Letters To The Editor

GROUPS AND GATHERINGS

Let ‘Hi y’all’ replace ‘Sieg Heil’

Re: “Aryan Nations drops youth Congress”:

News about the annual neo-Nazi skinhead congress, which celebrates the birthday of Adolf Hitler at Richard Butler’s Aryan Nations compound, being canceled has been greeted by many in our area as a tribute to the growing success of human rights task forces in our region. This again emphasizes the importance of educating people in regard to the dangers and hate crimes of the white supremacy movement.

Leaders of Aryan Nations and other hate groups - i.e., White Aryan Resistance - should be held accountable for their recruiting of impressionable young people.

Perhaps this spring, as Mother Nature renews herself, we can work together to help develop a brighter future for young people looking for an important place in our neighborhoods. James Gordon Perkins Colville, Wash.

Community Partners - I’m skeptical

I, too, was surprised by the turnout at the Community Partners event. Do I believe the Community Partners are genuine? I’d like to think so, but my trust has been worn very thin.

I see the Community Partners as another mouthpiece for the Spokane establishment, an establishment that has been more active in tearing down our rights and freedoms than protecting them. My recommendations for the Community Partners:

Put government accountability as the top priority. Remember that government must remain responsive to all citizens, not just the powerful elitists.

Blaze your own trail; do not allow any outside control over the issues you adopt.

Be inclusive. We are all in this life together. Petty name-calling will not provide the results you desire.

Give credit where credit is due. The issues you are working on are not your issues or the issues of the current City Council. Steve Thompson Spokane County Reform Party

‘Being There’ was big mistake

The March 11 “Being There” column, “Bracelet could help sufferers find way home,” was a disgrace. The subject deserved better.

The story either was very poorly written or tongue-in-cheek, which is entirely inappropriate for something agonizing to both the victims of Alzheimer’s disease and those who experience the heartbreak of watching a loved one descend into this terrible illness.

The first six paragraphs apparently were meant to be amusing and dealt with people getting lost on the way to a meeting designed to help Alzheimer’s sufferers who wander. Those paragraphs should have been cut by whoever edited the story as they were irrelevant and condescending. There is nothing amusing about Alzheimer’s disease.

The remainder of the story was so poorly written that it sounded as if staff writer Paul Turner was making fun of the entire concept that “something as simple as an ID bracelet could make a huge difference for families with someone who has Alzheimer’s.”

I believe this was not the case and that he is an inexperienced reporter or simply inept. As a newspaper reporter-editor-publisher-owner for more than 50 years, I can only assume Turner is very young and was executing an assignment he felt was beneath him. Apparently, he has been fortunate enough never to have experienced this cruel disease in someone he loves. June McMahon Libby, Mont.

SCHOOLS AND EDUCATION

Gifted classes: Diversity input absent

I carefully read the story on Spokane public schools’ proposal to create full-time gifted classes for 50 fifth- and sixth-grade students. I was searching for comments regarding the proposal from the district’s Instructional Equity Citizens Advisory Committee (IECAC). There were none. Committee members I spoke with said the first they had heard of the proposal was from the news story.

This isn’t the first time this citizens committee has been left out of a significant school district policy issue involving equity issues. There also were no comments in the story from the school district’s new team of equity coordinators and facilitators.

I’m a former chairwoman of the committee and authored the first report card on equity for Spokane public schools. One concern raised in each report card has been underrepresentation of students of color in the gifted programs and the disproportionately high number of those students in remedial programs and alternative schools. That disproportionality is by no means unique to this city.

IECAC cannot speak effectively for these children unless District 81 opens up the discussion in the planning stages, not when a program is awaiting board approval. The concept of offering a pilot program of full-time gifted classes to students isn’t bad, but where are the safeguards that will keep this from becoming just another level of an already exclusionary program? Choosing students through a lottery doesn’t absolve the district of the need to create a program that reflects the diversity of its student population.

There must be a real effort to deal with persistent inequities in access to the existing gifted education program. Jennifer E. Roseman Spokane

Sour note was out of line

Andy Kelly (letters, March 11) should check Spokane school band schedules before castigating the bands for unwillingness to play for the frolicsome frivolity of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade.

My son belongs to the Sacajawea Middle School concert band. I’m sure this band’s activities mirror those of other school bands in this area.

These musicians and their director have put on several public concerts since Sept. 1, one of which had practice days severely curtailed due to the ice storm. All concerts are of nearly professional quality.

This group also has played for school assemblies, parent meetings, seasonal programs, extracurricular performances and competitions, including the Lionel Hampton Jazz Festival in Idaho.

Some kids belong to additional music groups that practice at 7 a.m. certain mornings each week and often practice into the evening to be prepared for their commitments. The high schools add sports program appearances to the bands’ busy schedules, too.

Currently, our student musicians are practicing for Mom’s Night, Grandparents’ Day and a competition for orchestras at Eastern Washington University. Soon, they’ll begin memorizing music for the Lilac Festival parade and practice marching very early each morning.

Perhaps Kelly can find some phantom hours for our kids to rehearse or perhaps some ice- and snow-free streets to practice marching on during January and February so they can turn in their expected stellar performances at the St. Paddy’s parade.

All of us should stand in awe of what the Spokane schools accomplish in their music programs instead of adding fluff to their already-crowded schedules. Jan Brown Spokane

What seems so simple isn’t

As a member of the Lewis and Clark High School music department, I must respond to Andy Kelly (letters, March 11), who claims we are not given opportunities to display our talents, thus we should have performed in the St. Patrick’s Day Parade.

It makes no difference that the parade is on a Saturday, which he ridiculously seems to think matters. Preparing for a parade could be crammed into two weeks, minimum. Two weeks is a reasonable time until other factors are considered, which also challenge the validity of Kelly’s argument.

Three weeks before the parade - on a Saturday - the Jazz Band performed at a festival at the University of Idaho. Two weeks before the parade - on a Saturday - we performed at the Central Washington University festival in Ellensburg. One week before the parade - on another Saturday - our school participated in the solo/ ensemble festival at Shadle Park High School, which the vast majority of the band participated in by playing pieces individually and in small ensembles. This is a typical schedule for this time of year.

Suddenly, Kelly’s simple suggestion to have the bands participate in the St. Patrick’s Day Parade seems next to impossible, even if we currently are preparing for nothing else. To his naive idea that we do not display our talents, I suppose it never occurred to him that some of the greatest talent in the schools could be found in any of the rooms during the solo/ensemble festival. Did he bother to walk in? Aaron Cote’ Spokane

OTHER TOPICS

Fine ambassadors and all that jazz

What a pleasure to write a positive letter of well-deserved praise. Congratulations to the Whitworth College Jazz Band and its director, Dr. Dan Keberle.

I was in Melbourne, Australia, during the band’s January trip in which it participated in the Marvelous Melbourne Jazz Festival. My family and I attended two of its concerts. As this was an international festival, several countries were represented. Whitworth’s 20-member band was the single college and one of three groups from the United States.

The band was an instant success, not only for its professionalism and talent but the members’ decorum and enthusiasm as well. Audiences were receptive and eagerly asked questions about Whitworth, Spokane and Washington state. As our Pacific Northwest weather was covered each evening on national TV, Australians were interested in learning about our ice storm and snowfall.

Australians are not always as responsive to American visitors. Unfortunately, some Americans present the wrong impressions and create misunderstandings.

But wherever these students traveled and performed during their 11-day stay, they spread good will and made friends. They were truly world ambassadors.

Spokane is fortunate to have shared in this experience. Thanks to Whitworth College for opening another door to establishing future business and student opportunities abroad. Joanne M. Jones Spokane

Tax-saving points well-taken

Frank Bartel’s March 16 column, “Charitable gifts can pay dividends,” contains some excellent estate-planning advice. Tax attorney Alan L. Rubens was quoted from a recent clinic in which he addressed employees of Cowles Publishing Co. and their spouses.

Rubens explained that by making gifts to a charitable trust, you not only may get an income tax deduction and avoid a capital gains tax, but you also can enjoy a flow of income in return as great or even greater than was being received prior to the gift. For estate owners who find a conflict in their desire to leave assets to their children vs. a charity, Rubens suggests using a portion of the income flow from the trust to purchase life insurance on the donor equal to the assets given to the charitable trust. By making the children or an irrevocable trust the owner of the policy, proceeds payable on death will escape estate taxes and may even increase the net estate to the heirs. Rubens points out that this procedure not only will boost your cash flow, provide for your heirs and benefit charity but also “will probably have a benefit in your honor while you are still alive.”

Thank you, Bartel, for bringing the message presented to employees of Cowles Publishing Co. to readers of The Spokesman-Review. Eugene B. Bronson Spokane

HEALTH AND SAFETY

Learn, be safe in avalanche country

The death of Troy Douglas in an avalanche is a tragedy. Even more tragic is the fact that it could have been avoided. It is ludicrous for the victim’s friends and family to imply the search and rescue teams were somehow at fault or didn’t do an adequate job.

There are no guarantees in the backcountry. Douglas and his friends chose to play in the backcountry on a day when the avalanche danger forecast was moderate to high. They apparently had neither the skill nor the equipment to properly evaluate the avalanche hazard specific to the area they were in or to perform an avalanche victim search.

Even in a low-danger area, a primary rule of travel is: One at time and never ski or snowmobile directly above another party in a hazardous zone.

The only good thing to come out of this tragedy is a sudden interest in avalanche education and equipment. I work in a local mountaineering shop, and several snowmobilers recently have contacted us regarding educational materials and equipment. It is unfortunate it took a person’s needless death to spur this interest.

Please, if you venture into the backcountry in the winter, educate and equip yourself properly. It’s the least you can do for your partners and the people who love you. Paul Warner Spokane

Learn about winter outdoor safety

Re: “Searchers recover body of avalanche victim,” March 10):

Troy Douglas and his friends should have been much more aware of the high avalanche danger in the area and that they were riding on very slide-prone slopes. The fact that they had to grab sticks to probe in the debris tells me they weren’t adequately prepared to be out where they were.

While I feel very sorry for the victim and especially the family he left behind, it was the victim’s fault, not the search and rescue team’s, that he is dead.

As a longtime backcountry skier and one-time avalanche victim myself, I see more and more people venturing onto unsafe slopes with no idea of the danger they are placing themselves and their group in.

It’s high time people using the backcountry in winter, whether skiing, boarding or snowmobiling, get their act together. Get the proper equipment and learn how to use it. Take an avalanche class. Learn safe winter travel and rescue techniques.

If Douglas’ friends had proper backcountry avalanche gear - namely, avalanche probes, transceivers and shovels - they might have been able to save him.

To think that the local search and rescue people can come into such a remote place and save a buried victim shows a great lack of backcountry knowledge and common sense. Those search and rescue people risked their own lives going in to rescue the victim. And for what? To get lambasted by the very people who caused the problem in the first place. Peter Bock Spokane

Rescuers wrongly criticized

I was disappointed in the article on the avalanche victim and statements regarding the lack of search and rescue teams responding to requests for help.

On Saturday, my sister, her husband (both longtime search and rescue volunteers) and their search dogs drove almost 100 miles to the site. As they were preparing to make their way in, the search was postponed until the next morning due to unsafe conditions. The weather was bad. Helicopters couldn’t be used. There were not enough heavy-duty snowmobiles and there was no way to transport the search dogs.

Were the dogs supposed to run into the site, search and then run out?

I am not a search and rescue member, but over the last seven years, I have taken calls at 3 a.m. from dispatchers, helped pack search supplies, watched my sister and her husband leave Thanksgiving dinner to respond to a missing-child call and seen both of them take time off from work without pay. They spend hours training themselves and their animals to find people under adverse conditions. They provide their own equipment and supplies, including gas. If lucky, they get a hot meal at the end of a long day.

Frustration and pain can be appreciated. Blame should be centered on poor judgment and on conditions ripe for an accident, not on volunteers who sacrificed their weekend to respond to a cry for help. These volunteers are addicted to saving lives but sometimes must save their own. Jeanne Gilbert Spokane

Rescue response came up short

I agree we put ourselves at risk when we participate in high-risk sports. But we also put ourselves at risk when we load our families into our cars and drive to a movie, hockey game, etc. Many more people are killed in car wrecks than in avalanches, yet we still drive our cars. If the roads are icy and you voluntarily put yourself in your car, what is the difference in risk?

If any of the search and rescue people’s families or friends were in the same situation, can we still believe they would not have gotten through? I believe they would have, just as many friends and family of Troy Douglas did.

I was fortunate enough to know Douglas and participate in activities with him and his family.

I extend my sympathy to Marsh Jones for writing such a shallow, pointless letter in a time of grief. Tom Brown Priest River, Idaho