Letters: Alameda schools | Project lacks benefits | Complaints fall flat | Ignoring history | Diversity of views | Ban guns

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Alameda must do moreto reopen the schools

In January, I founded Alameda Families for School Reopening with another mother. We seek to swiftly and safely reopen AUSD schools, immediately for 4 days a week, 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., with before and after-school programs, and next school year, for 5 days a week, from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.

AUSD’s current in-person schedule is impossible for us parents who work outside the home. Last week, Alameda County reduced the requirement that desks be separated by 6 feet to a standard 3 feet, but AUSD says, even with one-quarter of the school year left, it is too late to change the agreement signed with employee unions to open schools this spring. So, classrooms will unnecessarily remain at half capacity, most children studying in-person only several hours a week. These bad decisions have consequences for families.

I ask all of us to reflect on what we can do to help our children return to school.

Maria Elena Moreno Van MarenAlameda

Solar project won’tbenefit Livermore

I’m from one of the pioneer families of the Livermore-Amador Valley (Buttner-Ziegenfuss). The last few generations of us have watched as the valley’s precious land is swallowed up by for-profit development one piece at a time. It’s all nearly gone, these gorgeous ag lands and open space unfettered by the kind of cluttered views of human “improvement” that this industrial-scale Aramis project will create.

Measure D was approved with strong support by those of us living out here for a reason. Driving the North Livermore Avenue corridor towards Morgan Territory is especially breathtaking in spring when wildflowers are at their peak; it’s considered a scenic corridor by the county.Consequently, we feel betrayed by this action.

This Aramis project approval was done absent a county solar policy. It does not and will not satisfy solar needs for this county, as it isn’t intended for us.

Scott SeeryPleasanton

Ballpark site complaintsdon’t hold water

I take issue with concerns expressed in recent letters and articles regarding the proposed A’s stadium. The first complaint is that  it will interfere with Oakland Port operations. The port operations are to the west of the ballpark and anyway even in a good year for the A’s they would be there maybe 100 days. What about the other 265 days?

The second complaint is that fans will have to cross railroad tracks and the train horn will disrupt the game. Please watch a game from Seattle to see if the train horn has ever disrupted a Mariners game. Also, note that there are restaurants across the tracks in Jack London Square. Let us remember that Howard Terminal was abandoned as a port facility and that modernization of the port with larger cranes and cold depot facilities have been built west of the proposed ballpark.

Gerald VeiluvaOakland

Column ignores historywhen decrying ignorance

Victor Davis Hanson is having all kinds of trouble with today’s world. It’s simply immoral and full of people who are ignorant of history. For instance, in his April 2 column “The 10 radical rules that are changing our culture” Victor Davis Hanson says neither statue-toppling and name-changing “require any evidence or historical knowledge.”

Victor Davis Hanson apparently lacks the historical knowledge to realize, for instance, what the topplers of Robert E. Lee’s statues know — that Lee was a bigot and a traitor, a slaveowner who led an armed resurrection against the United States in defense of slavery. We no longer want to honor those kinds of people in the land of the free and the home of the brave, now do we, Victor Davis Hanson?

Chuck McFaddenOakland

Keeping comic keepsdiversity of views

Re. “Comic strip spreading right-wing propaganda,” Letters to the Editor, Page A12, April 4:

Here we go again with a request from a cancel culture proponent to cease something that doesn’t align with his political or social views, in particular, the Mallard Fillmore comic strip.

The writer calls upon the East Bay Times to “drop this strip” because it offends him and makes him angry. Mallard Fillmore is one of the 26 comic strips the newspaper prints. While it is absolutely the writer’s right to stop reading the offending strip, it is not his right to demand its removal. It’s a matter of choice. I read only a few of the comic strips and skip the ones I find unhumorous, uninteresting or offensive. That’s my choice.

I commend the paper for continuing to print Mallard Fillmore for their readers who do enjoy it. Diversity and tolerance is important, and a cornerstone of freedom.

Linda ThompsonDanville

Only a ban willreduce gun violence

Re. “Antioch man charged with illegally possessing four guns,” Page B3, April 1:

I am disappointed that anyone can have a gun in our country and that it’s so easy to obtain one.

I appreciate that the police were able to find the culprit in a timely and efficient manner, but one person shouldn’t be able to have so many guns. With that many firearms, the situation could have been worse than robbing a hotel; a bunch of innocent people could have died.

Gun regulation has always been a problem in the United States and we need to face the fact that guns need to be banned. It’s too easy to obtain a gun and they offer more harm than protection. People working at a hotel shouldn’t be worrying about their lives but instead just trying to get through the day.

Gabriel BrowneSan Leandro