Letters for March 3, 2024
Wind farms are not farms
Sue Lani Madsen’s “Lessons not learned yet on industrial power facility siting” (Feb. 22) is spot on. She writes, “‘A wind farm is no more a farm than Grand Coulee Dam is a home for beavers. What developers are selling to landowners in Lincoln and Spokane counties are industrial energy production facilities.”
Few know it today, but Franklin D. Roosevelt is the architect of Columbia River hydroelectric developments – including Grand Coulee Dam – that electrified rural Washington in the 1930s. Until then, farming consisted mainly of rural gardens.
Electricity and the irrigation water that flowed from Lake Roosevelt made large scale farming possible in arid central and Eastern Washington. Yes, these hydroelectric developments have pushed migrating salmon and steelhead to the brink, but the recent agreement between tribes and the Biden administration seem to have us again headed in the right direction.
When Roosevelt visited Grand Coulee in August 1934, he explained his visionary support for our region’s hydroelectric future. Everything he said remains true today. Also still true is that Madsen’s “wind farms” are also butchering millions of birds, including bald eagles.
The federal penalty for killing an eagle is $100,000 and one-year in prison. But these penalties are not enforced. And discussing the tons of minerals needed to make one windmill is taboo – to say nothing of the thousands of acres of fertile farmland and bird habitat lost to wind farms. Why are we whistling past these graveyards?
Jim Petersen
Dalton Gardens
Disappointed in the loss of KEWU-FM
It was a sad day for me, though not unexpected, when KEWU-FM went off the air for good earlier this month. While I did not always agree with their programming, i.e., song choices (sometimes stretching my definition of jazz), the music was always a breath of fresh air compared to the exhausting programming of other FM stations in the area – with their 10 minutes of commercials for every six minutes of music, and anything-but-comedic-on-air-clown-show personalities, or, the imbalanced verbose programming of “public radio.” While I can understand that, budget and revenue-wise, KEWU could not compete with EWU’s Athletic Department (pun intended), I am nonetheless disappointed in, and now stewing in silence at, the university’s “business decision” to shut it down.
Al Pierce
Spokane
Electric school buses for lowering carbon emissions
Currently, the Legislature is considering House Bill 1368, which requests money for electric school buses. As we have seen here in Spokane, the city line, the electric, hybrid buses have a huge benefit to reducing carbon emissions in Spokane. Take a look at all of the school buses driving around Spokane County and imagine the huge benefits to our carbon emission decreases we’re looking for, passing HB 1368 is another way of meeting our goals for reducing emission standards. Please contact your state legislator and impress on them the importance of passing this bill We must pass HB 1368 to reduce carbon emissions.
John Alder
Spokane
Congratulations to all B schools
What a wonderful thing to watch on our local TV channel, B basketball, raw. No annoying announcer, no ridiculous trips to the scorer’s table for ref review, no huge egos on the court, just great sportsmanship between teams. Simply great kids playing a great game. Congratulations to all B schools. Just a wonderful event!
John Myers
Spokane