PUBLIC FORUM.

Inconvenient jail time

Re ``No choice: Guilty'' (Oct. 21):

So George Weller is ``too frail'' for prison. Every time an old person is convicted of a crime, there's a controversy surrounding that person's age. But justice is supposed to be blind. Therefore, if a prison sentence is appropriate for the crime, it shouldn't matter whether or not it's convenient for that person to go to jail.

More and more juveniles are being given adult sentences nowadays because they have committed adult crimes. That means they are being sentenced regardless of their ages. The same should hold true for Weller. After all, it wasn't convenient for his victims, either, to be lying dead in the street.

-- Cathy Edgington

Van Nuys

School building

Re ``Hiatus on bond (Our Opinions, Oct. 20):

Thanks for injecting a dose of sanity into the Los Angeles Unified School District's building plan. In the face of declining student enrollment, LAUSD officials should be carefully examining the need for additional classrooms beyond those already funded. They seem, however, to be in the mode of ``Damn the torpedoes; full steam ahead!''

Instead, they could start by examining the need for proposed Regional High School No. 4 on the Granada Hills Hospital site. The need for this school has never been justified by the demographics furnished by LAUSD. Every community organization in Granada Hills is opposed to the conversion of a medical facility into a high school. Additionally, the draft environmental impact report admits the school will cause massive traffic and parking problems that LAUSD cannot mitigate.

-- Dave Beauvais

President

Old Granada Hills Residents' Group

Old school technology

``LAUSD building cash may fall short'' (Oct. 18) indicates $6.2 billion is for ``modernization and renovations.'' Then why are older classrooms still technologically lacking, especially in low-income areas? Computers are integral in every subject. Updated computers should be in every classroom. I think some classes still have VCR, not DVD, players. You can't even rent VHS tapes at Blockbuster.

Many of the latest schools have new technology. I applaud retiring Roy Romer and have high hopes for new Superintendent David Brewer and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. How about a bond issue just to modernize older schools to help keep our kids up to date? I'd vote for it.

-- Kevin Dooley

(New LAUSD teacher)

Granada Hills

Quotas, a good thing

Re ``Officers claim ticket quotas'' (Briefly, Oct. 22):

Well, I guess the urban myth about ticket quotas is true. But is this really a bad thing? I personally support Capt. Joseph Hiltner's efforts to increase law enforcement. Speeding, reckless driving and inconsiderate driving are rampant on our roadways, and there is not much that you and I will do about it since we can't cite the offenders.

The next time you are at the scene of a fatal accident (praying that it is not one of your friends or family) think about this quota issue again. Drivers: Obey the law, and the quotas won't matter. Police officers: Do your duty and make the streets safer. Capt. Hiltner, I salute you.

-- Mark Ditko

Sylmar

Meltdown

Re ``Questions remain over just how big accident was'' and ``Childhood in idyllic hills held dark secret'' (Oct. 11):

The first of these articles reported that a nuclear reactor meltdown occurred in 1959 at the Santa Susana Field Laboratory, potentially exposing the residents of Chatsworth Lake Manor to harmful doses of radiation. The latter insinuated that very few people lived in this community in 1959.

That isn't true. This area was not only home to hundreds of residents, including more than 30 members of my family, but it also had a bar, a gas station, a store and a church. My family and many others were potentially exposed to harmful doses of radiation. Why insinuate otherwise?

-- Michael Turner

Chatsworth Lake Manor

Abe's 50 years

Re ``Nuclear leak'' (Your Opinions, Oct. 15):

Jeanine D'Elia said it all when she stated that she puts more faith in longtime Santa Susana-area resident Holly Huff's fears than in highly educated opinion of Abe Weitzberg, a nuclear engineer with almost 50 years of experience, that there was likely no radiation leak in 1959.

Weitzberg has an interesting perspective with no liability since he worked at Atomics International at Santa Susana three years after the ``event'' but would certainly have heard scuttlebutt about the leak. Everyone else is biased -- the anti-nuke, anti-defense anti-big business local watchdogs, authors of an ``independent'' report full of pure guesswork, predatory lawyers and angry, scared residents looking for compensation. I don't know what happened 47 years ago -- nor do most others -- but I put more faith in Abe's 50 years than Holly's fears.

-- Tom Reilly

Thousand Oaks

No on Measure H

Re ``Yes on Measure H'' (Our Opinions, Oct. 22):

The Daily News has made a serious error in endorsing Measure H. While there is no doubt that middle-class families are an endangered species in Los Angeles, the idea that providing free housing to the homeless will improve their situation is entirely false.

The Housing Authority currently manages more than 46,000 units of Section 8 and low-rent housing. Drive by those facilities, and you will quickly realize that many are cesspools of poverty and crime. Providing homes for the homeless will not change their condition. If this proposition had been limited to helping first-time homebuyers, it would have been a great idea. We must vote no on Measure H.

-- Don Evans

Canoga Park

Not here either

Re ``Valley's Oasis'' (Our Opinions, Oct. 20):

The Oasis was already rejected in the North Valley, and now an attempt is being made to push it onto the Woodland Hills-Warner Center community. Burdening this area with more congestion, in addition to that already being created -- with mega shopping centers and increased building of condos and apartments -- is insane.

If the North Valley with its rail access, less-congested 118 Freeway, an eventual link to the Orange Line and acres of suitable industrial property didn't want it, why should the Woodland Hills community want it? It makes no sense. In any event, are Valley residents to trust that any proposed ``tax revenues'' would actually be returned to our community? They never have before.

-- Eileen Johnson

Woodland Hills

Where's the money?

Re ``Sucking us dry'' (Your Opinions, Oct. 20):

Joseph Dillon writes that politicians try to solve problems by throwing our tax dollars at them. The problem isn't that politicians throw our money; it's that they hit the wrong targets. Six or seven bond issues in the last 30 years took billions of dollars from Los Angeles property owners to build new police stations.

Two new stations were built last year: West Valley and Mission. It certainly didn't take 30 years worth of property taxes to build two stations. Where's the rest of the money? No one seems to know, or if they know, they aren't talking. Until people go to jail for spending our property tax dollars on anything except what the proposition states, I will vote no on anything with a dollar sign.

-- John R. Schlank

Granada Hills

Monday night football 

Monday nights just don't feel right anymore without that familiar calming voice of Al Michaels prominent in the background of my safe world, with the relief of the dreaded Monday now over and the comfort of my husband safe at home on the couch. It's just not right.

-- Donna C. Carver

Granada Hills