The Press-Dispatch
Issue link: https://www.ifoldsflip.com/i/1449492
The Press-Dispatch Wednesday, Feburar y 9, 2022 C-5 Biden's commitment to nom- inating an A frican American woman to the court. South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham has signed off on the impressive credentials of one such can- didate — South Carolina fed- eral district Judge J. Michelle Childs. Let's give Childs, and the process, the respect they de- serve. Star Parker is president of the Center for Urban Renewal and Education and host of the weekly television show "Cure America with Star Parker." years. percent. pol- ex- Feder- would be Yellen inflation is retire ad- tweeted: charging goug- econ- new ex- pric- companies gonna be supply much ex- government's more from mon- Trump, trillion. it's year. more — money? own, politi- more, out of what experiment, than ev- sloshing mon- notice not does to pil- reduce sav- Most of to bills re- the- government money, government to con- says before. Nixon or- much that price people's in- Henderson. just information. guide "Mess the what to produce. price of Immediate- Bal- footwear suppliers to need. some inter- the prices, gasoline. I search- it's that says than thermom- temperature, actual to a Letter to the Editor Clarifying EMS spending Letters to the Editor SIGNED LETTERS MUST BE RECEIVED BY NOON ON MONDAY shortage of food. And yet in- flation got much worse. 270 percent, 700 percent, even- tually 400,000 percent infla- tion! Once inflation starts, it's hard to stop. In Zimbabwe, President Robert Mugabe couldn't col- lect enough in taxes to pay for his grand plans, so he printed more money. A few years later, Zimba- bwe was printing 100 tril- lion-dollar bills. Such drastic inflation hasn't happened here. It probably won't because re- cently the Fed reigned it- self in. But with Democrats and Republicans eager to spend more, it could happen here. John Stossel is creator of Stossel TV and author of "Give Me a Break: How I Ex- posed Hucksters, Cheats, and Scam Artists and Became the Scourge of the Liberal Media." Court Report CRIMINAL DOCKET Pike Circuit Court Dustin Easmon Dyer charged with op- erating a vehicle with alcohol concentra- tion equivalent to 0.15 percent or more, a class A misdemeanor and operating a ve- hicle while intoxicated, with a prior con- viction within 7 years, a level 6 felony. Jason D. Coomer charged with posses- sion of methamphetamine, basic offense less than five grams, a level 6 felony. Alison Austin charged with possession of methamphetamine, basic offense less than five grams, a level 6 felony. SMALL CLAIMS Pike Circuit Court Indiana Farm Bureau Insurance a/s/o (on behalf ) of Cassandra Drew sues the Indiana Dept. of Transportation. INFRACTIONS Pike Circuit Court Jonah Z. Ashlock charged with speed- ing in a 55 mph zone. Austin J. Newsome charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Michael S. Trueblood charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Kaleb R. Edwards charged with dis- tracted driving. Melissa E. Spivey charged with operat- ing a motor vehicle with a fictitious plate. Tara B. Swickard charged with driving while suspended. Camden K. Roembke charged with speeding. Hannah R. Parson charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Amaya L. Smith charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Antoine R. McNeal charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Haven R. Messel charged with speed- ing. Caprina Renee Miles charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Lainey N. Coffman charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Kolten M. Jenkins charged with speed- ing. Janson M. Sherer charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Alonzo J. Jefferson IV charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Aireanna M. Parrish charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Nestor J. Santiago-Sacarello charged with speeding in a 30 mph zone. Tyler C. Whitlow charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Stephen A. Habig charged with speed- ing. Karen A. Mitchell charged with speed- ing. Lorenzo L. Bradley III charged with speeding. Craig R. Mattingly charged with speeding in a 55 mph zone. Judy L. Heller charged with speeding. Lyle J. Dykstra charged with speeding. Kristin N. Osborne charged with speeding. Adrian L. King charged with speeding. Sameer Ahmed charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Tiffany L. Wallace charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Crystal M. Perez-Barron charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Briannah C. Andis charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Jeffery S. Neal charged with following too closely. Jennifer L. Baker charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Trevor C. Fiscus charged with speed- ing in a 55 mph zone. Holly A. Markel charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Christi L. Patterson charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Christopher K. Herz charged with speeding. Tyler L. Jarvis charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Tashana A. Ward charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Patrick H. Long charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Treven J. Maier charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Naga S. Sirikonda charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Charlene R. Doan charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Justin D. Smith charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Cheyenne C. Poindexter charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Francisco J. Petronilo charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Cuahutemoc Fernandez Jr., charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Matthew A. Lehman charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Scott k. Witsman charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Tessa G. Vinnedge failure to yield right of way at highway entrance. Ka Lashia Ni Kole Jones charged with speeding in a 70 mph zone. Alyssa N. Rainey charged with speed- ing in a 70 mph zone. Alexix Rosales Castro charged with speeding. TRAFFIC AND MISDEMEANOR Pike Circuit Court Patricia E. Adler charged with reckless driving, driving at unreasonable high or low speed so to endanger safety. Renato A. Zaboni Tarazona charged with possession of marijuana. sions rather than Washing- ton bureaucrats and politi- cians? There have been a multi- tude of other snafus by the government that only vali- date the utter incompetence of big government. Some $ 300 billion was stolen by fraudsters who ripped off the Medicaid and unemployment benefits programs. Now here we are, two years from the start of COVID-19, closing in on 1 million dead and $5 trillion more in debt. Millions of children have suffered, perhaps irrepara- bly, from a loss of schooling (some of which still goes on in some districts). There are some 50,000 to 100,000 deaths of despair caused by the lockdowns. And the vi- rus is still out there, though thankfully in retreat. Big government didn't save us. On the contrary, big government has left us weak- er as a nation in every way, and we will spend decades cursing the fact that we pan- icked and handed over so much power to so many in- competent people in Wash- ington. Stephen Moore is a senior fellow at Freedom Works. He is also author of the new book: "Govzilla: How The Relentless Growth of Government Is De- vouring Our Economy." Dear Rusty: If we take our Social Se- curity at our full retirement age (66 years and 6 months for both of us) and we both continue to work, what are the income tax consequences? Is there an age at which we can still work and draw Social Securi- ty without tax consequences on our ben- efits? Signed: Overtaxed Couple. Dear Overtaxed Couple: Regardless of when you claim your Social Security benefits, whether those benefits are sub- ject to federal income tax depends entire- ly upon your income as reported to the IRS. This is true even if you collect Social Security benefits after you reach your full retirement age - there is no age at which SS benefits become exempt from Federal Income Tax. Here's how it works: Taxation of your Social Security ben- efits depends on two things – first, the amount of your combined income from all sources (known as your Modified Adjust- ed Gross Income or "MAGI") and sec- ond, your income tax filing status (wheth- er you file your income taxes individually or jointly as a married couple). Your "MA- GI" consists of your Adjusted Gross In- come (AGI) on your income tax return, plus half of your Social Security benefits received for the tax year, plus any other non-taxable income you may have had. If your MAGI for the tax year exceeds certain thresholds, then some of your Social Secu- rity benefits are taxable at whatever your normal IRS tax rate is. If, as a couple, you file your income tax- es as "married-filing joint- ly," and your MAGI is over $ 32,000, then 50 percent of your Social Security bene- fits received during the tax year becomes part of your overall taxable income at whatever tax rate is standard for your in- come. But if your MAGI as a couple for the tax year exceeds $44,000 then up to 85 percent of your SS benefits becomes part of your overall taxable income. If your MAGI as a married couple is less than $ 32,000 then your Social Security benefits aren't taxable. For those who file their federal in- come taxes as a single the thresholds are lower. If your MAGI as a single fil- er is $25,000 or less, your Social Secu- rity benefits aren't taxable. However, if your MAGI as a single filer is more than $25,000, then half of your Social Securi- ty benefits received during the tax year becomes part of your overall taxable in- come, and if your MAGI as a single filer is more than $ 34,000 then up to 85 percent of your benefits for the tax year becomes part of your taxable income. But a word of caution for those who are married but choose to file taxes "married - filing separately"- if you file sepa- rately and live together at any time during the tax year, the threshold for taxation of So- cial Security benefits is zero. So, Federal taxation of your Social Security benefits depends en- tirely upon your combined income from all sources and your income tax filing sta- tus - your age doesn't come into the pic- ture at all, even if you are collecting So- cial Security benefits after your full re- tirement age. Be aware, however, that a dozen U.S. states levy an income tax on Social Security benefits, so you should check the tax laws in your state of resi- dence to see if some or all your Social Se- curity benefits will be taxed by the state you live in. To submit a question, visit website (amacfoundation.org/programs/so- cial-security-advisory) or email ssadvi- sor@amacfoundation.org. Will my Social Security benefits ever be Non-Taxable? Social Security Matters FAILURE Continued from page 4 INFLATION Continued from page 4 RACE Continued from page 4 To the Editor: In the past, EMS has been the topic of several Letters to the Editor. I don't normally respond to this; however some of the information that has been put out needs to be further clarified to be accu- rate. As I have read what has been printed, it looks to me like EMS is being made out to be a department that just wants to spend money. What one has to remember is that this is not only your tax dollars, but mine also. I agree that health care and every- thing that goes along with it is expensive. However, I do think that we do the best that we can to not overspend and still pro- vide an exceptional service. As I read this last Letter to the Editor, I want to point out a few things. First off, at no time did the County Commission- ers or the EMS Director discuss buying a new ambulance to replace the ambulance that just had an engine blow. The only discussion that we had about this ambu- lance was whether or not a new engine should be put into it at a cost of $25,000. I agree that this ambulance is not worth this amount of money, but it is worth fix- ing when I know the history of the truck. If we were to purchase another used am- bulance, we could be getting something that could cost us even more money than we are spending now. I continue to read about how Mar- tin County can do it so much cheaper. When you look at the bottom dollar, yes it is cheaper, but what kind of service are they providing for that county. I am sure that you don't know this answer, but I do. They have one ambulance that is staffed 24/7 and one ambulance that is a back-up ambulance. If both of those ambulances are out, where does the next ambulance come from if needed? I can tell you that it comes from a neighboring county, or from Vincennes, where the parent com- pany of this service resides. If you ha- ven't been watching the news or know much about EMS, this parent company is closing its doors as of 6/30/2022 in Knox County. Knox County is current- ly looking at ways to have an ambulance service available to their citizens. Now what happens when this parent compa- ny gives notice to Martin County, that they are no longer going to provide this service there? This is not going to leave Martin County with many options for $250,000.00. That's more than enough about oth- er counties; let's talk about Pike Coun- ty EMS. In 2011 when I started as di- rector, we had 1,209 total runs for the year. The collection (income) for that year was $244,890.34 and the expenses for that year were $ 675,928.01. That is an expense to the county of $431,037.67. EMS operated one crew 24/7 and one crew 12 hours during the day. A fter that we relied on volunteer coverage. Now jump forward to 2021. Income for 2021 was $1,475,055.37 and expenses were $1,371,865.91. This is an income to the county of $103,189.46. We operate two crews 24/7, one in Petersburg and one in Arthur. In January of 2022, we added a 3rd crew that works 10 hours a day/7 days a week in Otwell. In 2021 we had 1,812 total runs. In January of 2022, we had 208 runs. If this pace continues we will end 2022 just short of 2,500 runs to- tal. As you can see we are not costing the county the kind of money you are being led to believe. As for the EMS station in Petersburg, I am not sure how it can be said that it is "over-built." To my knowl- edge, the person doing the complaining has never been in this station. When it was built 6 ½ years ago, it wasn't built for 2015. It was built to last into the future, which it continues to do. I am sure numerous people don't know much about EMS: how it works, State re- quirements, etc. I can tell you there is a lot more to it than just getting an am- bulance and taking people to the hospi- tal. Pike County EMS has strived over the past 11 years to provide the best pos- sible pre-hospital care to the people of the county, since we don't have a hospital close. We have great employees that work endlessly to give their best every day. I am grateful to have such a great group of employees. Without the great leader- ship of our County Commissioners and County Council, none of what you have read above would have been possible. By not contracting with a private service we continue to have control over what hap- pens when an emergency occurs in our county. I know that there are a lot of peo- ple in this county who have used the EMS service and probably would not have had the best possible outcome if the service was not here. I hope that each of you re- member this when election time comes around. Chris Young EMS Director