Letters for Feb. 26, 2024

Out-of-date tabs

This is the fourth letter to the editor in as many months about the outrageous number of vehicles driving around our city and the Valley with expired tabs. It is obvious for these scofflaws (and that includes business vehicles!) that, since apparently traffic enforcement is nonexistent, it is worth the annual money saving.

I bet the (interim) Spokane police chief a box of donuts that roughly one in 10 vehicles drive around with expired tabs. Since I have unlimited respect for our law enforcement officers who risk their lives daily for our peaceful rule of law, my conclusion is they must not be trained to know what to look for, so here’s my 2-cent educational contribution. Year tabs for 2024 are black. Year tabs for 2023 are green and for 2022 are red. These green- and red -tab drivers (not displaying a current temporary permit), excluding potential fines, amount to millions of dollars that are taken away from our maintenance and upgrade of our roads and highways. There is no way any law enforcement officer, seeing these, can drive our streets without constantly pulling someone over for not paying their fair share!

And – oh yes – I heard the “shorthanded” or “priority” excuses. I sure hope this message gets through this time and stops this road tax backsliding!

Phil Zammit

Spokane

School board confused by bond failure

Regarding the Spokane School Board meeting Wednesday night. Their $200 million bond failed. Now they can’t figure out why.

Aren’t these highly educated people? Haven’t they noticed that inflation is sucking money from citizens in the community? Don’t they realize that we see all the new schools in the city? Don’t they realize that we have already been taxed beyond a tipping point? Don’t they understand that $200 million is really a lot of money?

Do they have any idea that the majority of citizens cannot afford to keep giving money to schools? They put a School Levy and a School Bond for $200 million each on the same ballot. Do they have any idea that most citizens don’t know the difference between these two financial programs? What difference does it make anyway? We cannot afford either one.

Have they forgotten that they just got a school levy from taxpayers recently? I think it is obvious that taxpayers have not forgotten.

So, the school board had a meeting and all of those “bright” educators sat around a big table stunned. I thought these were highly educated people! If that is the best we can expect from our educational system, then we should not give them another dime, ever.

We can get by with older school buildings. The problem with our education system is not old buildings. Let’s give the board members math tests. Let’s send them back to school for remedial classes in civics, sociology, arithmetic and critical thinking.

Dan Ferguson

Spokane