Letters To The Editor
PEOPLE IN SOCIETY
Stealing is not just about things
On Sunday night, Feb. 16, several items were stolen from my sister’s car, which was parked in the driveway at my brother’s home in Coeur d’Alene.
Items stolen included my nephew’s CD-tape player and several of his tapes and CDs. One of his favorite tapes cannot be replaced; it was a tape from a youth conference he attended last summer. The tape had been tossed onto the street, where it was crushed by a car.
Another item taken was a wrapped birthday present with a purple bow that I had given to my 8-year-old niece. The package contained a silver necklace with an amethyst heart. The value of this necklace was only $8. It was an inexpensive present for a little girl.
The true value, though, cannot be measured. You see, my niece was going to wear it to her grandmother’s memorial service on Monday morning.
The day I bought her the present was the last day I saw my mother alive. My mother touched the little necklace, commented how beautiful it was and said how much her granddaughter would love it.
Stealing is wrong. When you take something from someone else, you take more than a material item. You steal away a memory, something that can never be replaced.
It is our duty as parents to teach our children to respect the property of others. Pamela Noah Coeur d’Alene
Attention, motor-mouthed moviegoers
Yes, you did pay your money and you have the right to enjoy the movie. Have you ever considered that the people sitting in front of you, behind you and to both sides also paid their money and have a right to enjoy the movie, too?
Did you ever think that perhaps your talking during the movie might interfere with their right to enjoy the movie?
Explaining to your companion what is going to happen next could be compared with me coming to your birthday party and hosing it down with cold water or taking a big, sharp pin to your child’s balloon.
If you want to talk during the movie, why don’t you rent the video and watch it in the privacy of your own home?
I realize there are movies that are enhanced by audience participation, but those usually are science fiction, thrillers, etc. - not “The English Patient.” Barbara Hill Spokane
PEOPLE AND ANIMALS
Exotic pet law bad piece of work
Re: “Owners of exotic pets slow to come forward” (Feb. 15):
Why am I not surprised? This poorly written Spokane County ordinance was done without foresight or research. Did its author not realize the average Spokane family makes much less than her high salary? Many families cannot afford even the $20 license fee charged for a dog. That’s why they purchase turtles, lizards, snakes, etc. Now, she expects them to pay $50 plus insurance for their pets.
As for wolf-hybrids, if she had asked Oregon how its law regarding these pets is working, she would have found out that it is not working. The entire state of Oregon has only some 150 registered wolf-hybrids. Imagine that. The city of Spokane has more.
I don’t think the law even specifies what percentage of wolf is required for the animal to be considered a wolfhybrid.
All the ordinance did was lose control as people take their pets underground.
And what is the criterion for being classified as a dangerous exotic pet? It is an animal that’s “… capable of biting a finger off.” How stupid! A German shepherd police dog or poodle can do that.
The law was created because of a pet cougar, which can kill a person in seconds. With carnivores, biting a finger off is nothing.
I would favor this ordinance if it were limited to mountain lions, bears and the like. Its author went off the deep end.
The likely effect is that families will turn their pets loose in the wild rather than pay the fees or risk the fines. Michael Mayeau Spokane
THE ENVIRONMENT
Clinton right to change roads policy
I agree with Julie Pickrell and Kim Meyers (letters, Feb. 19) - taxpayers shouldn’t be paying for the degradation of our environment.
It’s bad enough that logging companies have destructive roads built through forests in order to cut down all the trees, but it is really sad that the government is financing the destruction. Logging companies are just like any other companies in many ways, and there is no reason they should be getting special treatment (subsidies) - especially not when the end result is the destruction of our land.
I am glad to hear that the president may be taking action against this absurdity (“Clinton budget asks loggers to pay for roads,” Feb. 7). Bryan Woodbury Spokane
Exploiters have a lock on forests
The headline on a Sunday article grabbed my attention: “Activists want to save forests by buying them.”
In my idealistic mind, I often have wondered why the environmentally minded wealthy do not purchase old growth forests to preserve them. I was appalled to find out that many cases exist in which people are not even given the chance.
I suppose some special interest managed to get the legislation passed that restricted who could purchase timberland. In this great country of democracy and capitalism, I find it difficult to imagine how the public would ever believe that our nation’s resources should go exclusively to whomever will exploit them most. We cannot allow this political bias to continue.
Visualize our gorgeous Pacific Northwest. Now visualize it without trees. Our future resources depend on public outcry. We must not stand by while our forests are dealt to whomever will chop them down. Ryan Kerkuta Spokane
Torching forests also a health threat
I take exception to interactive editor Doug Floyd’s Feb. 18 column (“Forests managed with fire, so what about grass seed?”) which simply fuels the fires of ignorance.
It is fair to point out the irony that one federal agency has decided it is in our best interest to burn the national forests while another is trying to adopt standards to protect us from the adverse health effects of smoke. What is unfair is to give over the column to the likes of Ed Davis, who would have us believe that regulations on grass burning resulted from the activities of hypocritical “environmentalists” driven by their hatred of private property rights and free enterprise.
For the record, this is a health issue. It was the medical community that stepped forward and proclaimed grass smoke a health risk to this community. Also for the record, citizens who organized to oppose grass smoke are people who suffer, sometimes seriously, from smoke themselves or who care about others who suffer. Smoke is smoke - regardless of its source.
I am appalled that the federal government would adopt a burn policy without considering the health consequences. Our forests are sick, and the problem is excessive fuel loads. Is fire the only way to solve this problem? Probably not. As with the grass industry, alternatives to fire are available. Those of us who oppose grass smoke are going to be just as outraged when the torching of Mount Spokane begins. Patricia Hoffman, DVM Save Our Summers, Spokane
Logging industry gets bum rap
I have yet to understand how people are so narrow-minded, sitting in their comfortable homes and workplaces and believing the cry of the radicals trying to scare us into believing their mortifying lies.
In Kim Meyers’ letter, “No subsides for forest damage” (Feb. 19), she is applauding the idea of making the forest industry pay for building roads on federal lands.
What she fails to understand is that timber is sold from federal lands, money which private industry pays to the government for raw products that become our homes, furniture, paper and other luxuries. So, now that the government will not be paying for road-building directly, the additional cost will lower the bid price by at least, if not more than, the cost of the road.
Such a policy will have a profound effect on the income from our federal lands. We might as well send the 35,000-plus Washington lumber industry jobs overseas.
“A hill full of stumps” and “butchering of their (public) lands” are just the kinds of words that scare people. I am a fourth-generation logging and lumber businessman and I know the forest industry has grown considerably in its harvesting methods. The logging industry does everything possible to protect our water, fish and wildlife and the beauty of our state and nation - and still provide jobs and wood products. Jerry Emerson Wilbur, Wash.
Government ignorant about forests
Re: the forest management plan - or is it the mismanagement plan?
Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt can sure come up with some good ones. He said loggers should pay for the roads they build.
Loggers aren’t making a profit from building roads; it’s figured into the overall cost of timber removal. Are loggers building these roads for the fun of it? Are they rich? Do they decide where the roads go or how long and wide they are?
Then, Babbitt comes up with the idea to manage the forests with fire. I’ve heard that one before. Remember Yellowstone National Park? Seems like that was a disaster. Then, I suppose, when the fire gets out of control, he’ll want to call loggers to put it out with their equipment. Good luck, Babbitt - the loggers will be bankrupt from paying for building the roads twice.
Sounds like Babbitt doesn’t know a ponderosa pine from a lilac bush.
The way to a healthier forest is not with stupid ideas. Perhaps he should ask a logger or a professional forester (or maybe just someone with common sense) - the real experts - about proper forest management. Did the U.S. Forest Service ever make a profit? I don’t think so. Government-run industry can’t or doesn’t have the incentive to. They have free land, pay no taxes and they still go in the hole. Every time the government tries to fix something, the citizens should watch out. It will cost money. David Way Kettle Falls, Wash.