Your Choice, Guv

With California’s  budget way out of balance again, it turns out Arnold Schwarzenegger was no more a bigger-than-life action figure than Gray Davis. A different superhero feared only one substance, Kryptonite. Schwarzenegger has his fear factor, too: taxes.

Guess what, governor, you can’t raise revenue by magic or super strength. It will require a combination of some spending cuts, and, gasp, raising taxes. Drastically hurt the most vulnerable of your citizens with severe cuts, or act responsibly like a chief executive should. Your choice, Governator. Choose wisely. – Arlen Grossman | Del Rey Oaks

No Laughing Meter

On Jan. 23, the Pacific Grove City Council will consider installation of parking meters or pay stations downtown and on Central Avenue. Meters increase the cost of doing business, create an inconvenience to shoppers, and drive customers to free-parking destinations.

More importantly, meters impact adjacent residential neighborhoods and change the character of the town. Small businesses have to compete with the big box operations, corporate shopping centers, as well as the Internet, where there are no obstacles such as meters.

In the interest of preservation and sustainability of the small-town environment, please attend the City Council meeting and Just Say No To Meters! – Moe Ammar | President, Pacific Grove Chamber of Commerce

More Than A Museum

Thank you for printing Dan Linehan’s article [“Bird-Brained Idea,” Jan. 3-9]. He illustrates brilliantly that the minor investment the city of Pacific Grove makes in its excellent Museum of Natural History is perhaps its best-spent dollar. 

Clearly, it makes no sense to attempt to make up a $2 million dollar shortfall on the back of a city institution that is already surviving on such a shoelace budget.

Linehan is also correct in pointing out that many residents aren’t aware of how innovative and important the museum is. The museum is more than its permanent collection or even its outstanding temporary exhibits, but is an important resource for the scientific community and critical to the functioning of the Audubon and Native Plant Societies, among other organizations. 

The museum is the only learning institute in all of Monterey County dedicated to the entirety of natural history. Stripping the museum of its paid staff or combining the museum and library directors positions makes as much sense as firing all city police officers and assigning untrained volunteers to do all their work. 

Cutting the museum’s budget would be penny wise and pound foolish. – Celia A. Bosworth | Pacific Grove 

What’s Pup?

I know Squid Fry is usually irreverent and frequently funny, but it is sometimes wrong and misinformed. Such was the case last week [“Squid Fry,” Jan. 10-16] when Squid had fun with a new Pacific Grove policy on harbor seals. Squid got the policy completely reversed. Let me try to summarize it:

The new policy in PG has two main provisions. One is to temporarily close and fence off any beach on the city’s shoreline if harbor seal moms and nursing pups are there. The city has actually been doing that for the past two years, but now it’s a formal policy. It’s protection of wildlife that goes beyond federal law, and it’s just the opposite of Squid’s twisted report last week.

The second part of the new PG policy applies only to the main beach at Lovers Point and only IF harbor seal moms and pups ARE NOT involved. It is intended to avoid a 20-year battle playing out in La Jolla, where harbor seals have moved onto a popular beach for year-round habitat–not just for the spring birthing and nursing season, when the seal pups are vulnerable.

It isn’t likely to happen here because PG, Monterey and Pebble Beach have a number of other, safer beaches this colony of harbor seals can use for their daytime sleeping and warming, beaches with less human activity and interference. But just in case… federal law enforcement officials suggested we have an acceptable policy in place to try to steer harbor seals–adults without pups, not moms nursing newborns–away from Lovers Point and avoid the confrontations in La Jolla, where seals have been harassed and injured, people have fought and been arrested, new laws have been passed and lawsuits have been endless. – Thom Akeman | Pacific Grove