Robert Luna for Los Angeles County Sheriff

The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department needs competent, professional leadership. It's the third-largest local police agency in the nation and is still scarred by many years of scandal and criminality within its ranks. Sheriff Alex Villanueva has prov

Villanueva was elected four years ago as a progressive reformer. In addition to having the support of the deputies union, he was even backed by the Los Angeles County Democratic Party. Upon taking office, however, Villanueva quickly revealed that his approach to the office was fundamentally cronyist and politically cynical.

One of his first courses of action, having taken office in December 2018, was to reinstate a deputy who had been terminated amid allegations of domestic violence and stalking behavior. The deputy, Carl Mandoyan, had been a volunteer for Villanueva's campaign.

This in turn set off not only an ongoing feud between county officials rightly outraged that Villanueva would seek to reinstate such a person in a straightforward act of cronyism, but a legal battle which has continued to drag on despite a judge ruling in favor of the county's move to block the reinstatement in 2020.

Most recently, Villanueva has been accused by highranking officials in his department of trying to cover up an incident in which a deputy knelt on the head of a handcuffed jail inmate. As part of this particular case, Villanueva shamefully targeted Los Angeles Times reporter Alene Tchekmedyian, who broke the story, by featuring her image during a press conference and suggesting she was under investigation.

Though he later walked back his remarks that indicated she was under investigation, this sort of incoherent thuggishness is what people have come to expect from

Villanueva. One of Villanueva's defining tendencies over the last few years has been his foot-dragging on investigations into deputy gangs and cliques in the sheriff's department.

Enough of this.

There are several candidates running to replace Villanueva, most of whom either work for or who have worked for the sheriff's department. We believe an outsider's perspective is needed. Accordingly, we think former Long Beach police Chief Robert Luna is the best bet for those seeking a needed shift to normalcy and integrity in the leadership of the sheriff's department.

Luna has worked in law enforcement for 36 years, most of which has been spent in leadership positions.

Luna vows to focus on building positive relationships between the department and the community by focusing on and promoting crime prevention and alternatives to incarceration when it's justified while also maintaining a particular focus on habitual and violent offenders.

“As sheriff, I will coordinate with the Board of Supervisors, LAPD and L.A. County chiefs to ensure that we are coordinated and successful in our work,” he told us. “In fact, one of my first priorities is to rebuild the fractured relationship with the L.A. County Board of Supervisors.”

For a department like the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, this straightforward agenda of focusing on crime prevention and not being a demagogue like Villanueva is precisely what's needed.

The Anthony Avalos settlement from county

Re “County to pay $32M in boys death” (May 12):

The immediate perpetrators of the torture and murder of Anthony Avalos are prime examples of why the death penalty should be applied in selected cases, and not 20 years after the crime. In addition, the various social service affiliates related to the case should be punished with loss of jobs or even prison sentences if adjudged appropriate for their contribution to this dreadful crime. However, to award $32 million dollars to family members is abusive to taxpayers who are funding this huge sum. There may be justification for some compensatory payment to the family (noting that the family had not effectively intervened in preventing these crimes), but certainly not to the extent reported.

Biden and Ukraine crisis

Re “Should President Joe Biden visit Ukraine?” (May 10):

Although I'm loath to offer any advice to Democrats, I think it's in everyone's best interest that President Biden stay home and not visit Ukraine. 1) There's no telling how Vladimir Putin would react to Biden's presence; he seems unhinged enough that he might consider the president of the United States an exemplary target for an assassination attempt. 2) Even if Putin were to leave Biden be, the president has enough history of gaffes, reminiscent of those of President Trump, to risk saying something stupid that might threaten Ukraine's defense posture especially when one considers Biden's bungling in the Afghanistan withdrawal fiasco, his botching of the U.S. economy and his obsession with placating his far left base at any cost.

Better that Biden stay in the background and if he really wants to help Ukraine try to supply it with enough effective weaponry to help the Ukrainians withstand Russia's aggression without jeopardizing our own security in the process.

Drought and water conservation in state

Re “2 largest reservoirs in state are already at `critically low levels'” (May 8):

How long are we going to cry and do nothing? Crying about our drought situation will not help one bit. Unless we get a flood like Noah experienced, we can conserve water and kill every plant and lawn in California, and it still will not fix the problem. First, we will be limited to watering three times a week, then once a week, then no watering at all. Then guess what, the agencies will have to raise prices because water is scarce. Where will it end? Will it end when all of California looks like Mojave? We live next to a body of water that will never dry up. Build the desalinization plants, remove the salt and we will have all the water we will ever need. It is inevitable; why delay it?

Economics of the rising prices of goods and services in the nation

Re “California's high gas prices” (Letters, May 11):

Economics is more complex than capitalists raising prices. When the government purposefully makes it impossible to obtain more product and the product is made to move from place to place with trains and trucks instead of more reliable pipelines the price for energy will go higher. When an energy-independent nation, such as ours just over a year ago, has to depend on foreign oil from say Russia, Iran and other enemies, the cost will indeed grow. The massive amounts of government spending that has the country over $30 trillion in debt to folks like China and other enemies of our nation is another factor. We can't spend money we don't have, print up more and borrow from our future without raising inflation. That's just a few of the dynamics involved with our current inflation and gas prices.

Moratorium on building more new homes here

With California in such a drought why not stop building new homes. They are not in the price range for low- to middle-class buyers.

Water is needed from start to finish when building a home. Water is then needed when living in the home. The only winner is the developer and state from the high property taxes.