Send the COVID deniers to Mars
Dear Editor:
Breaking news: U.S. President Joe Biden to offer incentives for people who get vaccinated for COVID-19.
Joe, I will give you one incentive for your consideration. Promise the non-believers in COVID–19, or its variants, that they can be the first people to inhabit planet Mars.
Tom Isherwood
Olalla
Pentictonites want beauty, livability
Dear Editor:
Thanks to the Penticton city councillors who voted against the rezoning on the property of the late David Kampe (Herald, July 27). You listened to the people who have hired you and not the speculators who just want to make money.
The people of Penticton are not against redevelopment, just these heavy, dense, ugly, cheap, cookie-cutter tenements sitting on asphalt. Those six-storey buildings are just warehouses to store people. They do not add beauty or livability to our city.
Speculators will try to tell you that you absolutely need to build thousands of units as soon as possible. They are interested in making profits and will walk away and leave the city to pay and contend with the problems left behind (traffic congestion, infrastructure, water and sewage plant rebuilds, insufficient social services, etc.).
The people of this city said loud and clear that they did not want any more towers. Developers got around this by labelling six- storey buildings as “mid-level rises.” This does not fool anyone. If you mass these buildings together, the total effect is the same as a tower — too much density in one place. They are cheaply built and will be the slums of the future. Also, they are a fire disaster waiting to happen.
If City Hall sends out signals that they will allow any land in the city to be turned into these massive developments, the big developers with pay big bucks for the land. This cuts the medium-size builders and individuals out of the market, thus raising house prices throughout the city.
There are so many other types of developments that can add some limited density, but also beauty to the city.
Examples: The Bow on Warren, rows of townhomes with adequate off-street parking, three-storey buildings with plenty of space in between buildings to allow for landscaping and courtyards. If you want this city to be a beautiful resort town, then set the standards for development and beauty higher. Hold the line and keep our valley from becoming a dense slum. That is not what the people of Penticton want.
Kathy Corbett
Penticton
Do bike lanes offer economic impact?
Dear Editor:
Re: “Inaccuracies, misinformation,” (Herald letters, July 28).
I read with interest Richard Hunt’s comments on the proposed bike lane. Somehow it seems that he has espoused the “build it and they will come” saying from the movie “Field of Dreams.”
Hunt makes it sound as though there will be a plethora of bikes on the road as a result of the bike lane opening Aug. 1. He makes a blanket statement “for those who choose to cycle.”
The question need be asked, “Will there be a gargantuan desire to purchase and ride and will all the local bike shops experience a thunderous upswing in sales?”
I take issue with Hunt’s statement “that over the past two years or so there has been an explosion of new bike riders that is going to continue.” Aren’t subjective opinions wonderful? Where are the new rider numbers? Are the streets teeming with bikes like Amsterdam? By making the statement does it mean that he has concrete, up-to-date numbers to support it?
To compare bike usage in Vancouver to that of Penticton might symbolically be like comparing Okanagan Falls to Los Angeles. His opinions tend to be somewhat subjective in that he uses Vancouver as a bench mark.
No real number evidence is presented, just opinion which anyone can have. Once again, I ask the question, “What economic payback will we see from the spending of millions of taxpayer dollars to placate the whims of a few bike riders?”
Again, I am not anti-cycling in any way. I would like to know what justifies this project from a financial standpoint.
It seems that council has too much money and is looking for ways to spend it. Perhaps more could have been done to address the infrastructural needs of the city instead of on one project that will benefit a select few.
Ron Barillaro
Penticton
Quality of life is up to the individual
Dear Editor:
Re: “Council rejects call for 5 more cops,” (Herald, July 30).
I hope Coun. Julius Bloomfield keeps his opinion columns coming. More voters need to know who we are voting for.
The so-called “quality of life” issue is to me the responsibility of the individual with help from parents, managers, police, bylaw and the courts, even though the police and courts are not doing their job responsibly at all.
The individual has to take the brunt of the blame for any consequences of their actions.
Gary Stevenson
Kelowna
Bike lanes a sign city has ‘grown up’
Dear Editor:
I moved back to Penticton recently after an absence of 13 years. There have been many changes during that time, the biggest being the increased number of every day cyclists.
It is a mark of how the city has progressed or “grown-up,” as one of my Pentictonite friends says. I was especially delighted to discover that a bike network running through downtown and extending to the south part of the city was in the works.
As a 66-year-old non-driver, my bicycle is, and has always been, my primary form of transportation. I have lived in several communities across Canada and in the U.K., and the ones with the designated bike lanes hold a special place in my heart.
I still remember the thrill of my first rides on the Laurier Street bike lanes in Ottawa and on the Claire Morrisette Piste Cyclable on Blvd. de Maisonneuve in Montreal.
Those were the first times I felt safe and recognized on a city street.
As a working person, it always has bothered me that my taxes were going into roads that did not serve my needs. Why were non-polluting, exercise-creating vehicles not given a special place on those roads?
Seeing parents transporting their children by bike to school and to daycare; the One Sky bike trailers for people who cannot ride being driven by those that can; people of all ages out on their bikes shopping, going to appointments, out for meals or a coffee, or simply out for a ride. These safe lanes will be a boon to so many. Good, clean transportation that provides exercise, to boot!
Kudos to the City of Penticton for recognizing the need for healthy, environmentally-friendly transportation in this time of climate change.
Pat Deacon
Penticton
Only the names and places would change
Dear Editor:
The latest scandalous revelations about the behaviour of members in the upper echelon of the Catholic Church reminded me of the Hans Christian Andersen story, “The Emperor’s New Clothes.”
As you may recall, two conniving swindlers pose as weavers and offer to supple the self-aggrandizing emperor with magnificent clothes that they say will be invisible to people who are stupid or incompetent.
The emperor and his retinue of flunkeys do not want to appear stupid and incompetent so they all speak glowingly about the new clothes that they can not see.
The emperor struts about more arrogantly than ever, until a child blurts out the naked truth.
With a few alterations, the story could be updated to reflect modern times.
The emperor would be a pope; his advisers would be a group of scheming bishops and lawyers; and, the child would be an articulate Indigenous princess who had once been forced to attend a Catholic residential school.
In the end, the pope and his entourage would be exposed for what they really are.
Lloyd Atkins
Vernon
People collect CERB rather than working
Dear Editor:
I say “boo” to the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit.
Get rid of it!
There are still too many Canadians who are taking advantage of this government- issued ongoing relief program.
With well over a year and four months gone since implementing this, our government elects and decides not to keep better tabs on those totally capable of working, but who simply choose not to.
How do I personally know?
I operate a very respectable and best-ranked and best-reviewed moving help service in Kelowna and finding new, good help is as painful as getting two teeth pulled at the same time by a dentist.
There are barely any takers on job postings.
I did my due diligence by offering a starting wage higher than most other moving outfits in Kelowna.
And with so many orchards needing help, and not many applying to prune or pick, this only proves my point more.
The service industry is also finding it nearly impossible to hire cooks and servers.
In Kelowna, so many are just plain lazy and want to take advantage of more free money when they are totally capable of working.
Some cannot work, yes, and I get that and some have no experience in certain fields. But many are just sitting home watching movies, shows on Netflix and playing video games.
All the while, they complain they don’t have enough money.
I hear this lots in my field.
So I say get rid of CERB or we will never be able to pay this grand amount back to recuperate our losses.
For those on CERB, the time is now to get out there and start looking for work and taking less advantage of this CERB that should have been put to rest long ago.
It is only hurting our country and economy now.
Get it together Canada!
Get it together Kelowna!
Nol Preen
Kelowna
Public safety more urgent than bike lane
Dear Editor:
Penticton has one of the highest per capita crime rates in the country (Herald, July 29).
Coun. Julius Bloomfield, who voted against adding five more police officers, states that the cost of the increase, reportedly in the vicinity of $1.5 million, is prohibitively expensive.
That is absurd.
Penticton is spending upwards of $8-16 million on bicycle lanes.
The entire city council is a disgrace for relegating the issue of public safety and law and order to a place lower than bicycle lanes.
John Ansara
Penticton
Two additional officers is still three too few
Dear Editor:
Congratulations to Penticton city council!
You only hired two RCMP officers instead of the five requested and you still proceed with the $8 million bike lane that most of the people do not want.
Valerie Wood
Penticton
Jason Kenney should end ETP payments
Dear Editor:
With his massive victory, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney should have cut off the Equalization and Transfer Payments within 24 hours after the election.
In Trudeau Junior’s 2015 budget, near the end, with one stroke of the pen, he silently added four more years to the ETP program. Why didn’t he ask Alberta first?
Why indeed?
Because he hates Alberta even more than his father did.
We’ll screw the West and then take the rest.
Only in Canada, eh.
Ernie Slump
Penticton
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