May 9, 2008

Letters

Official will be missed

Dear Editor: The worst of the worst has befallen us. Emily Harrison is leaving. They'll surely have to close down City Hall. It's difficult to see how they can operate without her.

This is the biggest blow to our city government in the last 20 years. She is the human face of City Hall. Immediate past Mayor Yoriko Kishimoto said that Emily is "the go-to" person at City Hall. She is always available, she will always listen and she frequently steers people through the maze of city ordinances, processes, departments, etc. During the recent investigation of the assistant city manager, it was said that there were incidents of "inappropriate behavior" going back several years. From our perspective, it appears that the city manager simply failed to deal with matters on a timely basis. Had he been more mindful, the entire debacle of the investigation and placement of Emily on administrative leave could have been avoided..

Emily has been an exemplary leader, a bridge to the community. Palo Alto is the big loser in all of this. Emily has been a longtime leader at City Hall. We may still benefit from her remarkable administrative skills at the county level, but that's small consolation. Thank you, Emily, for all your years of wonderful and responsive leadership.

Marty Paddock and Ellen Wyman,

Palo Alto



Kudos to teachers

Dear Editor: In honor of National Teacher Appreciation Week, I want to salute every teacher in our community for their extraordinary contributions to our community and our country.

As a proud parent of teachers and a legislator who represents many, many excellent educators, I have great admiration for the men and women who dedicate their lives to teaching our students and ensuring the success of our future generations.

Not a day goes by without me thinking of the teachers who've helped me throughout my life - inspiring me, encouraging me and equipping me to pursue my dreams and realize my potential. They've taught me what it means to strive for excellence in whatever I'm doing and it is because of my teachers that I am who I am today. As such, one of my top priorities in Congress has been to put our children and families first by increasing investments in education and expanding access to a high-quality education for all of America's children.

As we celebrate one of the oldest, and still most honored professions in the world, I encourage everyone to take some time this week to thank a special teacher in their life.

Rep. Anna G. Eshoo,

D-Palo Alto



McCain and Obama

Dear Editor: In a speech on energy policy last week in Denver, Sen. John McCain called for eliminating our dependence on foreign oil, and never having to send our troops into conflict "again" in the Middle East. McCain has admitted that this war in Iraq was about one thing, pure and simple: oil. But this is nothing new. Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill revealed memos for a post-Saddam Iraq and Defense Department documents titled "Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oil Field Contracts" from early 2001. Bush and Cheney have since used oil as the reason for sustaining our presence in Iraq. Does anyone doubt that Bush never would have gone to war if all that oil wasn't under the sand over there in Iraq? The nonexistent weapons of mass destruction and liberation of the poor suffering Iraqi people were all just more lies to justify the administration's war for oil.

And maintaining U.S. influence over that oil is the driving force behind John "Let's stay in Iraq for 100 years" McCain's future strategy. It's time to break this bloody cycle of lies. It's time for real change, and new leadership. It's time for Barack Obama.

Richard Marracq,

Redwood City



Open space vote

Dear Editor: I was very disappointed by your news story ("Whose say anyway," May 3) stating that the debate over developing Docktown, which is on environmentally sensitive lands, could "become moot" if the "Open Space Vote" is passed.

As a member of several local environmental groups, I respectfully disagree. I think you've got it backwards.

Supporters of Open Space Vote trust voters to support responsible development that will be an asset to the city while respecting the Bay.

If Redwood City would truly "be all the better" because of a particular proposed development project on our environmentally sensitive tidal lands at Docktown or elsewhere, I am confident that enough support can be found in the community to enthusiastically approve such a plan.

On the other hand, the Cargill salt-ponds "50-50" mumbo-jumbo is an open-space grab of such breathtaking proportions, and with only the barest veneer of public participation, that the community feels the need to act before those open spaces are given away and destroyed forever, converted into massive profits for out-of-state developers.

That's why the Open Space Vote is needed.

Gita Dev,

Woodside



Unreliable source

Dear Editor: It is unfortunate that Mike Caggiano gets his information from an unreliable source [Letters, April 5]. Ilan Pappe, the main source for Caggiano's letter about Israeli history, is a notorious fabricator, someone who claims proudly that facts and truth are of no importance. Pappe was quoted by the French newspaper Le Soir as saying. "Indeed the struggle is about ideology, not about facts; who knows what facts are? We try to convince as many people as we can that our interpretation of the facts is the correct one, and we do it because of ideological reasons, not because we are truthseekers." When Caggiano relies on such a source, Daily News readers should be careful in believing anything that he writes.

Arthur Cohn,

Portola Valley