Letter: On privilege and pools

It has been said there are seven wonders to the world. Now there is an eighth one to add to the list of things I don’t quite understand.

The voters of District 2 in the city of Dothan sent Amos Newsome to City Hall to be their voice and to look after their interests downtown.

Rather than be an advocate for his constituents’ need for a swimming pool at Andrew Belle Park, the good commissioner, at a recent meeting, became the chief advocate for spending $40 million to construct a new park on Taylor Road in someone else’s district.

As commissioner from one of the poorest districts in the city of Dothan whose residents are black, Newsome should be aware that statistics show drowning as one of the leading causes of death for young urban blacks due to a lack of public pools for swimming lessons in their poor communities.

He would know this if he was in touch with the people he is supposed to represent.

If Newsome can, in good conscience, vote to spend $40 million for a new park in a more affluent district, surely he can vote to spend a couple of hundred thousand dollars to build a swimming pool for the underprivileged children in his own district.

Perhaps he has forgotten what it is like to be poor.

Malcolm Black
Dothan