When you drive through construction, what do you think of? Whether it is how you are going to get through this big mess, and how much youhate road blocks, or and understanding view to just see it as their tax moneybeing used in a beneficial way. The Road commission is a major part of how communities run smoothly.

The winter months involve holidays, family, travel, and of course bad weather in Michigan. Communities rely mostly on the local Road Commissions to keep our roads clear and safe. With our economy being so poor, a little money does not get you quite as far anymore. Tax money that goes into paying for our roads to be plowed and taken great care of, is not enough. Paying workers wages, gasoline to run plows, tons of salt, and occasional plow repairis costing a lot now a days.

The new plan in our local community to save money is to stop running plows over the weekends. This I believe is a very risky, dangerous attempt to save a couple thousand dollars. Is our safety really not worth thatmuch? In the long run I believe that this is going to be a major problem andcost a lot more than graphed out by the head machos. We definitely do not need more accidents, we lose enough people within the year from car accidents andoff road vehicles. This is something that we can prevent by just putting alittle extra money into our community for our family and friends, not to take money away!

My fellow students love the idea of not having roads plowed on weekends, for the chance of a snow day on Monday. Some students do not look at everything involved, oh wow an extra 2 or 3 hours they can sleep in beforetheir parents come into their rooms screaming about laziness and contributing with the household chores. When we wake up Monday mornings, we do not even haveto look outside and we run to the television to see if we actually have school or not. The school board has our best interests in mind, they think, “okay maybe the roads are not the best, but these kids need to learn, a three dayweekend is not healthy.” People forget about what they ate for breakfast let alone what they accomplished on the Friday before. When there is not a snow day and the roads are actually bad because the plows just started running a couple hours before, it turns out to be just a very bad start to your day. Travel makes it very dangerous this time of year, and the new decision is not helpingthe situation at all. ‘Tis the season to spend money, eat a lot, and travel long distances to be with your family for the holidays. Fa la la la la…..la lala la