September 6, 2018 500 AM
Dear Editor: I am writing regarding school safety. My daughter, Louise Culbertson, was instrumental in organizing the Big Bend area March For Our Lives event in March 2017. The Marfa event was one of many gatherings throughout the US and internationally. The purpose of these gatherings was to acknowledge and to protest against gun violence and killings of students in schools across America. The Sentinel, during its back-to-school issue, featured increased security access and safety fencing at Presidio ISD. Personally, I think Marfa ISD, in co-operation with the City of Marfa, is a template for the nation. Housing police officers in what was the superintendent’s office across the street from the high school is a great for everyone. Maybe providing police with housing next to schools in the US would provide a deterrent for would-be shooters as well quicker response times when our schools and children come under threat. While I’m not an educator or familiar with law enforcement, I’m thinking that having security nearby as opposed to invasive and costly patrolling in the schools could very well be a good idea for our community.
Don Culbertson Marfa
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June 13, 2018
The Honorable Wilbur Ross Secretary, U.S. Department of Commerce Washington, D.C. and The Honorable Robert E. Lighthizer United States Trade Representative Washington, D.C.
RE: Investigations 701-TA-584 and 731-TA-1382
Dear Secretary Ross and Ambassador Lighthizer:
I write today to express my deep concerns related to the Commerce Department’s preliminary determination in the antidumping and countervailing duty investigations of the import of uncoated groundwood paper from Canada. As the investigation unfolds, I urge you to cautiously weigh potential consequences that would prove crippling to the U.S. paper manufacturing industry. As I hope your investigations have determined, the U.S. newspaper publishing and commercial printinf industry employs more than 600,000 Americans across the country, many of which are residents of Texas’s 23’ Congressional District. The petitioner company, which has sought improper government intervention to comer the market in its favor, employs only 260 individuals at its sole mill. These actions by an individual company have put the livelihood of thousands of Americans, especially in rural areas, in jeopardy. The majority of U.S. newsprint manufacturers, and the American Forest and Paper Association, oppose this petition. While I believe that American prosperity is the underlying goal for both the Department of Commerce and USTR, it’s critical to acknowledge that this market-distorting duty has throttled the ability of small scale papers to survive. As the newspaper industry continues to move forward into the digital age, we must continue to protect the most vulnerable publishing companies, many of whom simply lack the resources needed to move to a digital business model. Many of my constituents, who are still without adequate internet access, rely on their local newspapers as a daily source of news. Unfortunately, these tariffs have already forced some newspapers to reduce paper delivery to only once a week rather than every day. This particular case poses serious economic strains for newspapers across the United States, and the 23rd Congressional District of Texas. I urge the Department of Commerce to properly assess the toll that unnecessary duties on uncoated groundwood paper could have on hundreds of thousands of jobs and local newspapers across the country.
WILL HURD Member of Congress
