SPEAK OUT
I think this report brings to light the very issues of children trusting adults to do the right thing and not be victimized over and over again (“Protecting children,” April 6). We as a community need to continually follow up and check in with our authorities regarding these issues. We also can’t turn a blind eye when information is given that requires action.
These types of people, like Adam Power, are among us every day, and it takes time for many of us to completely understand what is happening, because in a normal world we see each other as good. Sexual predators are not wearing signs. They move in groups of people, very unassuming. They develop a barrier of friends whom they deceive and who help them, unknowingly.
It takes carefully listening to children if they say something. It’s about speaking up when something doesn’t seem right, and it’s about doing the right thing instead of armchair quarterbacking about how you would have done it differently. It’s not about placing guilt on the very people who are speaking out.
Adam Power remained among our youth for five years after the 2018 report. We should focus on that. How did the Springfield Police Department’s investigation fail those victims from 2018-2023? How did the DCFS investigation fail those victims? How did our community fail those victims? How did our school systems, both public and private, fail those victims? Finally, how did you fail those victims?
I am among those pictured in this article, and we have been fighting for justice for those victims since 2018, and even prior. We have been doing it from the moment we discovered it, and we did it among the doubters, the abusers, the enablers and our children. I can walk among this community knowing I at least tried.
Mark Wheeler
Springfield
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ACCOUNTABILITY
A failed investigation is not proof of innocence. The allegations alone were good enough for the Illinois Board of Education to deny Adam Power’s application for a full-time teaching certificate. Seems like a small, nonprofit theater could use the same moral judgment. Why would anyone ever err on the side of an alleged sex offender?
These are volunteer-run organizations. Bill Bauser was in no way, shape or form obligated to work with Adam Power. He chose to, simple as that. So either he is indifferent to the suffering of those children or he is incompetent.
The formal complaints that Mr. Bauser requested (and received) in 2018 were graphic, thorough, well-documented and extremely detailed. This article and his removal from Springfield Theatre Centre and The Muni never would have happened if he hadn’t chosen to ignore those complaints. Mr. Bauser is simply being held accountable for his actions.
Kari Bedford
Springfield
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THE REAL HELL
Nice review of a problematic play (“The Christians delivers thought-provoking theater,” March 30). It is quite a suspension of belief that turns a small theater into a megachurch, but the audience played along, hoping the script would be transformative. It wasn’t. The cast did a great job wrestling with the unknowns, but the script seemed dated, even naïve at times. Nevertheless, I suspect for some folks the argument for an earthly hell might seem blasphemous, but then, for Ukrainians or starving people in Yemen, that’s just the daily dose of reality.
William Furry
Via illinositimes.com
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SAFE NUCLEAR
Nuclear power is safe and clean (“The false promise of small modular nuclear reactors,” March 23). If only there hadn’t been so much entertainment fiction painting radiation as a magical boogeyman while the boomers were young and impressionable.
Rafael Joseph
Via Facebook.com/illinoistimes
This article appears in Spring Home & Garden 2023.
