Letters To The Editor

WASHINGTON STATE

Personett attuned to people’s needs

In the last few months of working with Judy Personett, I have not only come to know her as a committed leader of our district, I’ve come to know a great deal about the people of the 6th District.

I have talked to the elderly, who worry about affordable health care. I have listened to young parents concerned about education and a strong economy to support their family. I am more convinced than ever that Personett is the person to meet their needs.

Her professional life has been spent dealing with the difficult issues of health care as a nurse and an administrator. She would bring to Olympia an enlightened champion for access to affordable health care. Her life experience as a parent, care giver and teacher serves as an a example of her commitment to education and our children.

She is running for a seat in Olympia to help build a world that protects the young and gives them every chance for success. A vote for Personett will protect your right to quality, affordable health care.

Personett’s opponent is riding the bandwagon of destroying hard-won, necessary services. Personett represents the value that government has a role in protecting its citizens and providing for their basic needs in health care and education.

Send Personett to Olympia to build upon the promise of effective and efficient government, not a candidate who would go only to tear down and destroy that promise. Positive leadership is needed. Dave Williams Spokane

Benson will fend off bureaucracy

Election day will soon be here and there’s one candidate who has caught my attention: Brad Benson.

Benson is a family man with three children. He is concerned about their education, the rise in violent crime and that government programs meant to ease these problems only make them worse while increasing our taxes.

At least 50 percent of the state budget is spent on K-12 education, yet less than half reaches the classroom. Rising crime erodes our community, and Benson promises to support efforts to remove criminals from our streets and expand the law enforcement efforts, including workable alternatives to prison.

During the last 12 years, state spending has doubled and payrolls have increased from $60,000 to $97,000, yet we are told they need more money. Them, when we ask for better roads we are told there is no money. Unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats have written 22,000 pages or more of regulations. These mandates are often unwanted and unworkable, especially in Eastern Washington, and are always expensive.

Benson knows all this. He is committed to ending misuse and waste of our state tax dollars, streamlining bureaucracy and returning authentic local control to us. These are the reasons Benson is the best candidate to follow Jean Silver as 6th Distrist state representative.

A vote for Benson is actually a vote for the people of Spokane. Scott J. Randall Spokane

SPOKANE MATTERS

Heads up - this meeting’s important

Hang on, folks. The Spokane City Council is poised and ready to do it to us again. The council wants taxpayers to purchase the River Park Square parking ramp for a mere $30 million. Not to worry, the 24 proposed movie theaters will pay for this venture because of parking demands from the patrons flocking to the flick from as far away, we are told by Betsy Cowles, as Missoula, Mont.

Citizens are being dragged down by the arrogance of some professionals who are putting their strength and power ahead of logic and importance of the taxpayers. The city too often avoids logic in its quest for self-interest.

Spokanites, beware. The project is on a fast track. Never mind the immediate $1.5 million of much-needed maintenance to the ramp. Never mind the $7 million for the expansion adding 554 parking spaces. Never mind the taxpayers’ pledge for payment in the event of default for the $80 million shopping mall and Nordstrom store. Never mind the city streets that need repair and repaving.

The predetermined decision will be aired on the Spokane City Council comedy hour, 6 p.m. Thursday on city channel 5. The mayor and council will take testimony at 6:30 in the council chambers. This is a specially called meeting. See you there? Dick Adams Spokane

Speeding near schools is wrong

I am a sixth-grade student at University Elementary School. I am very worried about the safety of all schools’ students. All schools should have a radar patrol or something similar.

Schools zones are 20 mph. If you drive faster than that, someone could get seriously hurt.

My mom does radar for my school. She has caught school buses and other drivers going 45 to 78 mph in the 20 mph zone. With that type of impact on a kid, it could be instant death or serious injury.

All kids should have the right to get to and from school safely. Drive safely. Brittany Barnett Spokane

Don’t dare take memorial for granted

With Veterans’ Day approaching, there is something I have to get off my mind.

During the 4th of July festivities in Riverfront Park, I saw some worms (I won’t call them men) using the Vietnam Memorial as some sort of grandstand. I have several friends who are represented by that monument. In the future I will not suppress the anger I felt then. God knows, we fought a good fight; the very cornerstones of communism were dealt a fatal blow. I lived to see them crack and crumble.

In my prayers I let my friends know that they did not die in vain. I personally owe them so very much. I’ll make a promise to them and their mothers to die if need be to protect their memory. Robert Becker Spokane

County needs legal cost tote board

It is my understanding that with all this litigation going on between the prosecuting attorney’s office, District Court judges and the commissioners’ office, the above parties have hired private counsel to advise them.

If this is so, how much longer do the taxpayers of this county have to put up with this abuse of tax dollars? What is the accumulated cost to the taxpayers of this county for this legal nightmare? Jim Spilker Spokane

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

Dole endorsement downright agreeable

Having just read your Oct. 13 endorsement of Sen. Bob Dole for president, I want to let you know how pleased I was to see that The Spokesman-Review can look at the issues and change it’s long-standing view to the left.

It is refreshing to see the editorial board is able to see through the flowery speech and changing rhetoric of President Clinton.

If it hadn’t been for the shift to the right in the 1994 election Clinton would have never gone along with the Republicans and we wouldn’t have gotten the needed changes to help the country. He is not for a smaller government. He wants to spend more and more of our hard-earned money for government programs that have been proven unsuccessful in the last 30 years.

Yes, it is time for a change to a government run by the people within their states. I do not trust big government and politicians who fight needed reform. I do not trust Bill and Hillary Clinton.

I believe Bob Dole can help regain the respect the United States deserves both abroad and here at home. Thank you for your thoughtful and intelligent endorsement. Sandra Westrope Spokane

$120 will lose you $580

Re: Editor Chris Peck’s “Sound bites drowning out needed debate” column of Oct. 6.

I am one of the 40 percent of people who are on Social Security, whose income is higher than the national median and live on a fixed income.

Starting in January 1996, I received a $10-per-month increase in my Social Security check, which put me in a higher tax bracket. The $10 a month adds up to $120 a year increase on a yearly basis but cost me an additional $700 in income taxes this year. I’d like to tell them “thanks, but no thanks to the increase.” Ruth J. McEneany Post Falls