Cheers & Jeers
Cheers: Ringgold senior Ryan Pajak won his third consecutive WPIAL Class AA boys cross country gold medal last Thursday. Pajak pulled away to win easily with a time of 15:04 at White Oak Park to rid himself of one of the few demons of his racing past. The last time the race was at White Oak Park was Pajak’s freshman year, when he missed out on gold medal by 2 seconds despite a furious late push. He hasn’t lost a district championship race since, winning easily on Thursday, after earning gold medals the past two years at California University’s Roadman Park. Pajak goes for a PIAA gold medal on Saturday in Hershey. Pajak was second in the state final last year.
Jeers: We wouldn’t be surprised if the sale of aspirin has spiked in Waynesburg over the last couple of weeks given all the headaches officials must be having over absentee and mail-in ballots that have been sent to Greene County residents and have been riddled with mistakes. A first batch of ballots had to be recalled because they incorrectly listed both of the county’s magisterial district judge contests when they should have listed just one or none at all, since there is no race in one of the county’s three magisterial districts. But, rather than fully correcting the ballots, it turns out the replacement ballots still contained a glaring error — it asks voters to choose up to three candidates for the county commission, rather than two. Because the election is Tuesday, the county can’t send out new ballots; instead they have sent letters to voters who have gotten the ballots, and are giving them two options to correct the flawed ballots if they voted for three commissioner candidates. They can either go to their regular polling place on Election Day and ask for a provisional ballot, or stop at the county’s elections office and ask for a new ballot. But, as Democratic commissioner candidate Chris Bailey pointed out, this would be a problem for residents who are homebound or are in the military. Whether this is the result of inexperience, incompetence, or just simple human fallibility, this has been a massive embarrassment for Greene County.
Jeers: For the most part, COVID-19 has faded into the background, with the boxes of masks being stashed away and life proceeding pretty much as it was before the pandemic. But about 1,200 Americans are still dying of the coronavirus every week, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). That’s almost enough to fill the Byham Theater in downtown Pittsburgh. Even more sobering is the fact that few Americans have gotten the latest COVID-19 booster shot, which would help increase immunity and prevent the disease from becoming deadly. The CDC reports that, as of mid-October, just 7% of adults and 2% of children had gotten the latest booster. Of that cohort, only 20% of adults aged 75 or older had gotten the booster, and just 15% of those aged between 65 and 74. Those are the two groups at greatest risk for a severe or fatal outcome if they come down with COVID-19. There have been some bumps in the rollout of the latest booster, but it’s now widely available, and people should get it and not let down their guard.