Letters To The Editor

Fri., June 19, 1998

SPOKANE MATTERS

Fountains make a downtown special

As we work to make our downtown area more user friendly, we might consider a dramatic move to bring credit and valuable publicity to our downtown area.

We made an error in turning our back on the Pacific Science Center. A science center such as was proposed for the Pavilion would have been a real plus.

As my wife and I have traveled through the United States and to many cities in Europe, some of the most exciting and pleasant core areas have featured fountains of various types that feature sparkling water as their decorative factor. Fountains draw people and provide background for photography. This was proved by the presence of the fountain at the Parkade and the one in front of the Lincoln Building. The fountain outside the Opera House is another example of pleasant decorative value.

The future of downtown Spokane may well hinge on a revolutionary idea such as this. M.B. Hickey Spokane

Dress Down is not about scruffiness

After reading Whitney Porter’s comments about the Chase Youth Foundations Dress Down for Kids Week (Letters, June 13), I feel compelled to clarify the purpose of this event.

Dress Down is a vehicle through which money is raised to support Chase Youth Commission projects. Employers are asked to designate one day of the week during which employees can wear casual attire. Each business determines guidelines for casual dress and employees are asked to contribute money for participation. Donations are used for such things as scholarships for after-school and summer activities, expansion of KidsWeek events or developing youth volunteer opportunities.

Many adults in Spokane, including elected officials, routinely wear suits, dresses or uniforms to work. For these adults, dressing down is out of the norm. Other employees, whose jobs already allow more casual dress for comfort or safety reasons, still contribute and show their support by wearing the Dress Down for Kids badge during the week. The bottom line is that businesses are flexible and encourage employee financial support of programs benefiting young people in our community.

In no way does Dress Down encourage kids to wear sloppy clothes to school. In fact, if Whitney or others want to promote a Dress Up for Kids campaign aimed at students, I’m sure the Chase Youth Commission and Foundation would be happy to assist. In truth, the most important thing is not what you wear on your body, but what ideals you hold in your heart. Joanne Benham, director City/County Youth Department, Spokane

Arena wins praise from Canadian

Some weeks ago, we took a trip to Columbus, Ohio. While en route, we met one of the owners of the Guelph (Ontario) hockey team that participated in the Memorial Cup at the Arena. She had nothing but praise for our city and its people, and said that our arena was one of the finest facilities her team has been in.

Isn’t it wonderful to hear such nice things about our city? Keep it up, Spokane.

One more reason to get our downtown going! Joyce Bublitz Spokane

WASHINGTON STATE

Hysteria hurting children, parents

Re: “No room at foster homes” (Spokesman-Review, May 17). Ads in church bulletins and buses won’t end the critical shortage of foster homes in Spokane because the problem is not too few foster parents, it’s too many foster children.

Washington, like much of the nation, is in the midst of a foster care panic. Pushed by horror stories about a few brutally abusive parents, authorities are racing to place in foster care children who could safely remain in their own homes with proper services. As a result, children who really do need placement are forced into overcrowded or substandard homes.

The result is tragedy for children. More are forced to move from home to home. More are denied the attention and stability they need, and more are subject to physical or sexual abuse in overcrowded foster homes. More children are destroyed in the name of saving them and more parents are left on the garbage heap of addiction and irresponsibility.

There’s a better way. Washington state pioneered Intensive Family Preservation Services (IFPS) with the Homebuilders program in Seattle-Tacoma. Through IFPS, parents learn personal responsibility and how to keep their children safe, acquire parenting and job skills, and build family strength. Other states have since taken the lead, keeping tens of thousands of children safely with their own loving parents, saving space in foster care for children who really need it.

When programs follow the IFPS service guidelines of the National Family Preservation Network, they are more humane and safer than foster care. These programs are available in Spokane and can be cost-effectively used to help more families than are currently being referred for service. Anne D. LoPiano National Family Preservation Network, Laurel, Md.

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

Money is the root of political evil

Re: “Money’s not corrupting politics; it’s power of government” (June 12).

It appears Jeff Jacoby of the Boston Globe has the answer to our current political spending crisis. In responding to a couple of politicians who are trying to resolve the problem, Jacoby said, “If Shays and Meeham really want to get the money out of politics, let them bend their efforts to getting government out of our lives.”

Well, as more than one politician has said, I’m just a simple country boy. But, didn’t the last major effort to get government out of our lives result in what we all know as the Savings and Loan scandal? As I recall, that resulted in billions - or was it trillions - of dollars being stolen from the American taxpayer, meaning you and I.

Ronald Reagan, who was probably the poster child of the get-government-off-our-backs movement, gave us eight years of tax reform and deregulation that our children’s children will be paying for. As an example, the Tax Reform Act of 1981 dramatically increased the depreciation allowance for corporations and produced the leveraged buyout craze that destroyed hundreds of companies and cost millions of Americans their jobs. Considering the current wave of corporate mergers, now is not the time to turn our backs on government.

We need campaign finance reform with teeth to stop the abuses and take the “for sale” signs off our elected officials. Steve L. Brown Kellogg

We all pull spendthrifts’ weight

Re: “House OKs bankruptcy crackdown” (June 11). I fully support the crackdown and am appalled at the comment, “This is a bill of, by and for the credit card companies. Who gets hurt? Middle class Americans who are in over their heads in debt.”

Yes, this will benefit the credit card companies - and why shouldn’t it?

But this bill is not for the credit card companies. It’s for the rest of the taxpayers who can manage money and not burden society with their debt! We all pay for this with higher interest rates and prices. Yes, there are extenuating circumstances; but unfortunately, most of the bankruptcies filed are due to people living beyond their means. These “Middle class Americans who find themselves in over their heads” need to be responsible, not pampered by the system because they couldn’t pay for what most of us would consider a luxury. Bankruptcy should be humiliating and rare, not a common occurrence.

On June 9 and 10, The Spokesman-Review reported 54 bankruptcy petitions filed to the tune of $3.9 million. That’s absurd! I agree that credit card companies should show more discretion in who they issue credit to. But they are not to blame for being “in over your head.”

I am a middle class American and live comfortably within my means, only to see my tax dollars bailing out other people in the same income bracket. I know people can be impulsive (I’m guilty of that), but the bottom line is: those who plan ahead stay ahead! Deanna C. Walter Spokane

Medication coverage reform needed

I am writing in concern about the pending Equity on Prescription and Contraceptive Coverage Act being considered this summer that will ensure fewer unwanted pregnancies.

This act will “establish parity for contraceptive prescriptions and related medical services within the context of coverage already guaranteed by each insurance plan.” (Source for quotes: the Planned Parenthood Fact Sheet)

“Almost half of all unintended pregnancies end in abortion.” Everyone, no matter what side of the abortion issue, can agree that fewer abortions is much better than more.

“Women of reproductive age currently spend 68 percent more out-of-pocket health care costs than men. If health care policies were to include coverage for contraceptive supplies, annual cost increases would be minimal, only $16 per enrollee.”

It would seem much cheaper in the long run for the welfare system or state child care agencies to avoid costly unplanned and unwanted pregnancies/

Why would insurance companies cover 47 percent of the cost of the prescriptions for Viagra and not the most popular contraceptives, according to IMS Health? Sounds like a very large double standard when it comes to men’s and women’s health issues.

I guess the insurance industry and managed HMOs would like to see more children fathered by men who are mostly too old to be effective parents. (The more men sexually active means the greater chance of unwanted pregnancies.) Margo Derrick Mossburg Spokane

PEOPLE IN SOCIETY

Strangers’ needs too easily dismissed

I recently met a gentlemen in his 40s, who, like most Americans, has a comfortable life with a good job, a family and financial security. During our conversation he admitted that he was tired of the state using his tax money to help the poor, particularly the disabled, since he’s convinced they have no true need of help with living expenses or with health care.

He was angry when I mentioned that recent state cuts in funding had further contributed to the suffering of disabled persons, since many are now being forced to choose between food or medicine. In fact, he’s convinced that persons with schizophrenia are faking their terrible plight (in order to milk the system?) Perhaps he is capable of deciding who is, and isn’t, truly afflicted with this devastating brain disease. Yet, he apparently isn’t trained or employed in areas relating to disability or mental health and has little experience with our society’s less fortunate.

However, I cannot fault him alone without pointing a finger at myself and nearly everyone else. Like the Good Samaritan, we’re all guilty of bypassing that wounded stranger, instead of getting involved in a situation that would remove us from our comfort zones or require us to be just a little more generous with our tax money.

Perhaps before withholding our help, we should spend some time volunteering with the various agencies that give aid and treatment to the needy so that we may learn whether or not their need is authentic. As fellow human beings, we owe them at least this much. Bonnie M. Males, Ph.D. Republic, Wash.

Role of parents can’t be overstated

Andrea Scott (“Help stop kids killing kids,” Letters, June 13) is on the right track. Her list, however, needs a few additions.

Children also need discipline at home, not at school. They need parents at home, not someone else’s parents. They need parents to talk to, not teachers. They need parents to discipline them, not the school or the courts. Children need parents who are not so busy with their own social life, and keeping up with the Joneses, that they ignore the child and his/her needs. Too many parents have no idea where their children are or what they are doing until something happens and they have a policeman at their door. And in too many cases, parents don’t care where their children are so long as they are out of their hair and don’t embarrass them in front of their social circle. To that end, they buy their children cars, computers, boom boxes - anything - to keep them from under foot. And the kids are on the streets or at someone else’s house the majority of their waking hours.

Children don’t need a village to raise them. They need parents - full-time parents with whom they spend the majority of their time, with whom they can talk about anything and everything, who instill morals, standards, and values of right and wrong, who instill the tribal truths that perpetuate the culture that sustains the nation.

It’s time parents send the “experts” packing and get back to common sense child raising, guarding their rights and responsibilities as parents in the best interests of their children. Lynn M. Stuter Nine Mile Falls

THE ENVIRONMENT

Lead issue weighs heavily on us

I am comforted by your recent article stating that Coeur d’Alene city and Kootenai County officials are going to fight EPA on expanding the Superfund investigation beyond the Silver Valley area (June 10).

Tourism is so very important to the lives of so many businesses. Certainly, one cannot believe that lead would move downstream with the water. And certainly, if it did, one cannot believe that it could amount to much. And certainly, one cannot believe if some people were affected by this lead in small amounts that the symptoms could be attributed to swimming/drinking/living/breathing of the lead in the CdA drainage. They could have gotten contaminated somewhere else.

If the county and city officials are convinced of this, who am I to question their decisions? Don’t they represent the people in many areas where we have no knowledge nor wish for knowledge?

I certainly trust their decision. Their actions are predictable and hold true to form. Pro business all the way! Without business making pocketfuls of money from tourists, we would have no jobs.

Anyway, our children will figure out what to do with the lead, if they don’t suffer too many debilitating maladies from the lead. Did someone say this about the spent fuel at Hanford?

To those officials and other folks planning on fighting the decision - keep it up. Keep it on the front page of the newspapers and in the courts. Spend lots of taxpayer money. That is what government is for. This is what is necessary to get the correct decision made. Bruce L. Kessler Colville, Wash.

Meet Our Journalists

Jesse Tinsley

Meet Jesse Tinsley. As a certified drone pilot, this veteran Spokesman-Review photographer often can be seen capturing beautiful aerial photographs of our region. Sometimes though, the job requires getting down with the dogs.
Jim Meehan

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