Letters To The Editor
IDAHO VIEWPOINTS
Our future paved, plastic, ruined
So, the Sandpoint area is getting a Wal-Mart to mate with its Kmart, McDonald’s, Pizza Hut and Kentucky Fried Chicken, which are already in residence.
This area is fast becoming like the places the locals abhor and newer residents escaped from.
Increased property taxes and rental costs, a degraded environment and quality of life are well worth the profits when, and if, they trickle down to all. Right?
Who wants natural views such as trees, lakes, and mountains when “progressive” sights of chain stores, fast food strips and extravagant mansions sprouting on every mountain and lakeside property that money can get to await our purview?
If it’s good for the residents of Los Angeles, Seattle, and New York City, then congestion, pollution, crime and indifference are what this area needs. This excessive growth will provide it.
Is it always necessary to fully exploit and ultimately destroy the few decent areas left to live?
I shed a tear over today’s greed and tomorrow’s destruction. I then prepare to vote. J.R. Jordine Sagle
Transformation makes good sense
Barrie MacConnell and I have seldom agreed, and he has a right to his opinion. However, no one has a right to be wrong in his facts (“Transformation needs explanation,” Letters, Oct.13).
When Sandpoint Mayor Dwight Sheffler resigned, I became interim mayor, as per Idaho law. At that time I wanted to be the mayor. But it was not the right time.
As president of the City Council, I was keenly aware of each council member’s feelings. I realized that for me to become mayor at that time would cause further argument and prolonged disagreement on the council. For that reason, I reluctantly chose what was best for the city rather than what I personally wanted. In so doing, I nominated and lobbied for Ron Chaney because it was imperative that we have someone capable and experienced who could begin immediately. Anyone with roots or longevity in this community would understand what a doubly difficult decision that was for me.
I see this as strength more than weakness. I have proven more than any other candidate that I have the courage and ability to put the overall benefit of the city above my own desires and ambitions. The results speak for themselves, regardless of whom you support. It is difficult to deny the improvements of the last 18 months.
I believe now as I did then that I am the best choice for mayor and that now is the right time. I hope this clears up MacConnell’s confusion. Ray Miller Sandpoint
Track greyhounds constantly abused
Thank you, Spokesman-Review, for continued coverage of the atrocities at Coeur d’Alene Greyhound Park.
The greyhounds’ daily routine is extremely miserable. They live in cubicles barely big enough for them to stand in. Bigger dogs can’t even turn around in their boxes. Dogs are in wire boxes all day, except for two periods when they’re let out with all the other dogs. Sometimes, weaker dogs are attacked and killed by the other dogs.
When I went to a kennel to watch as a friend fed the dogs, she explained that it is common for the dogs to eat each other’s feces because they are so hungry. She redirected several dogs that did that while I was there.
If people are under the impression that the abuse or misuse of greyhounds only happens on occasion, they should request a tour of the facility and discover for themselves the atrocities that continue on a daily basis.
Coeur d’Alene Greyhound Park has repeatedly failed to correct the abuse and misuse. The management, without exception, denies wrongdoing whenever people come forward with information of abuse.
The greyhounds, on the other hand, are not able to represent themselves.
Thank you again. This is not old news. It is abuse that continues as long as we allow it. Greyhound racing must be abolished in Idaho. Laura Putzier Post Falls
LEARNING TOWARD EARNING
Phillips closure unjust, unwise
Re: The closure of Phillips Junior College, because the government says it had too many past students defaulted on their loans.
I just don’t see how the government can do this to the present students when they have nothing to do with what past students have or haven’t done. If some of the past students are in default, go after them. Don’t punish the present students.
My son is a student in the electronics and fiber optics class that should be graduating next April. I know that most of the students are very close to graduating. Why not let these students graduate?
My son likes this school because the teachers care whether the students get an education, and they take time out to work with students one on one.
This is a tragedy. The government wants everyone to work and pay taxes. What is it going to do when these kids aren’t working because when they try to better themselves, they just get beaten back down? Doesn’t education matter any more? Vanessa Trudeau Coeur d’Alene
Training, degree can mean little
As a 1986 graduate of what was Spokane Technical Institute, since renamed Phillips Junior College, I’ve seen my share of irony in work pursuits. Five years of busting and straining myself to the wire enabled me to sock away enough cash to settle the remaining balance due on my own federal student loan.
As a dishwasher since 1984, I completed a round trip by bus to Philadelphia and back, to visit my late father’s grave site in Pennsylvania.
As a dishwasher, I saw a stroke-afflicted mother to self-sufficiency and on her merry way. And as a dishwasher, I started a new marriage and completed a family history in vital records from 1900 to present, recovering a significant piece or two about long-lost relations in Pennsylvania.
The irony for me is that formal training as a computer operator at what is now Phillips Junior College, and as a graphic arts major at Spokane Falls Community College, have not to this day repaid the time and expense put into them by gaining me a placement.
After nine years, I got over it. I settled my dues and continued with my life. I hope most of the Phillips students can do the same, degree or no degree.
I commend those who turn their training into a relevant career. To those like me, who, for whatever reasons, can’t, I hope that as you await your break, that you’re braced to start with your sleeves rolled up and settle your dues by whatever lawful means and work falls your way.
In short, welcome to the club. Monte McCormick Reardan, Wash.
SCHOOLS AND EDUCATION
Author’s message escaped reporter
Jack Canfield presented a vital message to Spokane’s educators on Friday. He addressed the alarming increase in school-age violence, drug use and suicide. One important answer to the problem, according to Canfield, is to love and nurture our youth.
Canfield used Maslow’s example to point out that learning can’t take place until basic needs are met. Self-esteem is one of the basic needs missing in today’s youth gone awry. Canfield encouraged teachers to help fill the self-esteem void in order for their students to learn.
Many of us who attended savored his generous portion of “Chicken Soup for the Soul.” Mike Prager’s article in the Oct. 14 Spokesman-Review completely missed the point. Beverly Robertson Spokane
Down with curriculum days
I’ve always wondered what school teachers did on curriculum day. Thanks to your article in the Oct. 14, about Jack Canfield’s seminar, now I know. They’re attending seminars by New Agers, giving each other back rubs and hugs. Is that what teachers are going to bring to the classrooms?
I, for one, would like my children to learn academics in school. I’ll take care of teaching them hugging, back rubs and self-confidence at home.
If this is the kind of curriculum the teachers are learning on curriculum day, I’d say we don’t need any more curriculum days. Patrick G. Murphy Spokane
PEOPLE IN SOCIETY
Better reason for million to march
I’d be a lot more impressed if a million black men were to march in and take responsibility for their abandoned and illegitimate children. Sheila Naccarato Spokane
America has serious people problems
Am I proud to be an American? I used to be. I’m not so sure anymore.
We have Americans in Oklahoma blowing up children, Americans in Arizona derailing trains and killing innocent people, another American sends bombs through the mail. Worst of all, we have American men in Spokane and Coeur d’Alene killing innocent babies and walking out of jail because they are “not a threat to society.”
I came home from work three times this summer to find warnings from the sheriff’s department on my door telling me that child molesters and rapists are living nearby so be careful.
Now I don’t even have a job because we are on strike against a company that wants me to pay for my own medical while they give their CEOs $2.5 million bonuses.
So, am I proud to be an American? Yes, I love my country. I’m just ashamed of and saddened by some Americans living here. Katherine Johnson Spokane
GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS
Wrong to feed bears and poor people
Reading in the paper about demonstrators in front of the federal courthouse complaining about cuts in government programs reminded me of a story Paul Harvey had on his program.
It seems members of a family went to Mount Rainier National Park and were feeding the bears when a ranger stopped them. They asked why they couldn’t feed the bears. The ranger told them that if they kept feeding the bears, the bears would come to expect it all the time and forget how to fend for themselves. He also said many tourists feed the bears anyway, and that the bears often get indignant and at times attack people when they don’t get their food.
It seems Bill Clinton, Tom Foley and the liberal Democrats have been feeding a lot of bears the last 40 years. Joe Wollman Odessa, Wash.
Good thorn in eco-liberals’ side
Much to the chagrin of staff writer and editorializer Karen Dorn Steele on her bashing Rep. George Nethercutt (“Nethercutt’s pollution votes stir up anger,” news, Oct. 9), I don’t believe Nethercutt has as much power as she has given him credit for. She’s certainly given lip service to the self-propagating environmental industry, bureaucrats, and politicians.
I, for one, am sick of the doomsayers and end-of-the Earthers-as-we-know-it who keep promoting the extreme spending by federal agencies that are totally out of control and certainly have had no accountability to us ordinary citizens. Steele is certainly one of these.
Nethercutt is in Washington, D.C., doing exactly what I voted for. I feel my voice is finally being heard over the whining and threats of what is left of the eco-liberal establishment. Most of us realize when The Spokesman-Review stoops to these levels of trashing, the liberals are feeling the heat. Keep up the good work, Nethercutt. Jerry Stacey Spokane
IN THE PAPER
Dissatisfaction is exponential
The Spokesman-Review recently presented the following: Public Periscope (Oct. 9), regarding final cost of the new arena at $62.2 million, even though voters approved only $44.8 million. The difference of $17.4 million was because of paving parking lots, purchasing land, tearing down the old Coliseum and renovating buildings, which wasn’t anticipated in 1991.
What a disservice to readers. Why didn’t The Spokesman-Review print documents recorded at the county auditor’s office which state the facts? Or have the writers dig out The Spokesman-Review of March 13, 1994. The front page headline reads, “Arena legal expenses piling up.”
Another dandy is Editor Chris Peck’s Sept. 24 column, “We had a chance on science center and we blew it.” Peck states, “There is no next time.” He also says, “the project would have saved the taxpayers money.”
Yeah, Chris. The ink wasn’t dry when City Attorney James Sloane sent a memo to the City Council with a new scheme for resurrecting the Pacific Science Center.
Last but not least, pseudointellectual Doug Clark’s column, “Who needs science, you’ll never use it” (Oct. 5). Clark takes a shot at checkout people working at supermarkets, kids working at fast-food restaurants and the Gang of Nine. “Paper or plastic, or, duh, curly fries or regular?” What an insult.
As a charter member of the group of nine, I telephoned Clark and he informed me that other than two or three gang members, he has no idea who they are. Well, the nine now number nine to the third power, duh, 729. Dick Adams Spokane
Pope cartoon ‘enraged me’
Opinion page cartoons in my “Good Paper” often annoy me, but the one of Oct. 14 enraged me. I’m sure many Catholic readers had the same reaction. To consider the many thousand Catholics in the United States as refusing to follow the Holy Father is a gross exaggeration. Even the few who reject some teachings of the church have respect for Pope John Paul. He is regarded as a world leader, even by others who are not Catholic. Besides the distortion of facts in the cartoon, some of the language was in poor taste. Teresa Toffle Spokane
PLAYING BALL
Hey, over here
I agree with columnist Doug Clark, but go further. If Gov. Groundout, Sen. Sobeit, Rep. Ditto and the Mariners’ Musty Mob feel so strongly that the state must build another dome for them, let them build it - in Eastern Washington. Mary Ammann Spokane
Go Mariners - away
The Mariners (low team on the totem pole) finally lucked out and won a few games. Now they are blackmailing the state of Washington with “If we don’t get our way, we won’t play” for a new stadium. “The Kingdome isn’t good enough for us, “poor babies.”
Everyone in Washington isn’t a sports fan. Let the fans pay for it. I’m glad I live in Idaho. Waldo Larson Laclede
Logic hard to appreciate
The good folks of King County, who are earning any money coming in from the Kingdome, voted down a new stadium. The modern-day gladiators in the arena are paid hundreds of thousands of dollars, even millions, for playing a game most commoners would play for free. Now our governor, in the emotional climate of the playoffs and probably in return for team owner campaign contributions, suggests that those commoners, who earn somewhat less for actual productive work, scrape up millions - probably billions with cost overruns - to build a new stadium to avoid the extortion that these prima donnas might leave.
Mr. Spock would have a problem with this. Frank Dorman Spokane