Letters for July 5, 2018

FDR solutions needed

Re “Park pretense” (Newslines, by Meredith J. Cooper, June 28):

Precipitated by a lack of affordable housing and social services, hundreds of thousands have spilled onto our streets. Without massive government intervention, FDR-style, we will continue to see many people living in public spaces. Americans are not accustomed to seeing large numbers of people on our streets (especially in places like Chico) and we are also not used their various impacts.

I made these points at the last Bidwell Park and Playground Commission meeting, where the question of further restricting park hours was on the agenda. It seems that Chico First and its allies are pushing yet another way of making life on the streets more difficult: close parks for more hours of every day and, in theory, force out the homeless.

It was heartening to hear so many speak against this restrictive direction. What sense does it make to imagine that by restricting hours, or making more rules, the homeless population will somehow disappear or survive differently than they survive every day? If anything, this is a time to make our public spaces more accommodating and humane, especially as those FDR-style solutions continue to elude a morally deficient nation.

Patrick Newman

Chico

An app for that

Re “Making the connection” (Greenways, by Angela Fichter, June 21):

Thank you, CN&R, for reporting on food waste and how that impacts climate change! We normally don’t think about how agriculture generates greenhouse gases, but it’s a major contributor. It’s also really sad that there are so many hungry people, including here in Butte County, when Americans waste a third or more of the food we produce.

We can, however, reduce our waste, cut greenhouse gas emissions and feed more of the neediest among us. One way is through an app called Food Rescue. It connects volunteers with restaurants and grocery stores that often throw out excess fresh food because they can’t sell it all. Volunteers deliver it to local soup kitchens and food pantries. No one in Chico is using the Food Rescue app, but each of us could do something to make it happen.

You could, for example, sign up to pick up, deliver or donate food. If your organization is already feeding the hungry, you could link up with Food Rescue to accept the food. If you know a restaurant owner or the volunteers at a local food bank, you could tell about the system. For more info, visit: foodrescue.us.

Julie Heath

Chico

Make housing reality

Re “Building on a Legacy” (Newslines, by Evan Tuchinsky, June 21):

We’d like to thank Evan Tuchinsky for his article on CHIP’s 45th anniversary. Now more than ever, CHIP is doing its part to help keep people housed during this particularly tumultuous time by providing a place to call home for people with low and very low incomes.

We would like to ask for the community’s help to make affordable housing a reality for more Californians. Please join our campaign today and help pass the $4 billion Veterans and Affordable Housing Bond Act this November. The bond will build homes for veterans, working families, people with disabilities and Californians experiencing homelessness—maybe someone you know who needs a safe, stable home. Get on board by endorsing this bond as an individual, an organization or both at vetsandaffordablehousingact.org/endorse.

We would like to thank all of our supporters who have helped us exist and thrive throughout the years, and invite the community to attend our Rock the House/45th Anniversary Party on Friday, Nov. 16, at the Sierra Nevada Big Room. Go to chiphousing.org for tickets.

Desiree Gonzalez

Forest Ranch

Editor’s note: The author is CHIP’s communication and fundraising manager.

Time well spent?

Re “Bass-ackwards” (Second & Flume, by Melissa Daugherty, May 31):

There are many innovative ways to address homelessness that do not involve making it a law enforcement problem.

On June 20 at about 1:30 p.m. I saw two police officers talking with a homeless man on the grass in front of 101 Raley Blvd. When I returned to pick up my wife at about 2:30, they were still there with their two police cars. The homeless man was not in sight. This location is on a side street, not in the vicinity of a downtown business.

The Chico Police Department repeatedly says it is understaffed. Until relatively recently, police departments have resisted using paraprofessionals to do lower-priority work until parking enforcement staff. As a city and as taxpayers we gladly compensate our sworn police officers at an average pay and benefits of at least $150,000 a year. As one of those who contribute to this pay, and as the father of a police officer, I wonder if this is a good use of valuable, scarce and expensive police time.

Douglas Ferguson

Chico

‘Give me a break’

In 1979 Jimmy Carter (hands down the most humane/“Christian” president still here, maybe ever) installed solar water heaters at the White House. Because of his “faith” that climate change will just take care of itself, President Reagan took them down. During the last 10 years of super low-interest money, instead of investing in infrastructure and renewables, we have decided to make the rich richer. Our government is actively denying climate change and taking steps to make it worse.

Forty years ago there were people who were forward-thinking enough to realize we had to do something about climate change and the huge [screw]-up we had a hand in making in the Middle East, with our head-in-the-sand decisions of where nations should be divided after World War I, and who should run them. The Carter administration made major steps in the right direction in both. Now we are supposed to be more interested in and afraid of those terrible others (mostly brown) who are supposedly coming to get us, rape our husbands, wives and kids, and take our jobs. Give me a break! MAGA!

Maybe, if people thought for themselves, with unbiased information sources, we could each try to make a better small piece of the planet.

Rich Meyers

Oroville

No ballot

This is probably an isolated thing, but I have been registered as a mail-in voter for several elections, and this time I never got my ballot. As the election neared I called the number on the “verify your voting status” website. They told me it had been returned as “undeliverable.” I have had my P.O. box for almost 20 years without any such problem. At the post office I was told there was no apparent reason for this. I requested the ballot be mailed again, but it never arrived. Perhaps this was a singular glitch, but with the nationwide efforts at voter suppression I’d like to know if others experienced something similar.

Nelson Kaiser

Chico

Second chances

I once wrote and submitted a proverb to the CN&R. The proverb/maxim/whatever (p/m/w for short) was published online, but did not make it to the printed version. I recognized at that time that my p/m/w might have come off as an arrogant statement and perhaps required explanation. I also realize that a p/m/w that requires explanation is probably not that good, but it’s all I’ve got and these don’t exactly grow on trees.

Perhaps the CN&R will give it a second chance. So, here is my p/m/w followed by three questions to the reader that will be used for explanation. I am extremely confident that I do not know everything there is to know. I am equally confident that I do know everything I need to know. Does the reader know not to put their hand in a pot of boiling water? Do you know why it is wrong, in any way, to hurt another human being? Do you know that love conquers all?

If the reader answered all the questions in the positive, I think they understand my p/m/w. And I’m grateful to share the planet with them.

Wolfgang Jeffrey Straub

Redding

An offensive argument

There is a new argument in the gun control debate that offends me. The argument says a person needs to understand how a gun functions and know the vocabulary before they can have an opinion. I don’t need to know the difference between a bullet and a cartridge to understand that gunpowder can move metal so fast it kills or maims whoever it hits. The NRA doesn’t care about the vocabulary doctors use when treating gunshot wounds, so why should I have to say suppressor instead of silencer for my opinion to count?

Intelligent people can disagree on how to interpret the Second Amendment. I think revolvers, breech-loading shotguns and bolt-action rifles should be enough for personal defense, hunting and sport. I feel militias should be heavily regulated and military-style weapons should almost never be stored in civilian homes.

My position is extreme and a lot of people disagree with me, but I believe that would be the best policy for our country. We all think about patriotism around the 4th of July. Our Founding Fathers never said our opponents don’t have the right to an opinion—that’s what fascists and monarchs said.

Phil McGie Hall

Chico

Trump and the GOP

I am curious as to how you “Make America Great Again” by abolishing all the aspects that made it great in the first place. But what I have come to realize is how much Republicans hated this country in the years prior to Donald Trump.

Obviously, President Reagan—whom we once believed was their icon—was not a supporter of dictatorships (“Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”); or of eliminating immigration (“Our nation is a nation of immigrants. More than any other country, our strength comes from our own immigrant heritage and our capacity to welcome those from other lands.”); or abolishing free trade (“I’ve seen in my lifetime what happens when leaders forget these timeless principles. They seek to protect industries and jobs, but they end up doing the opposite. One economic lesson of the 1930s is protectionism increases international tensions.”).

Yet, with the unwavering support of a Republican Congress, POTUS has cut these values to the bone. What was it about Reagan’s policies that so aggravated the Republican Party that only now can they openly and unswervingly support the policies of Trump? How was it I missed this hatred of country in the many years of associating with Republican friends and neighbors?

Dean Carrier

Paradise

There’s an election coming in November, and I thought I’d share with you some of the things that concern me.

President Donald “Igor” Trump is trampling on the rule of law and as a result is endangering democracy. And there’s also “grab ’em by the pussy” divorces, sleeping with a porn star shortly after his third wife (the second immigrant he’s married) gave birth to their son, constantly demeaning women in his speeches (all recorded) and tweets, intending to nominate a conservative to the Supreme Court who will help do away with Roe v. Wade and, oh yeah, tearing families apart by jailing children.

By the time you read this, there probably will be more. You Republican women, and all women, must vote in November. And finally, our Congressman Doug “he’s one of us” LaMalfa consistently votes in lockstep with Igor. You do have options this election. Check out Doug’s opponent, Audrey Denney.

Ed Pitman

Chico

Any person who considers themselves a decent human being would never separate children from their parents. Jeff Sessions, the federal attorney general, said it was done to hurt the parents so they stop coming across the border. Doing this to children severely traumatizes them for life.

This is the purest kind of evil, similar to Hitler’s treatment of the Jews and the slave trader’s treatment of slave children. Trump is right up there with that kind of evil. When are you Republicans going to stand up to this treasonous, corrupt, evil human being?

By the way, Trump just pulled us out of the U.N. Human Rights Council. Of course, you can’t be in the Human Rights Council when you are committing human atrocities. I hope the U.N. charges Trump with human rights abuses and tries him in the International Criminal Court in The Hague for what he’s done to these children. Maybe they will put him in prison where he belongs.

Mona Uruburu

Janesville

‘Do something’

On Monday, June 11, the California Senate unanimously adopted the resolution to recognize “Juneteenth” on June 19 as a holiday in California. This is the day commemorating when the news of the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 had finally reached the state of Texas and the slaves there, at various communities, during the week of 1865.

Immediately after the resolution vote, over 50 California patriots interrupted the Senate session to remind our legislators that slavery still exists in effect, and it is their duty to repair this injustice.

This was part of a full day of action at our state Capitol led by hundreds of low-wage workers, the houseless, tenants, union members and folks from every other walk of life. Fifty years ago, thousands marched on Washington, D.C., pitched a tent city among the national monuments to democracy, and demanded fair treatment, living wages and affordable housing, even as they mourned the assassination, two months earlier, of the organizer of this Poor People’s Campaign, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

The countrywide actions of 2018 continue to demand no less. Our own city and county acutely experience the same injustices. It is still time for good people to do something.

Cathy Webster

Chico

Quoting Orwell

“In our age, there is no such thing as ‘keeping out of politics.’ All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred, and schizophrenia.” —George Orwell

Kenneth B. Keith

Tehama