I read why your editorial board has endorsed Adam Cervera as Broward’s District 6 School Board member, but he seems like another poor political appointment by Gov. Ron DeSantis.
We know what happened to his other appointments to the school board, who also did not live in the districts they were supposed to represent (both of them, Torey Alston and Daniel Foganholi, lost badly in 2024).
For much of the time that Cervera has been on the School Board, he did not live in District 6, and now your editorial tells us that his own children attend a Catholic school. Our schools are losing students to Catholic and charter schools, and he’s going to make decisions on this subject?
That seems like a conflict of interest.
If Cervera is not even man enough to have his own children attend a public school, then in my opinion, he is totally unqualified to serve as a member of the Broward School Board.
— James Harris, Davie
Olga Perez, light and truth
Human interest stories such as the one a letter writer called “disgusting” (“A disgusting ‘sob story,’” Letters to the editor, July 13) are vital to understanding how policies impact everyday people.
These articles strip away the comfortable distance that lets us avoid acknowledging the humanity of others, including people we assume aren’t like us and who don’t share our values.
Articles such as David Lyons’ report on Olga Perez are about light and truth. Sometimes, those truths are inconvenient and uncomfortable, which is why I think letter writer Barry Godofsky reacted so strongly.
Olga Perez, longtime translator for the Guatemala Maya Center in Lake Worth Beach, boards a flight to Guatemala City at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport on July 6. A refugee from violence in her country decades ago, she self-deported after being detained by ICE. (Joe Cavaretta/Sun Sentinel)
Also in the July 13 paper, Sun Sentinel reporting on Alligator Alcatraz reminded us that politicians like DeSantis use red-meat rhetoric, calling migrants “dangerous” and “the worst of the worst.”
Olga Perez, a woman who spent 30 years interpreting for the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office and social service agencies, plainly does not fit that description, yet her story enraged Godofsky.
My message to Mr. Godofsky is that the article he found “disgusting” is actually a mirror. In the reflection, you see the unnecessary pain that the policies and politicians you support have caused people like Olga Perez and her family, and clearly you don’t like what you see.
— I. Scott Singerman, Delray Beach
An ‘illegal’ in a store
In his letter to the editor, Mark Hoffman offers an interesting binary metaphor.
To roughly sum it up, a legal immigrant enters a store and buys something. An “illegal” breaks into the store and steals something.
He conveniently overlooks a third posssible scenario: An “illegal” breaks in and sweeps and mops the floors, dusts the shelves, restocks them where needed, and finally, feeds the shop owner’s cat before leaving.
As the shopkeeper, would you report the break-in and return your store to its previous and untidy mess?
— Jeff Zeitlin, Boca Raton
Shame on Congress
Trump may be my least favorite president of all time. That has to be stated right up front, but look who he ran against (Kamala Harris). We were forced to choose. Some of us used logic, while others used emotion — including a strong dislike for Trump — to vote for his opponent.
Every day in every way, the news media has been ripping Trump apart. Some of it was true, and it is sickening. At last weekend’s White House Correspondents Dinner, he gave it right back to them (back in my day, that was called an eye for an eye).
Patriotism must start in Congress, where the 535 members are only in it for themselves. It’s disgusting. If you ran a business with that attitude, you would file for bankruptcy. I’m ashamed of them. We need leaders and patriots, but look what we have on both sides of the aisle. Shame on you, Congress.
— Earl Strugger, Boynton Beach
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