LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Prepping for floods
I lived in College Park in 1960 when Hurricane Donna came through Orlando. I remember the Westside Manor flood well. I remember the rooftops sticking above the water line.
The story then was that some fasttalking Miami developers bought a driedup lake bed for little and built Westside Manor and then, along came Donna.
Back then the story sounded much like today’s (“County aims to end Orlo Vista floods,” March 1). A massive pumping system was to be installed and the problem would be solved forever. History repeats.
I guess that in 1960 the total “thoroughness” of government approvals for development were not in place as they are today.
Gil Daniel Winter Springs
Trump and sportsmen
When Donald Trump was elected president, sportsmen had high hopes that the president and his Cabinet would commit to, in President Trump’s words, “honoring the legacy of Theodore Roosevelt.” As our 26th president, Roosevelt worked tirelessly to stop special interests from developing and privatizing our public lands and waters, conserving more than 230 million acres by establishing 150 national forests, 51 federal bird reserves, four national game preserves, five national parks and 18 national monuments.
Sportsmen have applauded the administration for some Roosevelt-like actions, such as its proposal to expand hunting and fishing on 10 national wildlife refuges and calling on Congress to create a permanent solution to the practice of “fire borrowing.”
Yet we will continue to hold administration officials accountable for pursuing the rollback of conservation protections on millions of acres of national monuments, scrapping collaborative habitat management plans for sage grouse, and not fighting administration proposals to cut popular public access programs like the Land and Water Conservation Fund. These actions threaten to undermine Roosevelt’s legacy, and I join Backcountry Hunters & Anglers in urging the Trump administration to do the right thing and stand up for our public lands.
Aaron Wright Davenport
Holocaust museum
Yes, museums, books, articles, movies and documentaries are all needed to stop the Holocaust from happening again, but 70 years later a building is not going to cut it (“Holocaust Center starts fundraising with $10 million pledged for move,” Feb. 27). People searching out museums on the subject are already aware of it and want more information. There is a wonderful (if one can use that term when talking about this subject) museum in Washington, D.C. The people of this generation and future generations who may walk by this museum and see the pictures of this incomprehensible suffering might turn their heads and see human beings suffering today. Children, seniors, men, women, homeless and hungry. No, the suffering is not on the same scale. We can’t ease the pain of those who lived through this atrocity. We can ease the pain of those suffering today. Orlando has Disney. Tourism is not going to increase dramatically because of this museum. Recently there was an article about a $50,000 contribution to a Salvation Army compound to help those in need today. $50,000, compared to millions for a museum that purports to promote human rights and understanding. Really? Yes, build a museum, but does it need to be on the same scale as the one in D.C.? Required classes and required reading, strictly on the Holocaust, will reach much more people then a building. End human suffering today. Show that suffering of any kind to anyone is unacceptable and must end.
Lynn Garvey Clarcona