Readers
Animal Care a death sentence to most pets
Re: the Friday guest opinion “Pet shelter story just scratched the surface”:
Thank you for printing the reality of the dire circumstances for tens of thousand of companion animals in Tucson.
The average person who finds a lost pet brings it to Pima Animal Care Center, thinking he saved that animal from the ravages of living on the street.
People have no idea how low the odds are that the animal will make it out of PACC alive.
People are buying puppies from breeders and from accidental litters because they don’t think PACC has any puppies or purebred dogs.
They don’t know that PACC is destroying puppies and purebred dogs. They likely don’t know that sneezing or coughing is often a death sentence at PACC.
Achieving a no-kill community is possible, and it is everyone’s responsibility. Fostering, adopting and spay/neutering must be increased.
But there will never be enough cats and dogs adopted from PACC, and there will never be enough people who spay and neuter their pets, so thousands of animals will continue to be destroyed each year at PACC until people just say no.
Only incurably suffering animals or those who are irreversibly dangerous should be euthanized. All others deserve an alternative solution to their homelessness.
PACC is not “building a better community for people and pets” by destroying all these animals. It can achieve its motto and still meet its mandate to support safety for the community if it would just stop.
Marcie Velen
State Parks blighted by our lawmakers
Re: the State Parks Board’s decision on closing parks:
The public needs to understand what our “representatives” have done to the initiative we passed for Arizona Heritage Alliance Funds.
Those funds are to be used to support state parks, in part, and much-needed research and projects related to our State Trust lands and wildlife.
Our Legislature has robbed this fund to make up shortfalls in other areas. That’s certainly unethical and perhaps illegal!
You can’t give a grant with a signed contract, then take it back because you decided you need the funds elsewhere!
The Parks Board needs to make a statement to our legislative thieves and close every single state park, pay all the employees (not many at this point, again thanks to our legislature) to take a vacation, reinstate those grant monies and honor the contracts, and hope citizens get angry enough to fire their irresponsible “representatives.”
If they don’t, they deserve what they get.
Nancy Zierenberg
Editorial column is one person’s opinion
Billie Stanton’s April 1 column (“Women’s choice, not lawmakers’ “) is one of the most biased and misleading pieces I have seen in our paper.
Why was only one view permitted? A pro-life view should have been presented as well. Did Planned Parenthood pay for this column? Is Billie Stanton getting a new job with Planned Parenthood?
Several points need to be made.
Abortion is murder, and no one has the right to kill babies. Everything that can be done to prevent abortions should be done; HB 2564 goes a long way in that direction.
Good counseling should be available to a woman considering abortion; all sides should be presented to her, not just telling her why she should murder the baby.
Planned Parenthood only cares about doing abortions and getting money for them, not preventing them.
A woman’s health is more at risk from abortion, mentally and physically, than not.
No state university should provide abortions for any reasons, and I hope University Medical Center never does. Tax money should never be used.
I am distressed and saddened that these and other opposite views were not presented. It would have been better if a pro and con type article was printed.
We have needed a legal way to protect our future citizens for a long time, and I hope Gov. Jan Brewer will let it become law. I hope a better job will be done on columns like this, not just publishing a Planned Parenthood propaganda message.
DONALD J. WILLIAMS
Pipe down, men! Women have their say
Regardless of your views on abortion, allowing any member of the male sex to influence its choice is the equivalent of permitting a flu germ to have power over the use of antibiotics.
MARY SCHLENTZ
Summer rain forecast doesn’t reflect snow
Re: “March 7th warmest on record: above-average summer rainfall predicted”:
The story does not give a completely honest picture. According to the Salt River Project Web site, Roosevelt Lake has reached its highest level ever, and all four reservoirs on the Salt River are nearly full.
The Bureau of Reclamation says snowpack in the Upper Colorado River Basin has been at or near average through February and entered March at 104 percent of average.
“The overall water year precipitation rate through March 5, 2009, is right on average at 100 percent of average.”
Jonathan DuHamel
geologist