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Bay Area must build up
to save open space
Do you like driving every weekday, then Saturday and Sunday, too? Right now is an opportunity to address that. In 2022, every Bay Area city is working on a “housing element,” which involves zoning and property planning for single-family houses, apartments, mixed-use areas, everything.
Growth and change are part of life, and we need housing. But what if we stopped spreading out over the golden hills and fields, and instead spread up, leaving our landscape for hiking, biking, agriculture and to look at. Imagine instead a few neighborhood centers around town with four-to-six-story housing, ground floors with bookshops, florists, cafes, small grocers and some offices. An almost Parisian ambiance. A few 5- to 15-minute transit lines serving these centers would let you skip driving and parking.
Let your city know if you want these neighborhood centers. They’re listening. I’d love to protect the hills I grew up exploring.
Randy O’Connor
Oakland
Don’t paint all of GOP
as supporting Trump
I am a long-term Republican, and I personally don’t know of any Republicans that: believe the election was fraudulent; believe Trump is the legitimate leader of the party; support the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.
This political mantra to paint all Republicans with the same brush is the next big lie.
Jeff Johnson
Lafayette
Jan. 6 can be warning
to guard democracy
“Remember, remember, the fifth of November!” is a reference to Guy Fawkes Day, an annual commemoration observed in November for a failed conspiracy by a group of English Catholics to assassinate the Protestant King James in 1605.
We should take a lesson from the British and celebrate the 6th of January; a day remembering the failed conspiracy by insurrectionists to overturn the results of fair and free election that chose Joseph R. Biden as our 46th President. A year after the mob stormed the Capitol, too many Republicans are no longer remembering their initial responses were to hold all treasonous rioters responsible for their actions.
I propose the president and Congress declare a national day of remembrance for January 6th, calling it “Defend Democracy Day,” to help everyone keep in mind the awful events of a near overthrow of our government and remind us to remain ever vigilant.
Andrew Wise
Fremont
Wildlife corridor needed
for L.A. to Vegas rail line
California Governor Gavin Newsom should demand the proposed Los Angeles to Las Vegas electric railway have wildlife corridors to protect desert bighorn sheep. Wildlife corridors would give sheep a path to safely go over the tracks ̶ a path that could mean the difference between life and death.
Bighorn sheep contend with mounting threats to their survival. Freeways and housing developments shrink their habitat. Warming temperatures from climate change dry up seasonal springs they use for water. A type of pneumonia spread from domestic sheep is deadly to bighorn. As they lose habitat and climate change intensifies, bighorn sheep need to move to find food and water. Traveling to different mountain ranges gives bighorn the ability to mate with other populations of sheep. This strengthens their gene pool.
Promoting a project without wildlife corridors as sustainable is misleading. It’s not sustainable for bighorn sheep.
Hilary Clark
Berkeley
U.S. must confront GOP
push against democracy
I wonder how other democracies would handle a presidential also-ran who refused to concede defeat and instead tried everything possible
to overturn the election results. I also wonder how many democracies currently allow each of their states or provinces to create their own set of election laws including letting the leading party in some overturn results they don’t fancy. And I wonder how many democracies deem an election a success if the voter turnout is low because they were able to make it difficult for seniors and minorities to vote.
I’m assuming the answer to the first question is that he would be imprisoned. The answer to the other two would assuredly be none. So why do we tolerate this undemocratic behavior here? If the United States does not confront the GOP to address these three basic election issues, I fear our democracy will be lost.
Bob Parker
San Jose
Source: www.mercurynews.com