California Forum letters: Bee readers take on comics changes, Sacramento soccer deal
Not so funny
“To Our Readers” (The Sacramento Bee, March 1, A1)
You didn’t revamp the comics, you annihilated them. The following have been removed and will be greatly missed: Wumo, Curtis, Grand Avenue, Rhymes with Orange, Luann, Sally Forth, F Minus, Mutts, Crankshaft, Frank & Ernest, Rose is Rose and Reality Check. Many of these dealt with current events and issues. Most of the new comic strips are out of date, not very good, or both. Bad decision, folks.
Cynthia Martin,
Sacramento
Missed comic
“To Our Readers” (The Sacramento Bee, March 1, A1)
I was extremely disappointed when I opened the paper to find that the Jumpstart comic strip had been removed. This past year we’ve had a lot of conversations about diversity and representation. Jumpstart offered a positive representation of a Black middle class family and gave us insight into a family with multiple members in law enforcement. Comic strips like Jumpstart deal with a lot of familial problems that many of us can relate to. Please reconsider your decision to remove Jumpstart.
Susie Johnson,
Elk Grove
Localize climate goals
“California will fail to meet carbon reduction goals, scathing audit of state predicts” (sacbee.com, Feb. 23)
The Bee’s article describes a critique of California’s climate program, but said nothing about local programs essential to meeting climate goals. Passenger vehicles and building energy are the major local sources of greenhouse gases, and counties and cities can control them through land-use decisions minimizing long commutes and building codes aimed at energy efficiency and electrification. Good local climate action plans depend on citizen input. Sacramento has a good start with strong public education and a draft electrification ordinance. The Cosumnes Community Service District, providing emergency response and park services to south Sacramento County, has adopted a strong climate policy. Sacramento County released a disappointing early draft climate action plan; another draft will be out for public review in March.
Oscar Balaguer, Co-chair, 350 Sacramento CAP Team
Sacramento
Bipartisan solution
“California will fail to meet carbon reduction goals, scathing audit of state predicts” (sacbee.com, Feb. 23)
California’s cap and trade system is “highly unpredictable” and California “probably won’t achieve the legislatures’ emission reductions goals.” Why? COVID’s economic disruption tanked demand for credits and tailpipe emissions increased even as the Air Resources Board “failed to adequately measure how well regulations reduce emissions.” COVID’s societal and economic effects present difficult challenges, but our greatest is climate change. Thinking of climate change as ‘carbon pollution’ provides a better approach to solving this existential problem. Controlling pollution is fundamental to the health of people and the planet. ‘Pricing carbon’ allows market forces to efficiently address carbon pollution. A carbon fee and dividend policy drives technological innovation and mitigates costs by distributing dividends to consumers based on income. It can be a bipartisan solution.
Anne Marder,
Sacramento
Feds must act
“GOP says California has too much money. Will it hurt Biden’s COVID stimulus plan?” (sacbee.com, Feb. 24)
Cities have been on the front lines fighting the pandemic for nearly a year, spending billions to protect public health, assist vulnerable populations and help small businesses. These actions saved lives but depleted city budgets. California cities lost $5 billion in revenue, due to shuttered local economies, with another $1 billion in losses expected this year. Federal assistance to help cities respond to and recover from the pandemic should not be a partisan issue. Cities received zero funding from Washington or the state to address revenue shortfalls. More than 35,000 local government jobs have been lost in California since the pandemic began. This is no bailout. Cities stepped up to protect their communities. Now the federal government needs to be there for cities.
Carolyn Coleman, Executive Director and CEO of the League of California Cities,
Sacramento
Too good to be true
“Sacramento Major League Soccer expansion deal collapses. Key investor backs out” (sacbee.com, Feb. 26)
Burkle hails from Los Angeles, not Sacramento, and has no apparent connection to our city. From the start, he was in the deal to make money. This reminds me of the storyline from “The Music Man” of a con man coming to the town of River City promising uniforms and instruments to the people, but the promised goods are never intended to arrive. Ron Burkle promised us an MLS team which seems to have disappeared like smoke. Hopefully Sacramento has learned a lesson. In the future, invest our hope and money in people we know and trust.
Martin Relles,
Sacramento
Misdirected anger
“Left-wing violence rears its ugly head in Sacramento. But don’t you dare criticize it” (sacbee.com, Feb. 12)
I applaud Gil Duran’s stand against left-wing attacks. If you don’t approve of Mayor Steinberg’s actions and policies (I don’t!), take your protests to his office, not his home. His wife, children and neighbors are not responsible for Steinberg’s actions. I wonder how many of those “protesters” took homeless people into their houses or garages to provide them with a warm shelter. Did any of those indignant protesters realize that the warming center would only shelter 60 people – about 1% of the homeless? Even if the shelter was open (as it should have been), the chances of being sheltered there were approximately 99 to 1.
Ron W Loutzenhiser
Galt
This story was originally published March 9, 2021 at 6:00 AM.