Andra Bryan Stefanoni: U.S. troops to receive laptops

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December 20, 2009

Anonymous The Joplin Globe Sun Dec 20, 2009, 10:34 PM CST

PITTSBURG, Kan. — The Crawford County Sheriff’s Department approached the County Commission last week about giving a gift that will keep on giving.

Through a new program designed to get rid of phased-out technology, the department will offer 10 free laptops to troops serving overseas.

The intent, Sheriff Sandy Horton told the commissioners, is to provide a means for communication with friends and family — something he knows is important from a firsthand perspective.

Horton’s stepson, Zach, is in the Marine Corps and is deployed to Iraq. Zach communicates when he cans with friends and family through Facebook and e-mail, but his mother worries about him daily.

“His family kind of got deployed, too,” Horton said.

Communication, even in the form of a few hastily typed lines, brings joy to people on both ends in real time, Horton said.

Through his own experience with Zach, Horton began thinking about all the troops who must wait in line to use computers because there simply aren’t enough of them.

He approached the commission for an endorsement, as technically the laptops belong to the taxpayers of Crawford County. The laptops cannot be upgraded to meet current departmental technology demands, nor would they bring more than about $50 each at an auction, Horton said.

So for the next few weeks, the commission and the Sheriff’s Department will accept names and contact information of those interested in shipping a laptop overseas. People may contact the sheriff’s office at 620-724-8274 or Commission Chairman Ralph McGeorge at 620-231-558.

If more than 10 families express interest, a drawing will be held.

The laptops will be shipped directly to the names chosen.

Horton said he doesn’t know what to expect in terms of response. But if it’s good, he expects this to serve as a model program for other county departments, businesses and schools looking to unload computers that are no longer needed.

Next year, if the budget allows, the Sheriff’s Department will phase out additional laptops that it hopes to send overseas in a second round.

“This could really take hold, and what a neat thing if it does,” Horton said. “What these will bring at auction is not much, but what it would mean to these soldiers and their families will be priceless.”

He said families of Crawford County troops aren’t the only ones eligible to apply, and that shouldn’t make any difference to taxpayers.

In his words, troops are troops, no matter where they’re from.

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