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Who stole veggies?
This year I was blessed by producing several prize-winning vegetables.
When I went to pick up my vegetables Sunday morning, I found that most
of them were stolen from the exhibit building.
Who has the nerve to steal from a County Fair display which people
bring so others can see and enjoy? (I heard some blue ribbons were
thrown in the trash can.)
I miss my vegetables. “T’was pride and joy.”
Mary Ishimaru
Hood River
Love is big
Two jets, noses as long as giraffes’ necks, dog fighting,
wrestling, wing on end from north to south across our valley.
Growing up there were D-38s doing just that. When we face our
hurt’s conflict with love the war within will heal!
So simplistic, I cry, so full of wonder, love full, for all of us.
First of all we need to learn to love ourselves so we can tell
each other what we need and in love fill those needs.
Freedom — yes, freedom to love.
Start with every brother and sister so fear is shared and there is
a trusting support system, sharing equally one-on-one.
We all are needed to do this and we all are only 2,000 years old
at least, and we can learn together what works and cannot work in
a field of invention, creativity, fullness of harmonious growth.
Terror and terrorists can ceasefire in our mind and emotions.
All we need perhaps is to face the fear of loving and loveliness
and lovelessness.
The monster is gone!
Love is so big.
Allison Andrus
Hood River
Housing costs ‘crime’
I read the articles in the paper and question our planning
commission and city planners. They say we need more low-income
housing, and there is a project on May Street for this, and a new
project that is starting in Odell. One of the city’s ideas was to
decrease some of the parking space on a downtown lot and build
some housing. They discussed this at the same time they were
talking about low-income housing. I doubt if the many builders who
would like to build on it would put in low-income housing with
that view.
They did a study and found that the average price of a house in
Hood River is $259,000. They could have found that out by calling
any realtor in town, and found out that you are lucky if you can
find a house for $259,000. Last time I looked, there were more
$800,000 to $1 million homes than there were $259,000 homes. Do
the city and county think that selling this valuable land will
help with their budget worries?
I also think that it is interesting that the articles about
high-density housing, the over-crowding of the houses, and some
solutions that they mentioned, did not include the articles that
were in The Dalles’ paper about the request someone has made to
build high-density housing across from Les Schwab and possibly
building a motel where Nichols Boat Works is at.
There is a lot on Belmont Avenue between the dentists’ offices and
the First Baptist Church that the city approved eight townhouses
on. Please go by and see this property, and you figure out where
they fit, along with the people’s cars. Town is a mess right now
trying to get through after 5 and on the weekends. Side streets
like Rand Road and Country Club are backed up with people trying
to get on Cascade any time of the day. I think it is time that the
commissioners and city planners slow down their approval of
continuous building within the city limits, and printing in our
paper all the requests for more building instead of putting it in
The Dalles’ paper.
It is really interesting that now the commissioners and the Park
Development Committee are thinking about including the valley in
the bill for the waterfront park. We didn’t get to vote on it; we
didn’t get to have any say about it or the $20,000 spent for the
study for it. We pay park taxes. Just to make sure that people out
in the valley will possibly vote for it they want to put baseball
fields in the same vote, and you are right about how many people
from the upper valley would use the park: Not many. I would like
to see sometimes the city commissioners think about the entire
valley and not a few people who want to change our valley into the
place they moved from.
I am one of those people who were raised in the valley. I work to
be able to buy the things I need at Wal-Mart and in The Dalles. I
cannot afford the $100 tops and $200 jeans that seem to be the
norm downtown. I am in favor of a new Wal-Mart and I am in favor
of the casino in Cascade Locks. Our commissioners and city
planners are driving businesses out of town with building
requirements, and then they worry about the tax base. One of the
arguments against the casino by someone was that organized crime
and associated bad things would come. Sometimes I wonder if the
organized crime is already here with some of the housing approvals
I see going on.
Marilyn Johnston
Hood River
How to understand?
It’s been over 50 years since I put on my uniform. Today when I
meet men or women in uniform I am deeply conflicted. I think of
the idealistic youth I was, going off to war to defend my country,
or so I believed. Now, so many years later, I wonder. This is
especially troublesome for me because 90 percent of the infantry
unit I trained with never came back from Korea.
Did they die in vain — for a cause that did little if anything to
preserve our country’s freedoms?
No doubt they died as heroes, as brave and as dedicated to the
cause of freedom as our fallen heroes in the present war. But
knowing what we do now of the reasons we went into Korea and its
disappointing outcome, should we so willingly have risked our
lives and the honor of our country?
As I see the grieving families of our fallen heroes today on
television, I think of the Gold Star families of my day. How
painful it was for them, especially as the subsequent years
revealed even more clearly the futility of their loss.
Yet we buried my comrades with honors and heard it said that they
died “defending their country” and “preserving our freedoms.” Was
this a lie? I prefer to call it a “compassionate fiction.” The
death of a son is cruel enough in itself without having to deal
with the fact that it might have been in vain.
But let us not lose sight of the distinction. A compassionate
fiction is meant to console grieving families. It is not meant to
guide national policy or to justify its misjudgments.
Since Korea we have had Vietnam and Iraq. We honor our fallen
heroes; we comfort their grief-stricken families, and struggle
with how to understand their loss.
David C. Duncombe
White Salmon, Wash.
Fixing parking
Could we “kill two birds with one stone” if we applied common
sense to two problems rooted in common ground (Washington state)?
Both the city’s parking concern and the interstate bridge’s
traffic jams could be solved in busing. Mt. Hood Railroad did it
for Thomas the Tank Engine train.
You quoted the city’s parking consultant in a May issue of this
paper that he had advised acquiring the land from the Mt. Hood
Railroad for constructing a 100-stall facility, thereon. That’s
strange! He told me that mixing railroads with public agencies was
iffy.
You did quote correctly, re: “ ... employees should be encouraged
to use the two city lots that are only 64 percent occupied … ” but
did this include the city employees parked at the Third and State
lot? A lot which could easily be expanded by several stalls with a
“pick and shovel.” And is this lot a “freebee”?
And why wasn’t the city lot at Front and State included in this
study? Politics? Are the owners of those old (and one rustic) cars
paying $365 a year? (Mr. Bob Francis said that $1 per day was a
“good deal.”)
Back to common sense. In my opinion, the most serviceable location
for a parking garage would be at the southwest corner of First and
Cascade.
The more things change, the more they remain the same.
Alan Winans
Hood River
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