Letters To The Editor

SPOKANE MATTERS

Ordinance hearing clearly in order

As a member of the Spokane County Planning Commission, I’m concerned about misinformation on the critical areas protection ordinance portrayed in Robbi Castleberry’s letter of Feb. 4.

The commissioners were morally responsible to schedule the public hearing because the document that arrived on their desks was not the document the Citizens Advisory Group took three-and-a-half years to draft.

The Citizens Advisory Group’s consensus document was drastically altered by certain individuals with their own agenda from the CAG.

The current draft has many severe flaws that would hinder Spokane’s economy, threaten the availability of affordable housing and weaken the constitutional rights of private property owners. Some of these flaws include:

The most severe buffer zone widths in the nation.

No minimum standards for wetland classification (a ditch used for occasional runoff could be classified as prime wetland).

Haphazardly established buffer zones without regard to specific site characteristics or functions.

The whole Citizens Advisory Group process is in jeopardy when years of unpaid hard work are disregarded in favor of a bureaucrat’s or individual’s personal agenda. The credibility of the public hearing process is also in jeopardy when controversial issues are railroaded through with limited public input.

Commissioners Steve Hasson and Phil Harris were right in delaying action until a public hearing could be held. Michael Schrader, county planning commissioner Spokane

Need a facility, not a zoo scene

If Commissioner John Roskelley truly wants to do what’s best for our county, (“County joins consortium to build juvenile jail,” Feb. 14), maybe the first thing to do is check Juvenile Court Services Director Tom Davis’ numbers.

This is the same guy who started out in 1992 at $186,000 per cell, went to $158,000 per cell in 1994 and is now down to $83,000 per cell. That might even make sense, were it not for the fact that something else has come along - something more cost-effective that would serve most of Eastern Washington. Why isn’t Spokane buying 20 beds at Martin Hall, where the bed cost is even lower?

And Steve Eugster, please get all the facts on both sides before you start whining about another lawsuit.

If the powers that be would quit with the political game-playing and self-serving behavior, we might get what’s best for both the community and the kids. Marlee Griffith Spokane

City employees should reside there

Politicians talk about a tax base but define it only in terms of companies located within the city. What about people?

In Spokane, approximately two-thirds of city employees live outside the city. So what, you ask? Well, these people earn salaries from the city but do not share the responsibility of maintaining the city. Every year about this time, negotiations with unions occur and the end result invariably is a utility tax increase. The last stump speech I heard used the rate of 18 percent. Do you enjoy paying taxes for visitors?

When elected to the council, one is expected to make hard decisions. In other cities such as Detroit, Boston and Louisville, these decisions are handled by individuals who know what it takes to conserve funds and ensure a return on the salaries disbursed to employees. In each of these cities, a residency requirement was enacted that states, “All persons working in any branch of the city service shall reside in the city.” As expected, this requirement has been tested in court. Some of these cities have been operating under this requirement since the early 1970s.

Even individuals from the Spokane chamber of commerce do not claim Spokane as a residence. Ever wonder why downtown is deteriorating? Do any of these people care? Edward Thomas Jr. Spokane

Trail must not compromise cemetery

I applaud the Riverside cemetery board for keeping the Centennial Trail away from Riverside Memorial Park.

Our son lies buried at the edge of the cemetery overlooking the river. We chose that spot for its peace and serenity. Eventually, we all will lie there, together again.

I cannot fathom the extreme selfishness it takes for the Friends of the Centennial Trail to seek to deny us this last sanctuary and demand that the cemetery board change its mind. Don’t you people have a heart? Haven’t you lost anyone who means more than the world to you? How would you feel if your last refuge to mourn your beloved were taken away?

I can’t count the times I’ve sat at my son’s grave, shedding tears in privacy, recalling memories, having silent conversations. It has been my great solace and given me a chance to heal, to come to terms with his loss. I’ve come early in the morning to be alone in my grief and found deer grazing by his grave. It eases the pain.

This beautiful, serene place is the last gift we were able to give our son. Now you want to take that away from us? Some things are still sacred. Riverside Memorial Park is our sacred place. Valerie Snipes Spokane

WASHINGTON STATE

Support youth work programs

Spokane’s economically disadvantaged teenagers have had the opportunity to experience jobs during the school year and summer. These programs provided at-risk teenagers a chance to learn basic work skills and develop healthy work values.

A key benefit was that working adults served as role models and mentors. Often, these supervisors were the first positive relationship these kids have had with an adult. Research shows that work values are learned at home. One-fifth of the children in this country are living in one-parent families with the father-as-breadwinner absent. Where are the children learning work values?

Youth Employment and Training programs tried to provide this for high-risk kids as well as teach the benefits of developing employable skills. To get people off welfare, it might be important to teach work values to kids. But during the last year, Congress has cut these funds and discontinued future funding.

This is not good for Spokane or its kids. We have the largest population in the state on public assistance but about $1 million less to provide such services as youth job training. This summer about 600 teenagers will be on the streets instead of working, earning and spending their money in Spokane. Who will provide the role modeling? Gangs?

Lucky for our kids, Gov. Mike Lowry wants to budget $8 million for summer youth work programs. I ask concerned citizens of Spokane to support our kids. Call your legislators and ask them to support our governor on this one. Donald P. Orlando Spokane

Silver’s positions don’t compute

I am struck by state Rep. Jean Silver’s actions regarding grass burning (“Farmland becomes battleground,” Jan. 28).

She has expressed support for resolving this health and air quality crisis by signing on to state Rep. Lisa Brown’s bill to give the Spokane County Air Pollution Control Authority more responsibility. Now I understand Silver is proposing her own bill to support the farmers in their demand for higher profits. Where does she stand?

Silver should realize by now that some farmers are in the grass seed business because profits there are higher than in wheat production. If they didn’t burn, their profits would still be as good or better than if they were raising other crops that at least create food for people.

Silver’s flip-flop behavior makes one wonder if she has been smoking some funny little things herself. Joy Culp Spokane

Tuition a crushing burden for some

Regarding “Tuition hikes squeeze students” (Feb. 12), I am appalled with the attitude of some in Olympia. Rep. Ken Jacobsen, D-Seattle, doesn’t think tuition is too high. I know firsthand how high it is.

I attend college, as does my oldest daughter. She attends Eastern Washington University. Compared with private universities, yes, the tuition is a bargain. But does that make it right to raise the price again?

We are low-income and qualify for financial aid. Sen. Eugene Prince, R-Thornton, seems to think financial aid will be enough. But that financial assistance does not cover all of a university student’s expenses. What about housing and meals - more than $3,000 a year? Not all students can live at home and commute. My daughter can’t even afford a bus pass.

We have taken out student loans to cover the extra expenses. My daughter will be so far in debt by the time she graduates, it will be years before she will be able to repay those loans. So far, she owes more than $5,000 and she’s only a sophomore.

I would like to go on to EWU but cannot justify another two years’ worth of loans in addition to my daughter’s loans. We can only hope that her college education will be enough to get her a decent-paying job so she can support herself and pay back all those loans. Roxanne Coatney Chewelah, Wash.

Fifteen dollars per hour is not a “good job going begging” for a skilled machinist. Grand Coulee Dam has just retired three refugees from Spokane’s “good jobs going begging” market. A machinist here makes about $22.50 per hour.

One other retiree from Grand Coulee Dam is now employed in Spokane at about $12 per hour. Why he does that is beyond me. I know of a woman whose son is a machinist in Spokane. He has “the best job in the place and makes top dollar” - $8 per hour.

Spokane’s wage base is not good. Spokane will always be a second-class cow town if the wages for “good jobs going begging” stay at current levels. Those wages won’t support an economy of $120,000 homes and $25,000 automobiles. Clifford J. Appel Electric City, Wash.

LAW AND JUSTICE

‘Fault’ divorce law is not the way

Regarding Mona Charen’s column on no-fault divorce (Opinion, Feb. 15):

Halting so-called “no-fault” divorce means reinstating “fault” divorce. Bad idea.

The answer lies in strengthening marriages, not limiting divorces. Waiting periods and counseling already exist within the framework of the current law.

In 20 years as a family law practitioner, I’ve never seen anyone file for divorce on a whim. A minute number of divorces are completed in the statutory 90 days; the average is six to nine months.

Every potential client I’ve talked to believes deeply that they have “grounds” for ending the marriage, even though our present statute calls only for “irretrievable breakdown.”

Charen’s statistics are somewhat stale, and some comments are distorted. Her remarks about single-parent households presume that all of them result from easy divorce. A large percentage are the product of no marriage at all.

A divorce with children is the only litigation that involves everything in the lives of the parties: all money, property, identity - even future income and time. Yet society demands that it be as quick and cheap as possible.

In the 10 percent of divorces that actually go to trial, the judge is expected to dispose of decades of accumulations in a matter of hours. Miraculously, judges do manage to do it.

Regressing to a “fault” system will not cure the present problems. There is no longer any stigma to divorce. Do we renew the old stigmas? No.

The solution lies in building character and commitment in individuals who will then build strong marriages and families. Virginia Worthington Spokane

Execution is just a form of killing

Staff writer D.F. Oliveria has done a service for the movement to abolish capital punishment in Washington. His editorial of Feb. 15 reveals much about support for state killings even without appearing just after a day named for a man executed by the Roman government.

In essence, the editorial approved of putting away the noose simply because lethal injection makes it easier to justify executing a few random prisoners to appease the masses. He apparently would have no problem with hanging or other primitive forms of lowering the state to the level of the basest and most violent criminals.

It puzzles me that Oliveria has such hatred for Mitch Rupe, the most personable and sympathetic resident of Washington’s death row over the past 15 years. Surely it’s redundant to call murders brutal, and if Rupe hadn’t bought into Oliveria’s sentiment that violence is sometimes desirable, he would have found a non-violent solution to being thrown out of the Army for obesity or, at least would’ve decided not to take a gun to rob a bank.

As long as a state can use such a large portion of its resources to kill its own citizens, it will be part of the justification for desperate people to disregard human life. Oliveria abdicates any credible right to tell a troubled individual not to try to solve problems by killing somebody.

Executions create more victims, more violence, fear and anger in our society. If it’s wrong for bad people to kill, how can it be right for good people to kill? Rusty Nelson Spokane

GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS

Clinton itinerary disappoints

I am upset about President Clinton’s so-called visit to the Northwest after the recent flooding. His visit was so brief; how could he get any idea how devastating the flood damage actually was and still is?

I am an Idaho resident who grew up in St. Maries. I’ve been around to see the rivers rise and fall, but the water just kept rising this time.

My grandparents lost their home and everything in it. Friends, neighbors and other residents lost so much. Is Clinton too good or just too busy to see what the flood has done to Idaho, instead of flying off to Boise to get his information secondhand? Sure, he could actually go to Washington and Oregon, but he didn’t even go to the most damaged areas.

Cataldo and St. Maries have been considered the worst out of all three states. Why couldn’t he go and look at the community and the damage?

I will make a decision based on what I’ve actually seen. I won’t be deciding on Clinton. Shawnya Nelson Moscow, Idaho

Assumption flaws analysis

In his front page Feb. 11 story, staff writer Jim Camden would have us believe Washington voters prefer balancing the budget to getting a tax cut.

That’s how he interpreted a poll of Washington voters that showed 92 percent think balancing the budget is important and 64 percent think getting a tax cut is important.

There’s only one problem with this interpretation: It’s completely wrong. Camden incorrectly assumes that the 92 percent wanting a balanced budget do not want a tax cut. That is, he assumes that the 92 percent group wanting a balanced budget is mutually exclusive of the 64 percent group wanting a tax cut.

It’s clear from the poll results that the 64 percent wanting a tax cut must also be part of the 92 percent wanting a balanced budget. In other words, the 64 percent want both a balanced budget and a tax cut.

How many voters, then, want just a balanced budget without a tax cut? This is the group Camden implies is the majority viewpoint. We can find this number by subtracting those wanting both a balanced budget and a tax cut (64 percent) from those wanting a balanced budget ( 92 percent). The answer is only 28 percent.

Take off your liberal blinders, Camden. Most people want not only a balanced budget but that Republican tax cut as well. Gerry Pluth Spokane

Editor’s note: The two questions were asked separately, not as mutually exclusive options. The point of the story was that a significantly larger share of those surveyed said a balanced budget is important than said a tax cut is important - 9 of 10 vs. 7 of 12. Results were analyzed by Del Ali of Political/ Media Research Inc. and reported by Camden.