Letters to the Editor - 1-4-24

Prioritizing Mental Health in 2024

As we enter a new year, I propose a resolution — let our focus for 2024 be on mental health. Let’s make a collective commitment to prioritize not only our own mental well-being, but also that of our family, friends, and co-workers so we can create a community that actively changes the way mental health is perceived, reduces the stigma, and prevents suicide.

After a year of challenges that have highlighted the importance of mental health, it is time to take the small steps that can make a big difference.

Let us make 2024 the year we:

1. Prioritize Mental Health: Make a conscious effort to prioritize our mental well-being by incorporating self-care practices into our daily routines.

2. Check-In on Others: Extend our compassion to those around us by regularly checking in on friends, family, and colleagues. A simple conversation can make a world of difference.

3. Destigmatize Mental Health: Encourage open dialogue about mental health, dispelling myths and reducing the stigma that often surrounds it.

4. Raise Awareness: Educate ourselves and others about the signs of mental distress and the resources available for support.

5. Promote a Culture of Support: Create an environment where seeking help is not only accepted but encouraged.

It’s time to teach our communities to talk about mental illness without shame or secrecy. Together, we can stop the stigmas associated with mental health and suicide and save lives.

Donna Thomas

Founder, James’s Warriors
Wappinger

Making Amenia Affordable

Lower income people need affordable housing, but everywhere, including in Amenia, they face the same obstacle (Millerton News, “Amenia Town Board delays action on affordable housing at Spruce Hill,” Dec. 14, 2023): Not in MY backyard. Faced with such opposition, the town board has now delayed acting on a necessary change in zoning and, who knows, they may ultimately reject it.

Here is a solution: Approve the zoning-change but require the developer to offer to buy the property of any homeowner in the neighborhood who wishes to sell, for its property-tax-assessment. This is (or should be) the price of the property without the affordable housing development. This requirement would be fair to the existing owners and could do miracles to the tax rolls, since homeowners would no longer wish for low assessments.

People need housing, and because the population grows, this means increased density. But this increase will not occur equally everywhere, which is unfair. My proposal is a way to reduce the unfairness and with it the opposition to new developments.

Moshe Adler

Millerton