In letters: Winter is coming — and SLO County’s unhoused still lack safe parking | Opinion

Where’s the safe parking?

Winter’s almost here, and it’s cold outside. As our 14 outreach volunteers make their way around SLO, they witness the chaos that our neighbors experience as they struggle to live in the town they call home. They are lonely, hungry and anxious — they are hopeless and afraid — and they have good reason to be. It seems like the world is against them. Time for a change.

We are asking again for at a safe parking site — it’s been over a year.

We are asking that officers stop banging on people’s doors at 2 a.m. and telling them to move even if it’s been less than 72 hours and they haven’t been cited.

We are asking that the SLO City Council stop directing the SLOPD to have vehicles towed away that serve as people’s homes.

We are asking that you all stop directing 2Mexicans.com to confiscate people’s worldly belongings.

We are grateful for your housing help on the horizon, but it’s a long way off. We are still offering our help. A sanctioned encampment would allow us to know where homeless folks are so we’d know where to take the tents food, water and clothing and tell folks about services. An encampment could be done anywhere, way down the Bob Jones Trail where they’d bother no one.

Please, pretend it’s your family member out there. They need your help and they need it now.

Becky Jorgeson

Founder, Hope’s Village

Hello, cavities

I am old enough to remember the time before we had fluoride in our drinking water, when tooth decay in children was a huge problem, including for me.

Getting fillings was just something you did. After we started with fluoridated water, tooth decay plummeted and all of us, except maybe the dentists, were better off.

There was a right-wing group in the 1950s called the John Birch Society that claimed that fluoridation was a communist plot to take over America.

While the Birchers seem to have faded away, the current president-elect is planning to put a certifiable crackpot in charge of health policy who would, among other things, move to end fluoridation of public water supplies. Looks like the crazies are back.

Chris Toews

San Luis Obispo

The lowest light

Concerning your Nov. 10 editorial concerning local high- and low-light election results, I believe the lowest is surely the Atascadero School Board race. The last-place candidate, by a large margin, was a person The Tribune considered “among the most insightful, open and committed school board trustees we have ever encountered.”

The inescapable conclusion to be drawn for this result is simply this: The candidate is gay. He is married to a Black man. Together, have adopted three lovely minority children.

Instead, the currently leading candidates include two who have shown no interest whatever in school board affairs, one of whom did not support the needed bond measure and who has expressed willingness to ban books, while the other had so little courage in whatever convictions she has that she did not even bother to attend candidate forums.

They apparently rejected another candidate with many years of heavy involvement in board matters. I had thought our community was better than this. I was mistaken.

Ray Weymann

Atascadero

Calm after the storm

America needs to look at the positives post-election:

There’s not been any of the “blood baths” that were promised. The country has not burned down like the radical extremists threatened. There won’t be a Jan. 6 riot vandalizing the U.S. capital again.

The angered, violent pitch has stopped for now.

Whatever it takes, we need calm.

Now, all we can hope for is our elected local and state government officials keep their communities out of harm’s way. It can be as simple as careful traffic planning for a growing, small town while keeping its local citizens safe so they are NOT killed by just walking across the street.

What more can we ask?

R.E. Russell

Morro Bay

My Blue Cocoon

I live in Arroyo Grande. CA. My mayor is a Democrat and the council is typically Progressive. The county supervisor for my district is a Democrat and the Board of Supervisors votes mostly blue. The California governor, my state representatives, senator and congressman are all Democrats.

So, I don’t really care what those red folks in Washington, D.C. say and do. I’m safe and comfortable in my Blue Cocoon, living and loving the SLO life.

Paul Worsham

Arroyo Grande

Try a little kindness

What is right judgment? Right judgment is based on truth, reality and the Supreme Truth.

Today’s society is basing their judgments on a false reality. This false reality is being controlled by propaganda. Truth has nothing to hide, yet fake news is trying to hide facts and reality from the public. Many people based their decision on a false reality. Now the country and world face a stark reality. Compassion, empathy and kindness have been discarded. Greed, power and self-interest are now the norm.

How does America move forward — with one kind thought, one kind word and one kind action at a time. Plato believed acts of kindness showcase moral character, which contribute to community harmony and justice. May our new America be kind to one another and uphold freedom and justice for all.

Maggie Kraft

San Luis Obispo

This story was originally published November 18, 2024 at 8:48 AM.