Letters To The Editor

SPOKANE MATTERS

Street cleaning effort on track

Re: “Street cleaning effort wasteful” (letters, July 4), a clarification is needed.

The writer charged that on three successive days (Friday, Saturday and Sunday), we had two street washers, two street sweepers, one pickup with two men and a dump truck at Heroy Avenue and I Street.

Our street sweeping crews work 10-hour days, Mondays through Thursdays. A neighborhood street sweeping crew consists of a street flusher, a mechanical street sweeper, a vacuum street sweeper and a dump truck. The dump truck is there to haul collected debris to the solid waste disposal site so the slow-moving sweepers can stay on the job.

On this particular assignment, a pickup was dispatched to exchange a replacement worker for an employee who had to return to take a prearranged civil service test. There is no record of a second flusher with that crew.

Although heavy rainfalls can be helpful to the street cleaning process, it still is often necessary to flush and/or sweep accumulated debris after a heavy runoff, particularly in the vicinity of catch basins.

The crew is a day ahead of schedule in the letter writer’s section of the city.

For questions concerning street maintenance, call 625-7733. Citizens also may access a prerecorded street sweeping/snow removal schedule by calling 456-2666. E. Bruce Steele, director Spokane Transportation Department

Lawsuits obstruct needed progress

Our downtown building projects could be well under construction by this time if it weren’t for the lawsuits that have cost both the city and the Cowles family huge sums. These dollars could have been spent on building costs.

This isn’t about serving those who shop at Nordstrom; this is about the future vitality of the heart of our city. It has taken years to get the city to where it is today, and we shouldn’t give up now.

Another one of our city’s specialty stores, Louie Permelia Ltd., has just announced its closing sale. How much longer can we wait? Janis R. Miller Spokane

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

Investigation scope too narrow

House Speaker Newt “Deadbeat Dad” Gingrich, Rep. George Nethercutt and most other Republican members of the House of Representatives are afraid of including the Republican Party in the investigation of campaign finances. Why?

The dictatorial chairman of the committee conducting this investigation has unilaterally issued 156 subpoenas to people suspected of contributing to the Democratic Party, some of whom have turned out to be the wrong people but of the same name. Why so few Republicans?

Why is it that another Republican organization, called the “Christian Coalition,” is not being included in this investigation? Maurice B. Cauchon Spokane

‘Tax credit’ plan just welfare

For the first time in more than a decade, Congress is about to pass tax relief. If you’re Sen. Patty Murray and you’ve had huge successes like defeating the balanced budget amendment and passing 1993’s huge tax increases, what are you going to do to turn this legislation into more income redistribution?

The problem is the “5-50 rule.” Simply put, “5-50” means that the top 5 percent of wage earners pay almost 50 percent of federal taxes and the bottom 50 percent of wage earners pay about 5 percent of federal taxes. How can Murray turn a tax cut into welfare when all the taxes are paid by the hard-working, successful people she despises?

The answer: Give $500 government checks to folks who don’t pay income taxes and call it a “tax credit.” Excuse me? Has socialism advanced so far in America that a welfare check could dare be called a tax credit? The answer is yes, and Murray just might win this one, too.

At this rate, maybe Murray will make the 5-50 rule into the 3-70 rule and push tax-freedom day clear to August.

Wake up, Washington, and un-elect people like Murray. What good is the “land of opportunity” if she and the Internal Revenue Service are waiting for you with their hands out at the first sign of success? James A. Powell Liberty Lake

Thoughts were from Alinksy

In all fairness, I wish to clarify a portion of the recent story, “Industry gearing up for turf war” by staff writer Jim Camden, in which I was quoted.

From the way the story was written, it could suggest that several quotes are attributed to me, but they actually come from a well-known political activist from the political left, Saul Alinsky. I was quoting Alinsky, who said: There are no rules, silence equals assent, work within the system and your opponent’s reaction is your greatest weapon.

So that you understand my concern that the quotes are properly attributed, you should know that Alinsky advised the students who disrupted the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

My reference to Alinsky was in a workshop on how individual citizens can be more effective at the grass roots. The Washington State Farm Bureau believes that farmers must be more effective on the issues facing them, and we encourage our members to understand activism by studying the people who are best at it: environmental groups. And we believe, as Alinsky wrote but did not practice, that change should come from working within the system.

Our brand of activism turned out hundreds of concerned farmers at the recent Hanford Reach hearings in Mattawa, Wash. They spoke out against federal control of the Columbia as a wild and scenic river but supported local control by the people most affected by the decision. Patrick Batts, administrative vice president Washington State Farm Bureau, Olympia

OTHER TOPICS

Filter software works; use it

In response to Benjamin M. Kosse’s letter opposing library Internet filters (“Fans of filters just don’t know,” July 10):

There is filtering software, such as X-Stop or Cyber Patrol, that blocks out both obscene and child pornography sites without restricting access to legitimate sites that may discuss sexual topics (such as sex education or sexually transmitted diseases) and that provides an ongoing monitoring control service. These include library updates on a daily or periodic basis.

What many people don’t know about the recent Supreme Court ruling on the Communications Decency Act of 1996 is that although some portions of the law were struck down, obscenity, as determined by the three-part Miller test, and child pornography still are illegal, even on the Internet. There is an absolute and enforceable ban against the transmission of obscene material in cyberspace under the Communications Decency Act and also Title 1B of the U.S. Criminal Code, Sections 1462 and 1464-1465.

The Supreme Court also has held, in Ginsberg vs. New York, that protecting children from exposure to harmful material is a matter of compelling state interest.

I believe it also is a matter of compelling community interest for the public library to protect children by installing Internet filters. W.J. Lawson Spokane

Parents abdicating responsibility

Thank you, Robert Sayler, for your letter describing our socialistic “village” system of warehousing children (“Children parents’ responsibility,” letters, July 15).

After 10 years teaching early childhood education in Spokane, I left my last teaching position in June because I couldn’t compromise my values and ethics any longer.

At my former child development workplace, the owner chain-smoked inside the center, Tylenol was a steady cure-all substitute for a phone call to notify parents of 103-degree fevers and corporal punishment was inflicted.

There, the caregiver of four babies also was responsible for preparing 40-plus meals, answering the phone and running to and from the basement all day long to manage continuous laundry.

Why do today’s parents expect small children to spend longer weekly hours at day care than they, the parents, spend weekly at their jobs? I have a problem with the drive-up, drop-off parents who spend ample time grooming themselves for work but no time preparing proper breakfasts for their children.

What’s going to be expected of the “villagers” next - bathing and dressing them?

The state Department of Social and Health Services’ licensing standards look great on paper. But unless complaints are registered, DSHS does minimal footwork to enforce licensing compliance. U.S. Department of Agriculture meat inspections occur more often!

I don’t believe that the way to a child’s heart is through “happy meal” trinkets on the way home from 10 or 12 hours at day care. Dixie Lee Laehn Spokane