22 MONTEREY COUNTY WEEKLY DECEMBER 18-24, 2025 www.montereycountynow.com HEALTH CARES Wow. I hope it happens! We tried it when I was there but it failed (“CHOMP nurses are organizing to form a union, citing patient safety as their main concern,” Dec. 11-17). Anne McCambridge | via social media They’ve been cutting corners for years. I worked there until 2019. For many years it was such an enjoyable place to work and I was proud to say that it was my place of employment. Now, not so much. Best of luck to all hoping to find empowerment and protection from the implementation/installation of a union. Erica Aronovici | via social media Nurses are the ones absorbing the consequences of a broken system. This would be a step in the right direction for them. The nurses I’ve had at CHOMP were amazing and topnotch. Hope this works out for them. Seth Metoyer | via social media MIIS OUT Thank you for covering this story and please do keep following it and reporting developments (Middlebury College’s board decided to close the Monterey Institute, but some faculty are hoping to rehome it,” Dec. 11-17). It’s a great asset to our community and I hope another institution does step forward to keep it here. When I was an Administrative Law Judge and had hearings in this area, I had translators from MIIS appear on behalf of non-English-speaking witnesses. (This was before the affiliation with Middlebury.) The quality of the translators was excellent. This is just one example of the positive impact of this school. Barbara Moore | Monterey I’m grateful for your coverage of the MIIS story and I hope you stay on it. I’ve been grateful for Monterey County Now for years, allowing me to keep up with the goings on while I live overseas (I’m a professor in New Zealand now). You might find what I wrote about the MIIS saga worth reading as well: un-diplomatic.com/p/on-utopias-imperial-decline-and-monterey. It’s a love letter to Monterey as much as an analysis of what’s happening to MIIS. Van Jackson | Wellington, New Zealand ANTISOCIAL MEDIA How does he know who inside a restaurant is illegal? By profiling anyone and everyone with brown skin?!? OMG (“A wine and restaurant influencer promises to help local restaurants, but then they say he turns on them,” Dec. 11-17). Maureen Wruck | Salinas A lot of denials. Sure hope you do a follow-up and get to the truth. Stephen Moorer | Monterey The whole Peninsula should boycott him. Robbie Evans | via social media And just like that, I don’t see his posts…Good. Jennifer Stewart | via social media OFF THE LOT They got almost no notice close to two weeks before Christmas (“Seaside’s Hyundai dealership suddenly closes, opening a hole in the city’s budget,” posted Dec. 12). They were told they were getting severance at least. That severance ended up being $1,100, probably not a week’s wages for most of the salespeople. How cheap can they be? They were also told if they didn’t stay until the end of the day, while there were no cars to sell, they would be considered to have resigned and would not get the severance. Ingrid Markham | Seaside DORM ROOMS It’s not quite correct to say an office building is being transformed into dormitories, because before Gavilan Hall was used as offices CSUMB used it as a dormitory, and before it was a university dormitory it was an Army barracks (“CSUMB breaks ground on transforming an office building into on-campus sophomore housing,” Dec. 4-10). Word of mouth had it that it was purpose built by the Army to be a women’s barracks when the Army first integrated women into the force. Honestly, it never was a very good office building. Mike Lerch | Seaside AND, SCENE Absolutely brilliant pitch on a movie for Carmel! (“Squid Fry: Perfect Pitch,” Dec. 11-17) Admittedly, these Hallmark things are kind of cookie-cutter, but I hope you get paid for the perfect idea. Only a local would be able to dream this up! I’ll be looking for it next year. Colleen Anderson | Salinas PEP IN HER STEP [Peppoli is] our favorite restaurant in Monterey County! Well deserved (“Chef Angela Tamura took an Ivy League education and turned it into award-winning cooking,” Dec. 4-10). Michelle Williamson | via social media SPEAK UP Leon Panetta recently addressed a PBS fundraiser on the Monterey Peninsula that some of us attended. Asked for five steps we can take to preserve this country’s democracy, he replied: 1. Vote. 2. Establish a legal task force locally. 3. Express concerns. Protest. Be vocal. 4. Let local leaders know what we are losing in government funding. Work to restore that funding. 5. Send letters to the editor and to our leaders. Embrace free speech, and come together to express concerns. This letter is our attempt to implement Leon’s fifth suggestion. We will be working together on all his suggestions, learning from and networking with each other and others about how to be effective. His second suggestion is a new idea to us, and we look forward to learning what efforts have been made to establish a local legal task force and how we can help. Ladies Aid Society & Sidewalk Patrol (Hans and Annemarie Bleiker, Judy Dow, Dianne Driessen, Sally Eastham. Carol Galginaitis, Nancy Harray, Peter Lesnik, Linda Lee, Bonnie Lockwood, Bella Lofaso, Gina Puccinelli and Jane Sink) | Monterey LETTERS • COMMENTSOPINION Submit letters to the editor to letters@montereycountynow.com. Please keep your letter to 150 words or less; subject to editing for space. Please include your full name, contact information and city you live in.
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