The Ludington Torch's 2026 Resolutions for the New Year

[XLFD]

It's a special year and the Ludington Torch in starting what is our own recently started 18th year of existence will do something unusual and make some resolutions.  Surely in our short history, we have changed organically at times our focus, scope, and even editorial direction to reflect our core missions and vision as the local situation has adapted towards the worse, or for the better.  

But as we take the year to celebrate our country's 250th birthday, much like we celebrated Ludington's 100th back in 2023, we will put forth our own resolution or three to celebrate that original revolution that has made us into the great country that we are today.  And our primary goal, if you have been paying attention and have jumped on to our zeitgeist over those years, our modest efforts have always been to bring transparency, accountability, integrity and fairness to wayward area public agencies.

This is an everchanging quest we have defined for ourselves, as even the City of Ludington has had a period-- albeit short-- where they were behaving and doing rational actions that actually found that sweet spot where they raise the profile of both the citizens and the city corporate.  Pere Marquette Township, after experiencing a very difficult period itself, has rebounded into a model public body.  We see some better signs for Hamlin Township and the City of Scottville after they had their own growing pains and difficult decisions to make.  The City of Ludington sadly, is almost at its worst

We have tried to be like clinicians; diagnosing the disease infecting the body and doing the important job of shining the light on the affliction then daubing it using our other hand to apply antiseptics when necessary.   We will still be doing this as best we can, especially when disorders pop up or are ongoing.

But beyond that, we plan on devoting more of our time this coming year to attending the county courthouse rather than city and township halls.  The reason for this may seem obvious to our regular readers and for our public defenders, as the county prosecutor appears to have forgotten many of the cardinal rules for her occupation, and when prosecutors go bad there is not an easy fix in the system.

We have had a few stories in 2024 and 2025 from the courthouse where the system has failed the people of the county, resources have been greatly wasted, and determinations made by judges and juries should have been already figured out by the prosecutor.  Cases are going to court where the evidence shows innocence of crimes, and the prosecutor's office still tries to get a scalp, often by what reasonable people would call misconduct.

We should all get behind the words of Ben Franklin, one of those founding fathers of 250 years ago who said:

“That it is better 100 guilty persons should escape than that one innocent person should suffer is a maxim founded on the tenderness of the laws for the rights of mankind.”

It recognizes a crucial concept that acts as one of the defining lines between a free society and an authoritarian one. A notion that emerged in the earliest iterations of Western thought but became established most prominently within the precedents of common law.  To the contrary, Beth Hand seems to be more of a believer in Vladimir Lenin's philosophy of authoritarianism, it was he who said:

"I ask calmly and categorically which is better, to imprison several scores or hundreds of instigators, guilty or innocent, deliberate or unwitting, or lose thousands of Red Army men and workers? The first is better. I don’t care whether I am accused of committing every mortal sin imaginable and of violating liberties, I plead guilty, but the interests of the workers will be furthered."

This is a repugnant notion in a free society as ours has been, and we will bring to light with our ever-flickering torch those instances where Beth Hand determines that imprisoning the innocent is better than actually reviewing the evidence and protecting the integrity of the process-- which just hasn't been happening.

Our 2026 Ludington Torch New Year's Resolutions are hereby set:

-- We will proudly hail and celebrate the 250th year birthday of this great country and the values that have evolved ever since that continues to make us great.

-- We will do our best to bring transparency, accountability, integrity and fairness to those who appear to be ill-served by our county's justice system and hold prosecutors and judges accountable for their official acts.

-- We will continue to do triage with other public bodies in the county, prioritizing those who are a danger to the people and/or themselves.  At the end of 2025, the City of Ludington is in that first bed.

[Paul Galinski]

Interested in whatever ‘route’ is taken.  Judicial and prosecuting action is only one facet of a northern lakeshore city.  Seems like county commissioner and board influence (like school or church) and potential revenue and tourism enhancements can carry equal or more outlook weight.

[XLFD]

Our resolution doesn't preclude us from covering what needs to be covered and attending important meetings, but our limited resources, the most important being time, will be centered and increased at the courthouse and for legal proceedings therein.  We expect to have more court-oriented articles accordingly, and they won't be over the mundane court business that is generally the staple when you have a sensible prosecutor, but focus more on the misuse of the system that I was seeing a lot of this last year.