Letters to the Editor 7/11

Healthy choices

I was disappointed with your opposition to the state’s new menu labeling law. Eating a poor diet and being overweight are contributors to many serious diseases, like cancer.

If we are going to fight disease and get healthcare costs under control, we need to find ways to help people make healthier choices. This is exactly what the new menu labeling law does and why the American Cancer Society co-sponsored the bill that required this change.

We know from menu labeling in New York City that people do use the information to make healthier choices. Menu labeling does not tell people what to eat but rather gives them the tools to make healthier choices when they eat out.

We can look at the nutrition facts panel for the packaged food items we buy at the grocery store, but up until this month, we did not have similar information when eating out. I’m glad that California has taken this step to give people better access to nutritional information.

Berni Ann Lewis

Legislative Ambassador Volunteer, American Cancer Society, San Luis Obispo

Don’t feed the animals

I would like to respond to your photo of the child tourist feeding french fries to the gulls at Morro Rock (June 16.) Morro Bay has signs at the Rock stating: “Please do not feed the wildlife — It is hazardous to their health and to yours.”

Artificial feeding is hazardous because it concentrates wildlife into small areas, creating risk of infections, bird flu, parasitic and nutritional diseases, predation and conflict with humans. These conditions can act to the detriment of local wildlife populations as animals get sick and die of malnutrition eating snack foods.

It is dangerous for people, too, as animals can bite and they carry fleas and ticks that can transmit diseases, like tick fever and bubonic plague, to humans. There are many reports of ground-squirrel bites, especially to children, each year at Morro Rock. Not feeding wildlife allows them to find natural food sources, which provide better nutrition than the human foods that their digestive bacteria cannot process.

It is absolutely essential to the health of wildlife that they are not fed by humans. To be good neighbors and hosts, it is up to us to remind locals and visitors about the dangers of feeding wildlife.

Joan Carter

Morro Bay

No drought solution

Per the June 10 Tribune editorial: It makes sense to approve water and sewer rate increases in the city of San Luis Obispo because they may have some effect relative to encouraging conservation and also support our city’s water-delivery infrastructure and wastewater system improvements.

Yet the editorial missed the real point by not getting to the root cause of the problem: San Luis Obispo does not have a practical, workable, sustainable solution to the drought we now find ourselves in.

Sure, hopefully increasing rates will encourage conservation, but will that be enough? What else is being done?

And the $64 million question: If the drought continues into next year and beyond, then what?

As to paying for the Nacimiento Water Project, this may well be lots of wasted money. Nacimiento Reservoir is subject to drought conditions too. As of June 1, Nacimiento was at 32 percent capacity, down from 38 percent on April 1. Even if the hugely expensive pipeline was finished and serving the 18 communities scheduled, how long would it be before Nacimiento would dry up?

The goal should be a sustainable water source for the inevitable drought emergency. Perhaps desalination, even with its disadvantages, should be given another look?

Philip Ruggles

San Luis Obispo

Aquatics center

Despite the tough economic times in California, there is still a grassroots effort that supports the fitness needs of our community. The Morro Bay Community Pool Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, tax-exempt charity, is raising funds for year-round swimming and a new Community Aquatics Center on the North Coast through a campaign called the “First Lap.”

This foundation believes that our North Coast community deserves to have a convenient aquatics center, with year-round scheduling and priority access for those who are not enrolled in curriculum-based programs.

I support the foundation’s efforts to put the community first, and I encourage others to donate their time and/or money to the “First Lap” campaign now at www.morrobaypool.org.

Jessie Riley

Morro Bay

Build village in Grover

I read what Grover Beach has for a plan to boost business, and I have to laugh if people think this will solve the problem. Has anyone noticed Grover Beach does not have a downtown? Grand Avenue is an alternate freeway to Highway 101. Want to make tax dollars fix things? 

Picture it: diagonal parking and 15 mph speed limit in the downtown area. Then and only then will the vacant buildings fill with merchants and shoppers will feel comfortable walking and shopping. Grover Beach Village would be a good thing for all and an inexpensive way to make money with new speed limit signs and paint. Then you have a “village.”

What is wrong with Grover Beach? Look at other towns, wake up, and build a village. Then people will come to stop and shop. Why the City Council thinks we need to rush cars through town as fast as possible to Pismo Beach and Arroyo Grande is beyond my thinking sphere. Stand up, merchants and citizens! Demand a village if you want to survive and make money and tax dollars to repair this town. Make it a beach town with sidewalk cafes and gift shops. The fix is cheap, and the rewards will be enormous.     

Vants Anseth

Grover Beach

Why, why, why?

I see that our state senators are asked to take a 5 percent pay cut, while state employees are mandated to take the cut. Why? The workers in the United States are out of work and losing their homes, and we send billions of dollars to rebuild Pakistan. Why? Americans are going without food, medicines and other health care, and we send a rocket to the moon. Why? Just wondering.

Jim Stainbrook

Paso Robles