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Gas yard equipment
ban will help ‘little guys’
Re. “California’s gas lawn equipment ban hits the little guys,” Page A6, Oct. 19:
Dan Walters is right – this will hit the little guy – but he’s wrong about how. Swapping gas-powered for battery-operated yard equipment will save money, reduce stress, and improve health.
Even small gardeners will save thousands of dollars each year on fuel, maintenance and repairs. Electric mowers, blowers and trimmers need little maintenance.
Ever work in a noisy environment? It’s stressful, no matter how used to it you are. Electric blowers are quieter. So are electric mowers and trimmers.
Part of the charm of new-mown grass has oddly been from the motor’s exhaust. I’d become used to associating that pollutant with the smell of cut grass. These exhaust pollutants are in such close proximity to the gardener that they are vastly more harmful than following a car.
The little guy deserves a stress-free working environment with no added pollution. If they also save money (which they will), then make it so. California leads.
LJ Davick
Fremont
Avoiding vaccine is
a threat to all generations
Joseph Boertje (“COVID policy erroneously favors baby boomers,” Letters to the Editor, Page A6, Oct. 14) complains about the older generation stripping away his rights in demanding he be vaccinated. He seems to forget that he will be 65 years old soon enough.
There are a lot of people frustrated by the choice of those who refuse to get vaccinated and then demand hospital services when they get seriously ill from what is a truly preventable condition. More than 99% of those who die from COVID now are unvaccinated. What Boertje forgets is that because so many of the boomers have been vaccinated, it’s now younger people who are dying.
Boertje wishes to “take his chances.” Unfortunately, he’s also taking chances for others, including those of his generation.
Russell Button
Alameda
Best option for HSR is
to finish first segment
What does abandoning high-speed rail look like?
There are numerous significant structures and thousands of acres of land in the San Joaquin Valley dedicated to high-speed rail. Do we just leave them to decay and sprout weeds? Does the state continue to maintain them as monuments to folly? Or do we use the remainder of the bond money to demolish the structures and try to restore the land?
I hate to agree with the governor, but it might be best to complete the Merced to Bakersfield segment.
Jonathan Schaff
San Leandro
Strategies for helping
state’s bee population
I just attended an open house at the Ohlone Humane Society’s Wildlife Rehabilitation Center. Their wonderful volunteers had taken in some orphaned mallard ducklings we found this summer. It’s a terrific local resource that deserves our support.
At the event I learned that that human impact extends to small wildlife: bees. California has about 1,600 species of native bees, but they are stressed by pesticides, habitat loss and climate change — warmer temperatures have native plants blooming about two weeks earlier, but bees, which respond to daylight hours, emerge as before. Such asynchrony is affecting many ecosystems.
To help our bees, you can plant the natives they feed on (which also require fewer toxic chemicals and, as a bonus, less water.) And ask your elected representatives to support a price on carbon, the most effective way to limit global warming.
Irmgard Flaschka
Newark
GOP’s actions demonstrate
a disavowal of democracy
The unified opposition to even debating voting rights protection legislation in the Senate, by all Republican senators, has led me to one, simple conclusion: The Republican Party is against free and fair elections in these United States.
That is the only thing all voters need to know when heading into the next several upcoming elections. All other issues are meaningless if one party has chosen the path of fascism, of not providing governance for the people, by the people, and of the people, but to instead allow minority rule to be a permanent reality in America, that is willing to be guilty of killing democracy itself, and getting away with it.
Steve Wright
Dublin
Texas takes the right
approach to crime
I thought Dan Walters’ column, “Is California beginning to decline?” (Page A17, Oct. 17) was excellent.
The only thing I would dispute is the sentence that reads, “Texas locks up more criminals, relatively, but also has a lower violent crime rate.” The sentence should read, “Texas has a lower violent crime rate because it locks up more criminals.” That makes more sense.
Bill McGregor
Berkeley
Source: www.mercurynews.com