Letters To The Editor

SPOKANE MATTERS

Make it work, Colliton

Councilman Jeff Colliton says Mayor John Talbott “will have to struggle to get consensus built” (Spokesman-Review, Dec. 29). Well councilman, it is not just up to the mayor. Building consensus with the council should be a group effort.

So the mayor has “antagonized members of the council.” The council has antagonized at least 53 percent of the citizenry, from their non-responsiveness to direct questions at the Public Forum, to allowing pay raises to be retroactive for the city’s upper management

“It’s not impossible” Colliton says, for Mayor Talbott, “but he’ll have to work at it.”

Very few people are afforded the luxury of being able to vote for the boss they want. However the council is able to do just that. The rest of the working people in Spokane have little choice but to work with their person in charge. If that is just too difficult to do, there is always the option of looking for employment elsewhere.

Council members are paid $18,000 a year plus benefits. Many people in Spokane do not make that much money working two jobs.

I suggest Colliton help promote rapport in the City Council, instead of commenting on challenges and antagonism that he may have felt in the past. Reflect on a quote from past mayor Jack Geraghty, who said, “Any job is a good job.” (Spokesman -Review, Sept. 27, 1997). Sherrie D. Bryant Spokane

Airport board due for an overhaul

We are responding to the offensive quotes in “Socked in” (Public Periscope, Dec. 29).

The impression left about pilots as a whole is a disgrace. All of the pilots at Felts Field at hard-working, decent people, as are those at the airport. Several of them have their own business; some are retired and all have a passion for their hobby or work with airplanes. All of us contribute tremendously to the economy.

There is one pilots’ table at the mentioned cafT in the smoking area. You don’t see anyone smoking at that table, though. There’s also a nonsmoking area. If it bothers John Morrison so much, he shouldn’t be in the smoking area.

As for the drinking allegations about pilots, the cafT owners have applied for a liquor license because they want to extend business hours to include dinner. Beer and/or wine served with dinner is an option at almost every restaurant in town.

The mentality of the people running the airport board is just amazing. We’re ashamed to say that we pay for this and elected them as well. These same board members run the international airport, where there is liquor and a smoking room. Do they believe the pilots out there are smokers and drunks as well?

Pilots take great pride in themselves and others around them. We can’t say the same for the airport board.

Obviously, at re-election time we should all vote for who is right, not for who has the biggest mouth. Jim and Bernie Miller Spokane

WASHINGTON STATE

Tax savings or just redirection?

As with the firing of the Humane Society director, I imagine both sides of the story of the Spokane Falls Community College teacher firing may yet have to be sorted out as to who is most right or wrong. Ditto for the story of the disabled man being denied welfare.

Increasingly, however, whatever the particulars in these cases, I suspect the general trend will be to put more people who are incapable of living-wage employment out into the street. Perhaps we more fortunate middle-class folks may be able to reconcile that with a reduced tax burden on ourselves, unless, as some have theorized, the difference saved goes back into the pot for subsidies to major corporations that may (or may not) be exporting many living wage jobs. Time may tell us more on this matter and, hopefully, guide our role as citizens. Philip J. Mulligan Spokane

Keep our power price advantage

The 4th District congressional representative, in a recent meeting in Okanogan County, outlined briefly the future plans of the Republican Party. Among them was the deregulation of the public power companies.

What does deregulation mean? It means selling all systems of power production and their distribution to private companies.

The local rate for electricity as construction began at Grand Coulee was 8 cents per kilowatt. The present rate is approximately 25 cents per kilowatt. If private power should take over, 25 cents would just be the start.

I worked at Grand Coulee from 1935 until 1942, when I went back into the Navy. The wage scale was 50 cents per hour for unskilled labor and $1.20 for skilled. The power rate should be kept at the rate of cost, not some inflated rate.

The Columbia River makes a huge figure S in Eastern Washington. When the costs of building and maintaining bridges and highways are taken into consideration, the people in the state of Washington deserve low-cost power.

Many other states are blessed with an abundance of either oil or coal. Shouldn’t this state be permitted to cash in on some of its natural resources?

There are many other constructive things that should be developed, such as completing the Columbia Basin Project and Hanford cleanup. Theron F. Drake Brewster, Wash.

LAW AND JUSTICE

Legal system needs reform

Regarding Connie Bickley’s trial for manslaughter: What about the judge, Craig Kosonen, who just pled guilty to drunk driving himself?

I was raised to feel there are certain people who, because of the position they hold in the community, set an example. This judge looks to me to be a fine example to to the public.

Let’s wake up and change the legal system to make it unappealing to drink and drive. I would not tolerate any drinking and driving from myself, my family or my friends. Why would I tolerate it from strangers?

There are no excuses. There are alternatives. Rick W. Bayles Coeur d’Alene

OTHER TOPICS

Story wrong about my motives

Re: “Police review board survives more changes,” Region, Dec. 23.

Staff writer Kristina Johnson’s allegation about why I resigned from the Citizens Review Commission, in which she quoted me as saying, “‘What we have presently does not give any sort of workable type of oversight,’ said Holmes, who added he’d been treated with ‘overwhelming animosity’ by officers who disliked his opposition to the changes,” is a baldfaced attempt at sensationalism that casts suspicion on her agenda.

The article continued on page B2, where its headline implies that I was somehow driven from the commission by the behavior of the Spokane Police Department. Nothing could be further from the truth.

I did receive some negative comments from one or two officers I know, which were “overwhelming” because they were based on a distorted view of the situation and infringed on our friendship. With that small (and possibly not even applicable) exception, SPD has treated me no differently than ever, which is with the respect due a citizen of this city.

I felt it necessary to call Chief Terry Mangan and apologize (for something I didn’t do) because if Johnson got it wrong in a room full of witnesses, I thought she’d really blow it in a private conversation with anyone concerned.

In summation, I resigned because of reasons which are on the public record, even though they may not have registered in Johnson’s professional memory banks. Micheal R. Holmes Spokane

Editor’s note: The Spokesman-Review stands by its story as published.

A gender thing we can do without

Why is it that some men and boys feel the need to spit on sidewalks and out their car windows? It is absolutely disgusting, it’s gross and it’s probably not very healthy. Linda S. Wilcox Spokane