I totally agree with Harriet Tilley’s letter of July 13, about the so-called 7-percent gross receipt tax on the private paying patients in nursing homes.

These people have worked all their lives to earn a living, raise a family, and put some money away for their future.

Now our elected officials are penalizing these people with a 7-percent tax on the amount it cost them for room and board at a nursing home. This tax doesn’t go for better care, it goes to the state of Maine’s general fund so they can spend it as they damn well please.

These elected officials got us into a financial mess and are using private paying elderly to try and get out of it. This is discrimination at its highest level.

How can these officials justify using the elderly to pay off the state’s debt? Maine’s so-called elected officials should bury their heads in the sand for stealing (I can’t think of any other word) from the aging, ill, and defenseless elderly.

These people put aside money so they could be taken care of if tragedy struck and not be wards of the state. What did the state do? It levied a 7-percent tax on the already high cost of nursing home care. But most important, these so-called officials took away the most important thing for the elderly, their pride.

Please contact your elected officials and voice your displeasure. Because regardless of age, your parents, brother or sister might be in this predicament someday. Maybe even yourself. Herman Cyr Madawaska