CHEERS to inmates from local minimum-security prisons who help with community labor through work-release programs. A good example of this happens routinely at the Interfaith Food Shelf in Plattsburgh. At least once a month, prisoners from Altona Correctional Facility provide the manpower to help unload large deliveries of commodities for the Food Shelf. "As our labor force is not always large in numbers, the labor provided by the inmates is deeply appreciated," Nancy Hobbs, a Food Shelf organizer, told the Press-Republican. It is only one of many chores that inmates from local prisons do to help this region. Altona crews also participated in renovating St. Mary's Mission Center in Champlain, for example, and you can see inmates doing brush cleanup on road crews and performing other duties. Their work saves our communities money because agencies don't have to hire someone to do the jobs. And it surely must bring a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment to the inmates. That rewarding feeling that they are doing some good may even make a difference in their post-prison lives.
JEERS to a petty thief — and we do mean petty — who, the Clinton County Sheriff's Department said, recently made off with a couple of bags of returnable bottles and cans from his neighbor's porch. We hear all kinds of stories about the oppressiveness of the deflated economy and what it has done to people's lifestyles. We hear of how lost incomes have driven otherwise-law-abiding citizens to crime to fill in the gaps. But come on, has the world deteriorated to the point where somebody needs the proceeds of another person's recyclables? A 29-year-old Plattsburgh man allegedly grabbed two garbage bags full of recyclables and took them to Walmart, where he planned to redeem the booty for the munificent sum of $7.80. Yes, that decimal point is placed accurately. And for that, a person's reputation could be forsaken. The owner of the recyclables followed him to Walmart, stopped him from returning the bottles and called police. The suspect fled in a friend's car but was nabbed in a traffic stop soon after. The case is proceeding through the courts, but we have to wonder at the idea that someone would take a chance on a crime — and possible resulting punishment — for a profit of less than $8.
— If you have a Cheers and Jeers suggestion that you want the Editorial Board to consider, email it to Editor Lois Clermont at letters@pressrepublican.com.
