LETTERS Texas, water, terror, anti-Semitism, Koons | The Sacramento Bee

Texas is No. 2 after all

Re “California led nation in 2014 job creation” (Business, March 18): Who can forget when Texas governor and presidential hopeful Rick Perry visited our state a couple of years ago and touted Texas as the place where California business should move? A great sucking sound was predicted by those who thought that businesses and employees would move, thereby greatly increasing unemployment in our state. Well, surprise, surprise, California led the nation last year in job creation and created more than 100,000 more jobs than second-place Texas.

Water, water nowhere

SIGN UP

Re “With reservoirs depleted, state must restrict use” (Editorial, March 17): No snow in the mountains, no runoff in the rivers, no rain in the valley. And no discussions or comments of desalinization plants being built.

Water officials are wringing their hands, hoping and praying and wishing for rain. Rain is a commodity that isn’t coming our way. There is talk of new reservoirs being built, but they need rain to fill them. No new dams have been built in many years. They need rain and snow runoff to be effective. The environmentalists don’t want to dam our rivers. They don’t want to build desalinization plants, either. Just what do they want? Whatever it is, the governor and Legislature are listening to them with open ears. When California turns to dust and business moves away and people follow, we all know whom to blame.

More than meters needed

While I agree that water meters should be installed on all homes in the city, I disagree with the implication that those without meters do not conserve. I do not yet have a meter but have only watered my yard a couple of times since last fall. I catch rainwater in buckets to water potted plants and flush way less than my wife would like. So we are doing our part.

I think the bigger picture is being missed with thousands of new homes slated to be built in the coming years and all the new landscaping and irrigation systems that continue to be installed in public works projects and on freeways, such as the Watt Avenue at Highway 50 interchange. Not only do they use more water, but they will need to be maintained at significant cost to the taxpayers. Why not install native oak trees with natural grasses and mow it a couple of times a year?

It will not matter how much I and fellow citizens conserve when demand continues to increase and water storage stays the same.

Water sales cost birds, too

Re “L.A. water agency offers cash for Valley allotments” (Page A1, March 13): The article fails to really mention a third party impacted by a sale of irrigation water to Southern California: the environment.

Since 95 percent of California’s historic wetlands have disappeared because of farming and development, birds and waterfowl along the Pacific Flyway have seen their natural habitat nearly eliminated. Numerous studies have shown that rice fields provide suitable replacement wetland habitat when filled.

While this is not a panacea for lost avian habitat, it does provide some relief. However, water sales from rice farmers who will leave their fields fallow as a result will be a step backward for the Pacific Flyway.

Christians terrorize Muslims

Our media seem to be avoiding the slaughter and terrorizing of Muslims by Christians in the Central African Republic. U.S. Ambassador Samantha Power recently reported that 417 of the 436 mosques in the country have been destroyed and 1 million people have been displaced. Power referred to this as “kind of crazy, chilling.”

The balance sheet of history shows that Christians have resorted to terror and killing more often than Muslims, a reality that causes me deep shame. Both religions have a central commitment to peace, and both see violence as sinful.

I would invite all those who claim to be Christian to bring pressure to bear on those who claim the name of Christian in the Central African Republic.

What about a higher law?

Re “What about rule of law?” (Letters, March 16): Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union were ruled by laws, many of which Americans would consider to be highly immoral. We had (and still have) immoral laws here as well.

What would have happened to the civil rights movement if people like Rosa Parks had not had the courage to disobey the discriminatory and immoral laws of the Jim Crow South?

I don’t agree with people who commit violence or destroy property, but nonviolent civil disobedience can be a powerful force for change. Ultimately, each of us must decide for himself whether it is right, moral and just to disobey a law.

Koons choice was rubber stamp

Local artists are incensed because they were not given an opportunity to compete equally for a major project. As a former jurist for the Sacramento Metropolitan Arts Commission, I have some insight into how the art selection process functions. A committee screens submitted project applications for creative originality, site appropriateness and relevance to Sacramento culture and history.

If we subject our less expensive art projects to such vigorous scrutiny, why are we not doing it for major projects costing millions of dollars? The SMAC panel rubber-stamped the aesthetic sensibility of a wealthy art patron over the interests of the greater art establishment. The community did not ask for or need the money gifted. Public funding was diverted toward private interests without due diligence.

The local art community and the public deserve better treatment than this.

Can’t Koons do a cowbell?

Day after day, it’s made obvious there is far more opposition to the purchase of the Jeff Koons art piece than there is favor. While I appreciate art may be one thing to one person and something totally different to another, I remain baffled by a decision to purchase this particular piece that means nothing to this city.

If Koons’ work is such an investment, and of such specific importance to city leaders through a selection process that left local artists in the cold, why not at least make it one that both represents the fans who’ve given their emotional blood to the Kings for 30 years and honors their passion, without which there would be no “Sacramento” Kings? If it’s a Koons piece that’s being forced upon the city, why not a commissioned Koons cowbell? Geez.