Those who know homelessness can solve it

Bronx: A cottage industry has developed regarding homelessness, and what was started under Mayor Ed Koch’s administration in the 1970s has morphed into “housing experts” who receive hundreds of millions of dollars yearly. Yet, it only churns people through the system.

It’s time for those who’ve experienced homelessness to be trained to lead and run homeless services. Not only direct-care staff, but CEOs and board members. There’s such a negative bias against people who have no stable or permanent housing. They’re penalized for it. We are all tired of seeing people not able to take regular showers, having to wear dirty, crusty, smelly clothes, and having no access to bathrooms.

Too many people collaborate to kick the homeless can down the road. After 50 years, we know what needs to be done. We must admit that NYC spends so much money, but only a minuscule number of people receive help that enables them to live in permanent, stable housing. We can start with large nonprofits changing their internal cultures. Allow those who’ve experienced the whole range of homeless services to bring direction, not just add some “color” to turning the homeless situation around. Mayor Mamdani needs to be supported by all New Yorkers as he works to bring this situation into the light, a new day and a new model.

B. Jones

Let scores decide

Manhattan: Re “Looking to the future” (July 26): Decades have passed since NYC had one of the top-performing public school systems in the U.S. Classes for gifted children were abandoned in the name of diversity, resulting in whites and Asians fleeing the system. Today, NYC public schools are majority minority, and underperforming. The SHSAT test for gifted children, and IQ tests in general, are not a 100-year-old plot for Asians (the highest scoring) and against Blacks. They’re an accurate evaluation of potential academic ability. To slow down the education of above-average white and Asian children in pursuit of different skin colors is an uneducated thing to do, especially in grade school, when permanent neurological wiring of the brain speeds along. Children of different races should mix in school, and they can do that in art, music and gym classes and at the lunch table.

Ingrid DuBois

Lost this round

Tamarac, Fla.: All human beings are born free and equal. They’ll strive to maintain their lives freely, equally and with dignity. Some become great leaders with bold, visionary insights, and some try to transform a peace-loving country into radical, ideological turmoil, as seen in the United States today. Some people will be followers, some will lose footing and some will stay alienated by wrong leadership. It is our right to think, feel, vote and choose. Sometimes we win, sometimes we lose. This time around, we lost! We lost a place that was beautiful, safe, exciting and dear to our hearts. We lost New York!

Roberta Chaleff

Move over, Knicks

New Rochelle, N.Y.: Ending a 53-year championship drought is one thing; exorcising a 75-year no-win curse is one better. Kudos to County Mayo for their first All-Ireland Football championship since 1951, a match my late father-in-law and staunch Mayo-man Patrick Duffy followed on shortwave radio here in New York. My wife remembers the joy in her household that day. The apocryphal curse (supposedly placed on Mayo by a disgruntled priest conducting a funeral service that was disrespected by the returning ’51 Mayo champions) was that they wouldn’t win another All-Ireland until the last member of that team had died, which occurred three years ago, sadly.

Richard Rodrigue

Don’t bother

Manhattan: Congrats to Emily Wilson for bemoaning the movie “The Odyssey” (“Homer’s ‘The Odyssey’ expert says she’d be ’embarrassed’ if she worked on blockbuster movie,” July 28). I walked out after 44 minutes because it was so poorly done, with multiple flashbacks, inane violence and a convoluted and confusing premise. This time, Christopher Nolan hoodwinked us into thinking we’d accept his cockeyed vision for this project. With all the hype for it and the upscale prices, I know it has made some money, but seriously, it’s not an enjoyable or intelligent motion picture. Public, be warned.

Jack Weiss

Massive omission

Bronx: To Voicer Steven Davies: In your multitude of letters on Israel’s war crimes in Gaza, you have not once delineated the war crimes of Oct. 7. It defies all logic and reason not to blame the deaths, destruction and displacements of a war on those who started the war.

Michael Abbey

HED

Easton, Pa.: Voicer Lawrence Krasner can’t understand why the press pool didn’t leave during President Trump’s speech at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. I’m thinking that after 10 years of fake news, they could be fair and take a one-hour speech from Trump, especially with wine, lobster and steak on the table.

Barbara Cusano

Points of contention

Freeport, L.I.: To Voicer Larry Nekola: Yes, Barack Obama’s Iran nuclear deal expired in 2025, but Trump exited the deal in 2018. What’s your point? Iran is a sovereign nation. Why should it not have access to ballistic missiles for its own defense since we don’t want it to have nuclear weapons? Gas was more than $5 per gallon under Joe Biden based on post-pandemic demand. Trump’s incompetence early in the pandemic allowed it to spiral out of control. Facts matter, even if you ignore them.

Charles Whaley

Close enough?

Manhattan: On the tussle over whether to rename Penn Station for Trump, Sen. Chuck Schumer should offer this compromise: “Trump Terminal — we wish.”

Brian Graifman

Knowledge is power

Rego Park: I used to think there was nothing so complex that it couldn’t be explained to a person with an average IQ. I used to think scientists tried to keep scientific and technological secrets from the public like in ancient times, when monks, priests and thinkers knew the laws of nature — the stars, the tides, the change of seasons — and the peasants thought God spoke to them. If you understand something, it gives you a sense of mastery, or at least satisfaction. Walking down the street and knowing what concrete is can feel a little powerful.

Jeff Rosenblatt

Just complaining

Massapequa, L.I.: Voicer Christine Sheppard sounds like the typical silver-spoon, NIMBY Democrat who enjoys the latest iPhone and high-speed internet, yet is closed-minded and uninformed about the latest-generation generators that run silently on renewable energy and capture their exhaust to provide power. Data centers would provide thousands of needed construction and IT jobs and a welcome boost to the state’s tax rolls. Your preferred choice of power is probably windmills that kill birds and whales and cost five times what conventional power costs, and whose materials are not recyclable — which would give you something else to whine about.

Michael Greaney