Letters to the editor for the week of 11/6/19
Guidelines for letters
All letters must contain an address and phone number. Only one letter per week per person will be published; only one letter per person per month regarding the same topic will be published. Feather Publishing does not print third-party, anonymous or open letters. Letters must not exceed 300 words. Writers responding to previously published letters may not mention the author by name. The deadline is Friday at noon; deadlines may change due to holidays. Letters may be submitted at any of Feather Publishing’s offices, sent via fax to 283-3952 or emailed to [email protected].
Random act of kindness
My two friends and I met to go to the Blue Goose Gallery in Chester. One from Redding, one from Red Bluff and I from Taylorsville. We had lunch at the Happy Garden restaurant and we had a “God moment.” We had visited with another couple there, didn’t know them, and when we asked for our bill the owner said, “It’s been paid for.” How can you thank people you don’t know for their random act of kindness. By doing something randomly for someone else. “Pay it forward.”
Doti McDowell
Taylorsville
Thank you, Quincy
It has now been 20 years since I moved to Quincy. The 20 years I’ve lived here I’ve seen some changes in Quincy, like Subway, Dollar Tree, and Dollar General opening up, as well as some other companies. Around the year 2000 or so I became a docent (volunteer) at the Plumas County Museum sweeping leaves mostly, which I still do. It makes me feel proud that in some small way I can give back to the community. You might have seen me there handing out candy this year dressed like a Jedi. I want to thank the museum director Scott Lawson for all these years of telling me what to sweep and other things I’ve done (like vacuuming the Variel Home and the Law Office next door), and for being a great friend. I also want to thank Joan Stroemer who retired from being the apartment manager to the apartment complex I live at. She was always there for me for things I needed. Thank you also to my current apartment manager Tracy Williams who is also a wonderful manager helping me with things I need and Toby McAdams for keeping the place up great. Also, I want to thank my friend and minister Paul Finch III who helped me become a Christian at the Church of Christ here in town as well as our great congregation. They all represent the great people that live here in town. Thank you!
Kenneth Green
Quincy
Auto problem
I am immeasurably proud of the Quincy Community and am grateful to live, work, and volunteer in beautiful Plumas County. That being said, I am concerned about a problem that seems to be going unaddressed: Blight … and very specifically, abandoned vehicles. It is my understanding (and observation) that within Quincy boundaries there are at least 30 abandoned vehicles. These vehicles are being vandalized and drawing vandals into neighborhoods, that alone is of significant concern and that add to that the danger they present to curious children.I would think that anything that might present a liability issue for the County (attractive nuisance) would be at the top of the attention list. Clearly the County is on notice that these vehicles are present and creating dangerous situations — not to mention that they are an absolute eyesore.
I have contacted various agencies from the CHP to the Board of Supervisors. I have been assured that the issue is being addressed and yet, after months, the problem still exists.
The purpose of this letter is to directly and in public forum request that the County, and most specifically the Board of Supervisors, immediately act to resolve this issue and make it clear that these violations will not be tolerated and that those responsible will be prosecuted.
One agency told me they were not responsible because an ordinance needed to be passed; the BOS told me that ‘we’ needed a contract with a wrecking yard because there was no place to tow the vehicles. My request is pretty simple: If an ordinance needs to be passed, then pass it; if a contract needs to be in place, then sign it … this has been ignored long enough. Come on, Plumas County deserves far better than this.
Thank you for your time and consideration,
Michele Cruz
Quincy
Outride
Thank your for sharing this wonderful story.
My name is Andy Cunningham and I am a Programs Coordinator for Outride.
I just wanted to write and provide a point of clarification — The Specialized Foundation no longer exists. As TSF moved from a private foundation to a public 501c3 non-profit, we underwent a name change to Outride.
“To learn more about The Specialized Foundation and Riding for Focus, visit outride.org. For more information on Plumas Charter School, call 283-3851 or visit plumascharterschool.org.”
So, this should read: To learn more about Outride and Riding for Focus, visit …
Thank you for your time.
Andrew Cunningham
Programs Coordinator
Morgan Hill
Portola Outdoor Burn Ban
In July the Portola City Council unanimously approved the Air Quality Improvement program to reduce woodstove pollution. At the last minute they added a ban on burning of yard waste within the City limits. Consider the following:
• Forest fires are not caused by residents burning their pine needles.
• If a burn pile did get out of control the fire department would be on it instantly. Minimal impact.
• To burn, a permit is needed that makes the homeowner responsible for safe conditions.
• Burning was only allowed on days when the atmospheric conditions were acceptable.
• Burning only takes place for a short while in the fall and spring during optimal conditions.
• Woodstove pollution takes place all winter and is necessary to provide heat for our residents. Inversions in the river valley cause pollution to accumulate. This is a valid concern, but has nothing to do with burning of green waste.
• We are now subject to a backdoor tax to pay for the disposal of the green waste at IMD. I estimate this will cost me over $100/year, every year.
• As far as I know, no other communities in our area have instituted such a ban.
The council approved the Ordinance, with the addition of the burn ban, after the meeting minutes reflect that only two people agreed with it during public comment at the meeting.
The City Manager advised me that the ban can be overturned by the council if they wish, and I have heard nothing but complaints about it from my neighbors. This letter hopes to elicit input from Portola residents, so please contact City Hall and let them know your opinion.
Daniel T. Harvey
Portola
Power outage
So … since our well kept governor is going all in to go after PG&E maybe he should step up and rent commercial generators for these areas … that way PG&E wouldn’t be sued for providing us power and it would show what a fine stand up leader he is.. Oh pshaw … let’s run it by the Friday afternoon Dame Shirley brain trust and see what they think of it. heh heh
Mike Curran
Quincy
Corruption
It takes real chutzpah for Donald Trump and his sons to call Hunter Biden “corrupt” for doing business abroad. The entire Trump clan, including the president himself, “continue to make a mint” trading on Donald Trump’s position of power. Eric and Donald Jr. are actively promoting the Trump business overseas in such countries as Turkey, the Philippines, India, Indonesia and Uruguay. Ivanka Trump dined with Chinese President Xi Jimping and her father at Mar-a-Largo, and the same day China granted her preliminary trademarks for jewelry and handbags potentially worth millions. Jared Kushner serves as WH advisor while continuing to profit from a complex web of business abroad. Trump is paid millions by foreign governments and U.S. corporations that stay at his properties to curry favor with him. The House Oversight Committee is investigating allegations that a foreign government and a trade association booked large blocks of rooms at Trump’s hotels without actually using them. Bribery? That’s corruption on a large scale.
Duane Vander Veen
Graeagle
It’s just sad
In 2016, 46.1 percent of Americans voting for President (only 27 percent of eligible voters), chose the Republican candidate. Despite his main opponent tallying almost 3 million more votes, an outmoded, anti-democratic electoral college system, combined with carefully orchestrated voter suppression tactics, extreme gerrymandering and the added bonus of Russian meddling on his behalf, propelled a TV reality show host and New York real estate shyster to a shocking victory.
American voters have historically been intrigued by professional sports and entertainment figures who sought public office, electing several at all levels of government. For example, Californians have elected actors — Ronald Reagan and Arnold Schwarzenegger — as their governor. Often, celebrities have performed their new jobs acceptably, thanks largely to their willingness to seek and value counsel from those with experience and expertise in governance.
Sadly, the current White House resident — a consummate huckster, and dangerously ill narcissist — has produced little that is acceptable. He is incapable of trusting counsel because he is a “stable genius” (self-described) who always knows best. His unwavering need to always be right and in control of the moment compel him to constantly lie, denigrate, abuse, and destroy. His foreign policy is disastrous. His domestic policies rely on religious discrimination, misogyny and white nationalism. His energy and environmental policies will doom our grandchildren to a diminished, polluted existence. He doesn’t care that a dead planet has no jobs.
He has put himself above the law to the extent that he is clearly deserving of impeachment and criminal prosecution. But the checks and balances system dissolves when it depends on politicians who are at their core sycophants with more interest in protecting their own electability and the self-serving agenda of the President than standing up for the historic principles of the Grand Old Party, the Constitution and the well-being of future generations.
Piers Strailey
Quincy
Neglected future
For people living in the 2040s and 2050s (according to the best and most recent science) our current climate problems will seem as innocent and small scale as a kindergarten play. Do we really think those struggling to survive on a dying planet will wish people in 2019 had just written more letters to a corrupt government, begging them in vain year after year to stop the carbon assault on our eggshell thin skies? Or will they wonder — even as forecasts for our future become more grim by the day and the reality starts to bite — why we were so polite and obedient in the face of tons of rail-transported fossil fuels traveling through our communities every day? Will they also ask why Plumas County residents elected climate-crisis-denying people like Trent Saxton to positions of authority?
Whatever our individual beliefs, this culture is well on its way to deserving the extreme scorn of near-future humans for our inexcusable failure to stop the great burning.
If we put our faith in the U.S Government (essentially the governmental wing of the fossil fuel industry) to set the timeline for a carbon fuels phase out, it will be a case of too little too late.
I encourage everyone to read the book, “Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming,” by David Wallace-Wells, available from Plumas County Library. I don’t agree with all opinions expressed by the author, but it’s certainly food for thought. Read it, and let’s come up with our own plan to avoid being victims of a neglected future.
Josh Hart
Portola
Of national interest
Our country was initiated as a democratic republic. Why is it so difficult for our citizens to focus on our national needs? Our nation’s physical infrastructure has been deteriorating for decades. Many of our underground pipes are over a hundred years old. Dams, bridges, overpasses, highways and electric grids are in need of thorough examination, and repair or replacement. Our public schools have reverted to telling students what to think, when how to think is most needed. Regulation of corporate industry should be a means of alleviating fraud, corruption and incompetent management. We’ve seen the results of deregulation. Reregulation is long overdue. ‘Citizens United’ has made a sham of our electoral process — as has gerrymandering. Our lands, lakes and streams have suffered serious chemical contamination over these past decades. They need to be cleaned up. Autism might well be a direct symptom. The pharmaceutical industry has been beyond rational control for generations. Greed and corruption have more than doubled our overall medical costs. The extinction rate of other species, on our watch, has risen from about a dozen a year to over a thousand. America is ill-prepared for the cost of a natural disaster, yet we continue to add to our expensive and unusable atomic bomb stockpile.
As a nation, we need to begin acting like a responsible country. We need to rejoin the other nations of the world. We cannot continue to refuse participation in such international matters as climate change and overpopulation. In the meantime, our nation’s political parties focus either on appeasing the rich and creating a one-party political system or, conversely, attempting to regain power by catering to a multitude of narrowly contrived special interest groups. It’s time to refocus.
Wallace B. Eshleman
Quincy
Plessy v. Ferguson
On June 7, 1892, Homer Plessy purchased a rail ticket to travel from New Orleans to Covington, Louisiana. He sat in a “whites only” carriage; he was soon asked to move. He refused and was subsequently arrested. Mr. Plessy’s defense maintained that he was 7/8 Caucasian, and 1/8 African-American, and that that the 14th amendment afforded him equal protection. Judge John H. Ferguson maintained that the 14th amendment guaranteed civil rights, the right to vote and the right to a jury trial, but not social rights, such as the preference for a more comfortable and safe rail car.
After four years of appeals (1896) the case landed in the Supreme Court. The court found in favor of Judge Ferguson, and against Mr. Plessy. The precedent established by Plessy v. Ferguson stood for more than 50 years, until being overturned by Brown v. Board of Education. Information for this section was from history.com.
My contention is that 1/8 African-American ancestry was used to justify discrimination against Mr. Plessy, in other instances an even smaller fraction of ancestry was used to justify discrimination; so that tiny fraction of Elizabeth Warren’s ancestry which is Cherokee (established by DNA testing to be 1/64th or smaller) should be recognized and honored. All our ancestors are indispensable; if any hadn’t survived long enough to be there then, we wouldn’t be here now. It shouldn’t be necessary to explain this to anyone who successfully passed basic eighth-grade science, let alone anyone even remotely involved in the medical profession.
Regarding the other alleged misleading claim by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, let me just ask: how many men have lost employment due to pregnancy?
Gene Nielsen
Crescent Mills
Climate
California as you know, is now a one-party state. Socialists have supermajorities in both houses of the Legislature. Only seven of the state’s 53 congressional seats are held by Republicans. The result is that there is no credible check on a mostly coastal majority.
PG&E, along with other utilities decided to shut down during high winds, to avoid having massive fires from faulty transmission lines. Remember, it takes strong winds for those wind turbine farms to generate electricity. In hindsight that was a bad investment for birds and electric cars. Shutdowns happened to over two million people — and we still have the fires.Guv Newsom said it wasGlobal warming, climate change. Do not take him seriously; he thinks the Dodgers didn’t get to the World Series due to climate change.
On that subject, we have many “opinions” from amateur-meteorologists; they lack the expertise to tell us the ideal global temperature. Shouldn’t we have a reachable goal? Perhaps, in their “opinions,” they can also explain how carbon taxes lower the earth’s temperature? Who here believes you can buy down the earth’s temperature?
Then Democrats, (socialists) wanted to spend (redistribute) trillions of American tax dollars for the Paris Climate Accords — your money would go to corrupt third world governments. Supposedly, they would eventually lower the earth’s temperature and at the same time lower the American standard of living. Cough, wink.
Well bless their hearts. An MIT (study) News article in 2016 discussed the true impact the Paris (more socialists) Agreement would have on global temperature increase. Using their Integrated Global System Modeling (IGSM) to predict temperature increase results by 2100. They concluded that, although beneficial, there was strong evidence the Paris Agreement could not be met in the future; under all scenarios, warming would be at least 3.0degrees Celsius by 2100. You know what they say about opinions, right?
Trent Saxton
Lake Davis
