Letter to the Editor

To the editor:

Imagine waking up the morning of April 19,1775, to the sound of a British rifle-butt banging on your door.

You open the door and a British officer is confiscating your house for the service of his men.

“Sorry, old chap,” says the soldier. “You should have gone to the library to find out ‘THE BRITISH ARE COMING.’ Too late, we’re here!” Thanks, Paul Revere!

Now, imagine a homeowner way behind in payments wakes up one morning to the knock of a sheriff’s deputy with papers to evict you from your house, which was foreclosed on the day before. “But I didn’t know,” the panic-stricken old lady exclaimed. “It wasn’t in the Town Crier newspaper.” “Well, ma’am,” said the deputy, “you should have gotten in your car and driven to the library, where you could search for the website of the bank or attorney that filed the paperwork.”

Just how stupid are Sen. Andrew Koenig, R-Manchester, and his cohorts like Sen. Paul Wieland, R-Imperial, to sponsor legislation to stop requiring certain public notices in newspapers?

What burden are notices, and on whom? The lawyers? The banks? This is a clear scheme to put more money in the pockets of those who already have it, and to limit the free speech and press rights of papers to publish. This is not “consumer protection,” it is the practice of a carpetbagger.

Given the absolute travesty of millions of shoddy home foreclosures in 2007-2008 by crooked bankers, would anyone trust such entities to play fair?

Mark Crombie
Oakville

Editor’s note: Bills sponsored by Sen. Koenig and Sen. Wieland to stop requiring certain public newspaper notices did not get out of committee in the 100th General Assembly. The Call takes its name and logo from the “town callers” of old like Paul Revere, who delivered the news before there were newspapers.