Senior Tax
Dear Editor: Reading one of our Assembly statements in the Sentinel, quote, ‘‘We don’t have the money to keep funding the senior citizen tax exempt.’’ Where was this statement before the Assembly spent millions on a dam the people didn’t want or need, that we, the senior citizens, are now paying for, along with all Sitka citizens.
Also a huge entertainment building that we can’t afford to heat much less pay for at Sitka High, and a dock (cruise ship) at the old pulp mill site, that was put on the ballot three times and voted down by landslide votes all three times, but it’s being built anyway, and where does the Assembly think senior citizens are going to get money to pay for all these Assembly mistakes.
To the voters out there, remember, we elected them, so we can also get rid of them, at the very next election. Especially the head hunters who constantly go against senior citizens or anything that doesn’t have tourist attached to it.
No more spending money we don’t have, and no more rate increases. Do the best we can with what we have. No more spending on advice from people who don’t live here. When I moved here in 1958, Sitka had 3,237 citizens and Sitka High School was in one building on Baranof Street. Police and firemen and the chiefs were all local people. Things started going to hell when people from down south started moving here and changing things. Now people from Sitka are leaving in droves.
We can still change this. Quit spending money we don’t have. Get rid of the self-serving Assembly people, known as ‘‘head hunters’’ by the senior citizen community. Most of us are $30,000-a-year people. We don’t have big or any retirement and we would like to live out our lives in Sitka. But the Assembly and mayor are making it almost impossible. I am 76 years old and looking for a job so I can live here. If something doesn’t happen soon, a lot more of us will be moving out to the land of the malls, Seattle or move south. Assembly, leave us alone and fix your past mistakes before you turn the screws on us anymore.
Gary Lang, Sitka, 76-year-old veteran
Raffle Thanks
Dear Editor: The Sitka Soccer Club has benefited recently from generous donations by Sea Mart and Orion Sporting Goods toward prizes in the club’s raffle. Thank you to these businesses for supporting this program. Thank you to the Sitka Elks Lodge for working with the club on carrying out the raffle. Your commitment to youth sports in Sitka is felt throughout the community.
Lastly, thank you to the community members who bought raffle tickets. You’ve supported the youth in Sitka and it is much appreciated! Congratulations to the winners of the raffle.
Tracey Johnson, Sitka Soccer Club
School Walkout
Dear Editor: Thank you to the 150 Sitka High School students who participated in Friday’s “National School Walkout,” either in support of or opposed to the control of weapons and ammunition in the United States.
As Miss Lubin so eloquently put it: “It is our time to take a stand on what we believe is important… . We are the future of our nation.”
And it is these folks – the future of this nation, this state, and this community – who will have to deal with, and to live with, whatever decisions their adult political leaders make on this issue; long before any of them can be in office, or even vote. Which means that they – even if ineligible to vote (but they do pay taxes) – may and should have very meaningful and relevant things to say about all this. And that they should be listened to, and gravely and seriously considered.
One way to make this happen, at least here in Sitka, would be an open, public forum in which SHS, Pacific, and Mt. Edgecumbe students present their perspectives on the following questions, directed at both advocates and opponents of “gun control”:
1. What was the original reason and justification for, and purpose and intent of the Second Amendment? Why was it included in those Ten Amendments, without which there never would have been a Constitution – or a United States of America – in the first place?
2. Is the problem today with legally-manufactured, -distributed, -sold, -bought and/or -owned weapons and ammunition? Or is it with illegally-manufactured, -distributed, -sold, -bought, and/or -owned arms and ammo? Or is it the money to be made in the business of arms and armaments, legal and/or illegal? Or is it something else?
3. To exactly which weapons and weapons systems does the Second Amendment apply? If it encompasses assault and automatic weapons, does that also include AK-47s along with AR-15s? What about M60 7.62 mm and .50 caliber M2 machine guns? Or shoulder-fired grenade launchers, bazookas, and/or recoilless rockets?
4. re Question 2: How will those who want “gun control” deal with those who choose NOT to abide by whatever form of federal law comes out of all this, for whatever reason: NRAers and Second Amendmenters, on the one hand; outlaws and black marketeers, on the other; arms makers and dealers, on the third?
5. re Question 1: What is the relevance of the Second Amendment today, as regards enabling citizens to protect themselves from their own national (or state or local) government(s)? What good will bump-stocks and mega-magazines be against the biggest, baddest, and most expensive military organization on the planet?
6. re Question 4: How will any federal gun control law be enforced out there in TrumpLandia? Or in America’s inner-city battlezones? Or anyplace else in between? And, most importantly of all: Who is going to enforce it?
7. Should the laws regulating the possession and use of firearms in the State of Alaska be determined by the peoples of Alaska, or by the politicians, lobbyists, pressure groups, and talking heads of SwampLand?
Wouldn’t it be very interesting to hear and – even more significantly – to read what Sitka’s High (and even middle) school students have to say about all this?
Jeff Moebus,
Veterans Against War, Sitka Platoon
Shop Locally
Dear Editor: The era of letting Amazon.com drain the economy of our town must end.
This goes hand-in-hand with turning to our neighbors again, instead of letting Facebook be a substitute for actual friends.
These thoughts struck me as I was thinking about local merchants who have understood my complications and predicaments with products or services, then have helped me see that issues resolve through local communication, not by clicks. When I have issues with a .com, I come up against a policy designed to protect the company from my reasonable needs as a customer. When I purchase in town, I gain a durable human interaction and response worth more by far than a bit of savings. This is one of many signs telling me that we will recover from our infatuation with computer imitations of life.
When we support our local merchants and enjoy their support in return, we turn our backs on companies that rob our town by avoiding sales tax and property tax. This can only be one of the reasons that city charges keep rising. The avoidance of taxes by mega-companies transfers the cost of running the city onto the citizens.
Buy local from a friend and from a business that pays taxes in support of our town. We are not isolated in Sitka. We are concentrated. We are well-placed to relate locally through our local society.
John Welsh, Sitka
In Response
Dear Editor: This letter is in response to Karen Parker’s letter “No Plastic Bag Tax” of April 20.
First, thank you, Karen. I appreciate that we can have a respectful disagreement AND still be friends and supporters of one another. And thank you for your green efforts (both personal and as a business) and for your suggestions. The local volunteer group, Bags for Change, encourages input and ideas from all community members as we try to support our community in changing to more sustainable behavior related to plastic.
In many ways we agree. We agree that waterproof shopping bags can be helpful in our rainforest weather. We agree that we need common sense, positive approaches that encourage healthy, sustainable behavior related to plastic bags. And, like you, we wish that things like incentives for bringing reusable bags or for recycling more plastic bags would work to solve the problems related to plastic getting into our oceans, our food, and our wildlife.
Bags for Change is looking for and working on common sense, positive approaches to plastic pollution. We encourage everyone in Sitka to carry and use waterproof reusable bags when doing all shopping in Sitka. And we will give a free waterproof reusable bag to anyone who needs if you call us (747-2708). Many of these free bags have flaps or zippers to help keep contents even drier than a plastic bag! We are also working with Sea Mart, AC Lakeside and other stores to put up artfully designed signs that help remind people to BYOB – Bring Your Own Bag. We are working to educate people on things like how to clean reusable bags and how to rethink plastic bags (so that, for example, a cereal bag can suddenly become a dog waste collection bag). We’ll be working to revitalize our “Reusable Bag Libraries” at Sitka’s grocery stores and we hope to do more!
We have also thought about incentives – like 5 cents off for each reusable bag used or recycling incentives. Studies – and even local experience – have shown that these incentives don’t work to encourage behavior change. The studies show that the people who take advantage of the incentive are those who already bring reusable bags and that the amount stores can afford as an incentive (usually the cost of a bag equals 5 cents) is not enough for people to take on the new behavior. And recycling plastic bags is not a great option. Most people don’t know that “it costs $4,000 to process and recycle one ton of plastic bags, which can then be sold on the commodities market for $32. (Jared Blumenfeld, director, San Francisco DEC, 2007). Add the cost to ship the bags to Sitka and ship them out of Sitka, and the economics of recycling plastic bags get even worse.
In terms of local economics, our group suggested that the bag fee include a small amount per bag that could be retained by each business to help pay for the store’s efforts to collect, track, and remit the fee. And at the local government level, we’ll be working on community-supported ways to support fee collection and remittance.
And if the question is, do we really need to do something about plastic? Then I encourage you to watch the movie “A Plastic Ocean” (available on Netflix). Our oceans are becoming a toxic, plastic dumping ground and it is getting worse every day.
It is time for us to make a change in the way we think about and use plastic locally, nationally and globally. We can do this Sitka, and Bags for Change is here to help.
Michelle Putz,
Leader for Bags for Change
