choices of a free person.
Voters, not just these 527 organizations that promote their ideology, have and need the choice of knowing whose alter ego is funding these organizations and why?
When these 527 organizations fund and impose their ideology upon people, through the likes of the Republican Party's politicians, the voters want to know and demand to know where that politician's money is coming from and who do they truly represent?
Jerry L. Payne
Ripley
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