Letters To The Editor

Unpublished correction: The name Olmsted Bros. was misspelled in this story.

Spokane matters

Bond an investment in preservation

I wish to express my support for the parks bond issue on the Sept. 4 ballot. In addition to the three new parks, repairs on six city pools, a skate park, upgrade of playground equipment, master plans for Manito and Riverfront parks, consolidation of park maintenance facilities and improvements to 19 neighborhood parks, I am especially impressed with the north bank land purchase adjacent to Riverfront Park.

I applaud the foresight and vision of our Parks Department to acquire land that will actually secure expansion of Riverfront Park. As we all know, real property is a wonderful investment, and this piece of land will never be cheaper than right now. But more importantly, I am excited about the investment in Spokane’s historic preservation. We are so lucky to have had the Olmstead Bros. landscape architecture firm design the beginnings of Spokane’s park system in the early 1900s and to be able to perpetuate their legacy and vision as we step into the 21st Century is an exciting honor.

Y3P. Yes Parks, Pools, Playgrounds! Mary Anne Brown Spokane

Smoking ban

Hurray, for banning foul cigarettes

Hats off to the Spokane Interstate Fair and their decision for a clean air festival. I am married with four children and we will be going to the fair with carloads of friends who don’t smoke.

The tobacco industry has roped millions of insecure people into their legal drug addiction. The 2000 plus additives the tobacco industry adds to tobacco are not only tattering smokers’ lungs, they are on the job to destroy those of us with clean lungs. People who smoke are unaware of how nauseating smoke is to nonsmokers. When you are in a public place, smokers have two options: smelling smoke or breathing fresh air. Nonsmokers unfortunately must endure the obnoxious, toxic waste smoke from smokers.

I am glad the Spokane Interstate Fair is not promoting drugs of any kind; cigarettes are indeed a drug. Perhaps it is time people realize just how foul cigarettes are. The problem is not that smoking kills you, it’s how it does and the people it takes with you.

Check out a respiratory ward in a hospital, watch patients gasp for air or how uncomfortable a tube down their throat really is. Maybe these big spender smokers would have a different opinion about the decision. Janice Simeone Sandpoint

Family won’t be in this year’s fair

I am a nonsmoker and would be the first to defend my right to not have to experience second-hand smoke. Family members and friends know I prefer they smoke outside my home when visiting. I have supported the laws that forbid smoking in the workplace, restaurants, planes etc. But when I read in the paper that the commissioners had banned smoking on the fairgrounds a red flag went up in my mind that at first surprised me: smokers have rights too.

Most smokers are considerate of nonsmokers and I imagine most of the smoking fair attendees in the past have followed the rules and have gone to the smoking areas that have been assigned to them. Smoking outside doesn’t bother most people. If it does they can walk away just a few feet and distance themselves from it. I imagine the next restriction to smokers will be no smoking in Riverfront Park or on the Centennial Trail.

I look forward to the fair every year so I can watch family members participate in the cow penning event. They are so disgusted with new law that they are not going to compete. I love the fair and have always supported it but I hope everyone, smokers and nonsmokers that feel the commissioners have gone way over the line all stay home!

Come on, commissioners, it is not too late to admit you were wrong and give smokers back the right to at least smoke in designated areas. Wende C. Barker Spokane

Other fair factors harmful, too

I am getting tired of people trying to tell me how to live. I am very thoughtful of nonsmokers when I smoke. A few people are trying to dictate, to the rest of us, behavioral patterns based on their feelings.

What possible harm can smoking cause when done in designated areas? Will it kill someone just to see others smoking? Will it cause some small child to run out and buy cigarettes?

I believe that other factors at the fair are just as harmful as everyone says smoking is. The particulates from the diesel buses and trucks for one. The gases from the cooking areas. The ridiculous amounts of perfume some women wear is personally very bad for my sinuses.

Smoking is not the only thing people should be afraid of in this world. Let’s see an article on everyone’s rights, including smokers. We are some very solid citizens and have helped maintain everyone’s rights (including those who don’t want smoking). Mike L. Fettig, Sr. Spokane

People in society

Driver and bicyclist both wrong

Angela Moore, (Your Turn, Sept. 1) you certainly do have the right to share the road with cars. You also have the right to leave your purse laying around in public places. You even have the right to walk by a bunch of drunken sailors in a wet T-shirt without being bothered. It is just not realistic to expect a good outcome.

The man who yelled at you was wrong and guilty of assault. But don’t let that bad experience keep you from taking a hard look at what you were doing. You were on an arterial street with a bike towing a stroller trailer? How can you enjoy a ride like that? You should have been terrified.

Ride a bike on an arterial and you will have traffic backing up behind you - Spokane traffic, with its mix of carelessness, incompetence, and downright mean-spirited drivers. Your kids are strapped in (read that trapped in) to a light-weight shell that wouldn’t survive a rear-end collision from another bicycle. And if (God forbid) you were hit by even a slow-moving car whose driver felt pressured by all the cars closing on his rear end, forgive me for being so morbid, but you would likely take a hard tumble and break a few bones, but your kids are down at a level where they would almost certainly go under the car. Ron O. Brickley Spokane

Possible dangers left out of story

This letter is in response to “Get her motor runnin”’ (InLife, Aug. 22) suggesting girls start taking road trips alone.

It may sound like fun but there was one part that was completely left out, namely the amount of killers of females out on the highways today…and growing. The mother and two young girls murdered in Yosemite Park a couple of months ago is a good example.

I come from a big city and I’ve had a couple of female friends attacked, bloodied and raped. The suffering these women went through is almost indescribable.

There is strength in numbers, especially when a couple of them are men. Robert R. Smith Spokane

Time for students to own up

Thank you so much for your article “Wet-noodle lashing won’t deter rowdies” (Opinion, Aug. 21) I was so happy to find someone who agrees with me. I am in my fifth year of college, and I can’t tell you how sick I am of hearing about these stories where alcohol is involved and it is always the university’s fault, or the living groups’ fault.

I don’t know why students can’t own up to there own mistakes and realize that it is no one’s fault but their own.

We live in such a sad society where we blame anyone and everyone but ourselves. Everyone has to be responsible for their own actions and their decisions. I wonder when people will realize this and stop blaming others. Jennifer Gish Moscow, Idaho

Other topics

Take control of North Idaho’s image

Both Larry Kenck and Norm Mahoney are correct in their assessment of the Nazi activities. Their thought-provoking comments do not tell all of the story, however.

Enough is enough, and Coeur d’Alene made a mistake in letting them march because every time they steal publicity, all of Idaho suffers a black eye.

As the original director of the Panhandle Health District, I was first elected to a national health board in the 1970s, and I spent most of my time explaining that Idaho is not Iowa and how to pronounce Coeur d’Alene. Later in my career I noticed that many folks knew or heard of North Idaho’s beauty.

This summer I spent time in five different states on family maters from graduation to weddings. In all five states I found the image of Idaho had changed, and I spent a great deal of time defending Idaho. No longer did I hear praise of Idaho. Instead, I heard about the Nazi movement, the Order and how so many hate crimes link back to Idaho. This is the image of Idaho that we experienced this summer, and I find it sad, for we raised our family in Coeur d’Alene to help others, not hate them.

Enough is enough, for the Nazis gain recognition at our expense. Coeur d’Alene must take a stand against such planned community disruption. This could lead to a lawsuit, but at least Idaho would gain some recognition for standing firm for justice for all. Coeur d’Alene, and all of Idaho, would benefit form such positive image. Larry M. Belmont Coeur d’Alene

Use science-based methods

Trying to eliminate predators to manage wildlife was not successful in the 1950s and will not work now. An overall, natural balance of an ecosystem is more important than trying to maximize and manipulate elk populations at the expense of other wildlife.

The data on elk populations for the Clearwater region provided by the Idaho Fish and Game Department is sketchy at best. A data set that covers only a short span of time cannot tell the whole story. Populations of elk have decreased in some units but have increased in other units of the Clearwater region. Elk populations are effected by many factors, not just predators. Ecosystems are complex and the interdependence of elk, other wildlife, weather, habitat, traffic patterns and hunters needs to be better understood.

To assume elk populations ten years ago were in balance and can be sustained is not supported by facts. Jim Peek, wildlife biologist, asserts the two most important impacts on elk populations in the last 100 years have been the paving of U.S. Highway 12 in 1962 and the elimination of cow elk permits in 1976. The increased access after 1962 led to a decrease in elk. The elimination of cow permits increased the elk populations. These two factors directly related to people management, not habitat or predator management.

People in Idaho, many of whom are non-hunters, expect all wildlife, not just huntable game, to be protected. Public backlash will occur if wildlife decisions are based on politics instead of science. Larry O. McLaud Moscow, Idaho

Why was missing woman driving?

I read the brief in the Sept. 1 Region section, “Woman with Alzheimer’s missing from South Hill” about the missing woman who has Alzheimers and is allowed to drive. Am I missing something here? Who is allowing Nancy Rockwell to drive in the first place? This isn’t right. I am worried for her! Tami N. Sorensen Spokane

Overwhelming evidence. Where?

In Jack DeBaun’s letter, (Sept. 4) he claims that there is overwhelming evidence in favor of evolution. Where? Could it be the transitional forms found in the fossil record? Oops, I’m sorry. There are none.

Maybe it’s the scientific probability of evolution through genetic mutations. Oops again. Nearly 99 percent of all genetic mutations kill the organism, and many more leave the organism in a degenerate state.

I know, it’s the radioactive dating methods, like carbon 14, potassium-argon, and uranium-lead. Maybe not, since these forms of dating all work under certain assumptions not facts. And they often give a wide variety of dates from which the scientist must choose the so-called right one based on his preconceived notions.

This is but a sampling of the mass of problems and inconsistencies that must be dealt with to truly support evolution as science.

When viewed in its entirety, evolution is not a history of success. It is a record of death, deformity and debauchery. How dare you give God credit for causing changes in organisms that lead to their very death! If I were you, DeBaun, I would ask myself, what kind of God do I believe in. Frank A. Walker Sandpoint

Initiatives

More than saving money to I-695

To those folks supporting I-695, here’s food for thought. At first glance I-695 sounds great. We’d all like to save money by reducing high license tab fees. Please stop to think before marking your ballot in the affirmative. Someone has to make up the difference…it’ll be done by cutting jobs.

State transit systems, including STA, will lose major portions of their funding. What about our paratransit system? Is it a luxury we don’t need? Ask the people who rely on it.

What about the North-South Freeway? Who needs it? We have Division; everyone’s aware of how smoothly traffic runs there. With fewer buses, there will be an increase in traffic. That will mean more road repairs. Do you wonder where that money comes from? Could we vote in a carriage repair tax? After all, those people driving $100,000 RVs, that will only be paying $30 to license them will surely sustain lots of damage from potholes caused by increased traffic.

Transportation projects are not the only ones to feel the pinch. Large portions of license tab fees support education and criminal justice. I-695 could reduce jail time for offenders in Washington. If it passes, where will the money come from to house prisoners? Some look at I-695 as a get out of jail free card.

Some motor vehicle excise tax fees goes toward public health. God forbid we’d have another outbreak like the hepatitis epidemic. Debbie A. McMurtery Spokane

Support Initiative 695

The people who think there will be a state income tax are all wet. They have not taken the time to read what I-695 would do for the average working person. Now the voters will never again get a chance to reduce the high license tab fees.

Idaho and Oregon do not want this $30 license tab to pass in Washington as it will take away their cash cow. Those special interest groups do not like I-695 as it will take away their high welfare money (namely their paychecks).

These high license tab fees go on and on and they will continue to go higher and higher. Now they are putting forth a proposal for another fee for new license plates. If this goes through, it will also go higher and higher.

Where is the gas tax money going? They are getting more money off the gas tax than the license tab fees. Still the best way is a higher tax on liquor and cigarettes.

Let’s take back our identity and vote for I-695. That will tell politicians enough is enough. Or better yet, take a secret survey: Those who are against I-695 can pay the outrageous fees and those for I-695 will pay only $30. Fair enough? Lloyd L. Etier Spokane

Fishing initiative ill-conceived

This November voters will be asked to make commercial fishing by nontribal fishermen a felony. The sport fishing community thinks it will gain by this tactic. It won’t.

Any reduction in nontribal fishing will be allocated to the tribes. Most nontribal commercial fishing is for chum, sockeye, and pink salmon. Examining catch records clearly shows very few listed salmon are taken in nontribal commercial fisheries. There will be no savings of endangered salmon by eliminating nontribal commercial fishing.

Should Initiative 696 pass the investments of thousands of families in licenses, boats, gear, and opportunity will be taken from them with no compensation. Besides being unfair this sets a very dangerous precedent. When the promised increases in endangered stocks don’t show who will be next? If I were a farmer looking at water allocation problems I would be extremely concerned about this kind of approach to resource management.

We are facing a time of diminishing resources and conflicting wants. Wouldn’t it be better to resolve these issues by addressing the needs of all parties, then working together to find just solutions? Ill-conceived and confiscatory measures like I-696 have no place in resource management. Please vote “No” on I-696. Lanny R. Carpenter Olympia