Dear Editor: I must question your article on SPOST and yes, I am a supporter….How can you possibly compare spending in 2007 when it was rampant to spending today? If in 2007 people spent an average of $186 per family, that means they spent $18, 600 on sales taxable goods and services. Does this mean the family with two adults and an infant spend as much as a four adult family traveling to work, eating out often, etc? Do you really think that is accurate today? Or somewhat misleading? Would a disclaimer of "these are the most recent stats" with a follow-up of spending has declined since then be in order?

You are reaching a population who will read the headlines and that’s about it.

Another "left out" piece of information that most certainly needs to be in this article would be the number of people who do not pay property taxes but contribute to the use of our roads, our schools, our emergency room and our jails. Where do they fit in? Yes, I know that someone owns the property but I ask, are taxes proportionate to the number of occupants? (three-bedroom house valued at $130,000 with 10+ occupants?—yes, you know this is the case often)

Are you basing the property taxes of "today" and the "spending" on 2007? It seems so or these figures would be quite different.

Newton County is faltering and is not on a good road to becoming a place where people want to be nor where industry wants to come. Without industry, the family businesses will not sustain this county. There will be no jobs. We are already so low on the totem pole and this headline has put us farther down. We just have very little to offer. I know you, as a writer and employee of this newspaper, hope that your article is informative and factual.

In many ways it is, but I see problems and those who are the "non-contributors" will read your headline and there it goes. This is not a political issue and we all need to be on the side of the betterment of our county.