PUBLIC FORUM.

The residents of Simi Valley, Moorpark, Thousand Oaks and Newbury Park finally have a chance to vote on our future on the March ballot. Why should we pay for another General Hospital in Ventura when we have only one private hospital in Simi Valley and none in Moorpark? The money they want us to spend on the County Hospital could probably be just as well spent in this area as the less populated area of Ventura. Not to mention the 30 to 50 miles required to travel one way to Ventura. I would rather have those jobs at this end of the county.

Also on the ballot is our area's chance to keep their trash where it belongs, in their end of Ventura County. They want us to believe that it is better for Simi Valley to accept their trash, rather than open a dump in Ventura. What will happen when our dump is full? Will they ask us to use the greenbelt area between Simi Valley, Moorpark and Thousand Oaks because few people live there and it would have good freeway access from the west end of the county? I think not.

Our end of the county has absolutely no ties to cities of the west end. We have police departments second to none. The property values on comparable homes tend to be higher and we tend to be much more closer aligned with Los Angeles than Ventura.

If the people of the west end want a public entity, I would suggest that if the state closes Camarillo State Hospital as has been proposed why don't they let them convert it to a state prison? After all, we have to put it somewhere, don't we?

- Ralph N. Burquist

Simi Valley

Zero tolerance? Yes! For weapons, firearms, guns, knives, dangerous objects and "toy" guns in our schools? Right! That is the position of the PTA Council and who doesn't agree with that?

And zero tolerance for those who break the law? Yes! And who doesn't agree with that?

School board member Carla Kurachi's 10-year-old son had a "toy" gun in his backpack at school to take to another child's house after school. A "toy" with a 6-inch rod that unfurled a red banner with the word "bang" on it. Scott never took the "toy" out of the pack, but it was seen by another child who reported it, which was proper and good.

Kurachi chose to make this public. Why? To clarify for all children, not just her own, what the law states regarding these "toys" being brought to school. And what does the law say?

Article 1. Suspension or Expulsion, Section 48900, paragraph (b) Possessed, sold, or otherwise furnished any firearm, knife, explosive, or other dangerous object.

The law does not include "toy" guns. The law does not allow suspension of a student with a "toy" gun at school. A student may not be suspended for bringing a "toy" gun to school. To suspend a student for having a "toy" gun at school would be breaking the law.

Note, the law specifies firearms, not guns, and the definition of a firearm is: (ar 5131.7(A) paragraph 1. a device capable of propelling a projectile by the force of an explosion or other form of combustion. A gun? Same definition.

Kurachi has been viciously attacked and maligned publicly, by PTA Council President Sandi Otto and Janice DiFatta, who was, to quote herself, "elected unanimously by the PTA Board to represent them in the issue of Mrs. Kurachi's son."

These two women held positions of authority in our area over situations that affect our most valuable natural resource, and our future - our children In letters to the editor they accuse Kurachi of showing "blatant disregard for authority." I would like to ask these two, obviously women, what authority are they babbling about? Theirs?

It appears they demanded . . . advised . . . urged school authorities to break the law and suspend Kurachi's son for violating a school rule, whether the law allowed it or not. It isn't Kurachi who is showing "blatant disregard for authority." It is you!

DiFatta states, in print, "the gun her (Kurachi's) son brought to school was just that, a gun. Kurachi chose to label it a toy." Could we take up a collection for DiFatta and get her a dictionary? Then she might be able to learn the meanings of the words she uses. "Gun: a weapon by which the projectiles are fired by the force of an explosion."

Or could your attack on Kurachi be for purely personal reasons. Didn't Otto's husband lose the school board election in 1990 when Kurachi won? That's right, and DiFatta lost to Kurachi in 1994.

And didn't you two also fail in an attempt to recall Kurachi in late '93, which, if you had succeeded would have taken $83,000 away from our schoolchildren?

Kurachi took a courageous stand on the side of the law at personal risk. Toy guns should not be allowed at our schools, but if the child, from kindergarten on up, is to be suspended, then she's right. Change the law, don't oppose it. Freedom can't exist without laws even in the land of the free.

- Bill Schermerhorn

Simi Valley

I am an environmentalist. For years I have packed into and I have lived in, the wilderness of the Sierra, for up to six weeks at a time. Last year the Sierra Club helped me gather people for a pack trip I led into the wilderness above Kings Canyon, to acquaint others with this treasure.

And I have worked to save endangered species all my life. I moved to my present home on San Antonio Creek because I am an environmentalist.

And I am a thinking environmentalist. I have done some serious thinking since the environmental group, the Friends of the Ventura River, stepped in at the 11th hour, intent on preventing the one thing that will save my home from flooding; again, the channeling of San Antonio Creek. I have thought on the meaning of "environment." According to the World Book Dictionary, the first definition is "all of the surrounding things, conditions, and influences affecting the growth or development of living things." Only in the third definition does that dictionary refer to "the condition of the air, water, plants, and animals." Webster's Collegiate Dictionary defines environment: "1: something that environs (surrounds)"; and "2a: the complex of climatic, edaphic (soil-caused, and biotic (man-caused) factors that act upon an organism or an ecological community, land ultimately determine its form and survival;" and "2b: the aggregate of social and cultural conditions that influence the life of an individual or community."

How is it that Friends of the Ventura River and some other "environmentalists," have plucked out definition 2a for their use, and discarded definitions 1 and 2b? The word "environment" includes all living things; the definition embraces individuals and communities. I have always championed the protection of the air, water, soil, plants and animals; at the same time I have worked to defend the rights of individual men. I do not see these two efforts as necessarily opposed.

San Antonio Creek is a microcosm of the problem worldwide, of humans interfacing with nature in a responsible way. Unless men live in isolated colonies completely separate from plants, animals, air and water, men and women must find a way to co-exist as stewards of that environment.

My home was flooded in the January storm; the interior walls had to be gutted and replaced and I was unable to live there for weeks. In March, again, the flood waters surrounded my home; we fought all night to keep the water out - we were successful. We have rebuilt the eight-foot berms of dirt, concrete and boulders that skirt the creek side of my property, and we have built a four-foot wall around the side and back of my house. Now we wait for the next onslaught. Nothing can stop the water; it is too powerful.

We on San Antonio Creek are suffering the effects of the increasing runoff from the Topa Topas, due to the lack of watershed, a problem emanating from building over the open land. The creek can function as a conduit for that runoff without flooding us, only if there is a channel. Right now there is no place for it to flow. It was 25 years ago that the last channeling was done, and it has not been maintained. San Antonio Creek naturally channels itself in a random way, scouring the land, and then it regenerates the plant and animal life in a miraculous way within the year. We who live on the creek ask only that the least impactful channel be made within the natural channel. This has been done several times before. In some places it means digging down only one foot. Men have created the problem on San Antonio Creek; men need to fix it. Asking the families who live on the creek to bear the brunt of others' actions is not fair.

The environment of Creek Road is the Ojai Valley; we are surrounded by the valley at its perimeter on one side, and by the creek, which carries water from the Ojai, on the other. We are deeply affected, as the definition above stipulates, by these "surrounding conditions and influences."

It is time to look at how we are part of each other's environments. We cannot be separated from nature. We are part of it.

- Starr Hungate

Oak View