Letters for May 17, 2023

Horrified by blatant racism and profiling

I was incredibly disheartened to receive the below email from the secretary of our Coeur d’Alene neighborhood HOA: “Today, May 5, between 3-3:06 p.m. we had a young black man walking in the middle of the street.” The secretary then detailed which streets he’d walked, continuing with that he “stopped at our driveway, started talking with a neighbor … He had a black hoodie on and the crotch of his pants was down to his knees. We noticed that he was making a point of talking to a few people as he walked through the neighborhood. Other neighbors also watched his activity. If you see anything suspicious, please call the police department.”

Let me paraphrase: For exactly six minutes, a Black man walked through the neighborhood and talked to some people. And this has been deemed as suspicious.

While I am unfortunately not surprised to discover I live in a neighborhood where people of color are so blatantly profiled, I am saddened to confirm that my family members with dark skin will not be safe visiting my home.

Lest anyone claim this has nothing to do with race, perhaps I’ll start issuing the same kind of report regardless of race: “Alert: Today, a white girl with blond hair walked through the neighborhood for six minutes and said hello to some folks.”

If anyone had any doubts, you probably shouldn’t visit Coeur d’Alene unless you are white and well-dressed.

Abigail Heath

Coeur d’Alene

Avista wants rate hike

On March 31, Avista submitted a rate increase for electricity to Utility and Transportation Commission, increasing rates by 6%. Avista says that they erred in calculating how much they would need for energy usage in an annual report that is submitted to the UTC. They underestimated how much energy would be needed and overestimated how much revenue they would get which resulted in a difference of $34.06 balance we owe to Avista. That includes interest and addental cost for accounting as they are “loaning” us the money. Why are they making this request? Because they can.

All of the supporting documents have been redacted for confidential reasons and all that we see are blank pages. A company called Alliance of Western Energy Consumers has been engaged to act as an advocate for Avista. This company specializes in advocating for utilities who are their customers. Why?

The open meeting for this request will be held on June 29, in Lacy, Washington. It will also be virtual for those who are not able to travel to Lacy. To sign up for the virtual meeting, email utc.wa.gov/consumers/submit-comment. At that time if anyone wants to speak, indicate that on the request.

Other ways of contacting the UTC is by mail to UTC P.O. Box 47250 or phone at (888) 333-9882. In all forms of communication, refer to Dockett No. UI 230214.

Urge the UTC to deny this request.

Jacqueline Truelove

Spokane

Support teen mental health

Throughout my high school career, I’ve seen many people struggle with mental issues, myself included. I have suffered with severe anxiety for most of my life and I know it’s not easy to talk to someone. Our issue is that most students don’t feel comfortable talking to the counselors in the schools. A survey by Rhitu Chatterjee shows that “1 in 3 girls had seriously considered attempting suicide, which is up by 60% over the last decade. And I should point out that teens who identify as LGBQ+, more than half of them experienced poor mental health recently and 1 in 5 had actually attempted suicide in the past year.”

The way schools are trying to help is by adding more counselors to the staff, yet this hasn’t helped the students who are afraid of coming out about those thoughts. The evidence only shows the data of those who come out with their health, what about the others? Should we keep the same solutions? No. I ask you to help and support our teens in the journey of healing and growth. Give our students a chance to feel comfortable and heal from whatever they are going through, as well as giving them the resources they may need to grow into who they are meant to be. Let’s give them the opportunity to help themselves by opening the sites needed and having them available for our students to use.

Brandon Stevens

Spokane

Help fight food insecurity

Food insecurity is a big problem. In middle school I was a part of the action team in a program called Generation Alive and after, I developed a passion for helping our community by working at Second Harvest and distributing food.

Second Harvest has been struggling with getting supplies needed to help the community, “’If there is less food coming in, that means there is less food that we can give out, that means that there is a possibility of turning people away if we don’t have food to give out,’ said Grandy.” (Maragos). Another struggle is the food waste issue, “Eastern Washington, including Spokane, leads the state in per capita amount of food waste thrown away annually.”

Food waste is a problem in Spokane, we are wasting organic food that could be used to feed people that are food insecure. There are solutions like children getting free lunches but that’s only for when they are in school so there is no guarantee that students can eat another meal. We can help by helping our nearest Second Harvest or food drives and by not wasting as much food. Help feed Spokane.

Allison German

Spokane