Letters to the Editor July 18

Editor:

In the recent letter "Clear choice in coming election" submitted by activist Jim Slade I take exception to his comments regarding me and my campaign.

Mr. Slade mentions that I am a coworker of Commissioner Kelly Kite's and he serves as my mentor.

I appreciate that. I have always been taught to learn from those that know the job. Mr. Kite is a respected member of our community and is the longest-serving commissioner in recent Douglas County history. That level of institutional knowledge should be sought after not disdained.

Since when has good become bad? Kelly has unselfishly served the people of Douglas County for 12 years, ushering in the master plan and I respect him for his commitment and appreciate his working knowledge of our community.

I believe that the knowledge he has shared will help me become a better commissioner for Douglas County, should I be elected.

Activist Slade also indicates that all my thoughts and votes are self-serving. Mr. Slade, anybody who knows me knows I am an honest person who cares for Douglas County and wants to see the good community we all live in remain. I believe that Mr. Slade should consider using his good intelligence to help bring our community together rather than continuing to divide us, keeping good people from being involved.

Government activist Slade is at every public meeting decrying the corruptness and dishonesty of all involved in the process. It seems that we should all work together to make our county government work, not accuse and disrespect those that provide public service. We should hold them accountable, not abuse and demean them.

I have never seen Mr. Slade desire approval of any item on the agenda of any planning commission or board of county commissioners meeting, including most consent items. I know many consider him a know-it-all for doing this, but truly he would be better described as a no-it-all where nothing is ever good enough to like.

He says that I never met a development I didn't like. Well that is not true, there have been plenty. But what is true is that I never met a person I didn't like. But activist Slade, you're getting close. Quit your disrespectful approach to everything in our community and let's deal with the matters at hand. You want a rural community, act rural.

There are many good candidates in this year's election. This community attracts good people and many of them are asking for your vote.

Take time to review the candidates, and what they stand for. I'll bring some pie, and we can talk over the issues.

Mike Olson

Candidate for Douglas County

Board of County Commissioners

District 5

Editor:

In his guest opinion article published July 11, 2008, Larry Walsh attacks the Sustainable Growth Committee as a fringe group with a narrow agenda. The truth is that its Sustainable Growth Initiative was put on the ballot in 2002 with nearly twice the number of required signatures. It passed with the approval of more than 8,800 voters that November. SGC is hardly a fringe group.

For over seven years, SGC's members have served the expressed interests of a significant majority of the citizens supporting the concept of sustainable growth (not no growth). SGC has done so on a purely volunteer basis, with no personal agenda, and only with the best interests of the community at heart.

Most everything mentioned by Mr. Walsh as to SGC is untrue. However, we certainly do support the candidacy of Dave Nelson, Doug Johnson and Stuart Posselt. That is primarily because each one of them supports the newly enacted building permit allocation and growth management ordinance, the successor to the Sustainable Growth Initiative, which will be on the ballot for advisory approval in November this year. They also more clearly embrace the philosophy of SGC: sustainable growth that pays for itself, helps protect our precious resources and preserves our quality of life.

The committee does agree with Mr. Walsh that in this Republican primary we should vote for those candidates "who seek to bring long term benefit and prosperity to our community." We believe that Messrs. Nelson, Johnson and Posselt are the right candidates to accomplish this.

We respect and appreciate the fact that Mr. Walsh is entitled to express his opinions. On its face, however, one would get the impression from his guest opinion that Larry Walsh is just an average Joe Citizen living in Gardnerville. It would have been more candid for Mr. Walsh to disclose his credentials as a developer and managing member of Rocky Terrace Estates. Further, Mr. Walsh should disclose the fact that he formerly served as a Douglas County planning commissioner at a time when the majority of the planning commissioners, including him, were connected to the developer community. Mr. Walsh is representative of the ultimate special interest in this county - the development community.

That is not to denigrate some of the positive contributions developers have made to our community, but disclosure of one's affiliations and background would help the reader to understand and weigh the writer's expressed opinions. SGC officers disclose their affiliations when writing ... and so should its critics.

Judy Sturgis, Co-chair

Sustainable Growth Committee

Genoa

Editor:

Lately, we have had several discussions with local residents who are trying to determine which candidates they should vote for in the upcoming Aug. 12 primary. Specifically, when asked about our preference for District 1 commissioner, Greg Lynn or David Nelson, our response has been "Greg Lynn, of course!" On a few occasions we have been asked "Why Greg Lynn, isn't he a builder?" Our response has been a resounding "Yes, and a darned good one at that!"

In fact, in 2001 and 2007, Mr. Lynn was voted the Contractor of the Year by Douglas County residents. They did so because they know that Mr. Lynn builds quality homes that are consistent with master plan guidelines. Mr. Lynn guarantees his product and Carson Valley residents know that his word and handshake are as good as gold.

Greg Lynn is a life-long conservative Republican who has lived and worked in Carson Valley for 28 years. He resides in an upscale District 1 community that he has developed over the past 10 years. Mr. Lynn is a respected member of the community who is always first in line when help is needed. For instance, he volunteered to design and build the Carson Valley shooting range which is the No. 1 facility of its kind in Northern Nevada. Over the years he has assisted the county in numerous tasks such as developing the design manual, modifications to the county jail, providing leadership in the development of the growth ordinance and much, much more.

The SGI special interest group would lead you to believe that Mr. Lynn is sponsored and funded by the development community. Nothing could be further from the truth. If you know Greg Lynn, you know that he is his own man beholden to no special interest. His allegiance is to the citizens of Douglas County and their best interests.

When you consider Greg Lynn's qualifications, commitment, and competence, he is the only viable choice for District 1 commissioner. He has our vote and he deserves yours. If you want to learn more about Greg Lynn and what he stands for we urge you to check out his Web site at www.electgreglynn.com or contact him via e-mail at aught6@charter.net.

Jan and John Burgman

Gardnerville

Editor:

The July 9, 2008, Record-Courier article about the residency of the candidates for county commissioner was quite interesting.

The first issue that jumped out at me was that Blaine Spires, a recent UNR graduate, changed his address the same day he filed for office - on May 5. Two paragraphs later the article states that "Nevada law requires that a candidate live in their district for 30 days prior to filing for office." Perhaps The Record-Courier needs to do the same type of front-page examination of his actual residency as it did for another candidate. The second issue that caught my attention was the filing by Eric Rieman of the American Independent party. The article states that he "changed his party ... after filing for office." This doesn't seem right.

It's also interesting to note that Mr. Rieman's last-minute filing forced a primary between Mr. Spires and incumbent Doug Johnson, which otherwise would have gone straight to the general election in November. An Independent American candidate has almost no chance of election in November, so why would he even file? Call me a conspiracy theorist but it almost seems like someone convinced Mr. Rieman to file, thinking it could help their own candidate.

I wouldn't suggest that, however, unless there were more dots to connect. Guess what else? Michael Hayes, Blaine Spires' father-in-law and campaign manager, serves with Eric Rieman on the Carson Valley Conservation District. Perhaps Mr. Hayes didn't want his 24-year-old son-in-law, Blaine Spires, to face the entire electorate, and wanted the issue decided in the Republican primary, so he convinced his friend Mr. Rieman to file at the last minute. Of course I have no proof, and while this may be entirely legal it certainly looks suspicious, potentially even underhanded and unethical. Surprised?

Donna Buddington

Gardnerville

Editor:

It's that time in the election cycle in Douglas County when the posters and signs supporting the county commissioner candidates start to appear. If history comes to fruition, then the candidates who put up the most signs will win in both the primary and November elections. It would be preferable if the candidates whom have the best ideas on how to straighten out the fiscal disaster left by the current board of commissioners could win the elections, but most of the candidates just plaster their names around the county hoping that the populace will remember them when they are in the voting booth.

Our current commissioners recently voted to make severe cuts to the youth activities and sports programs, senior services and library budgets for the current fiscal year. In Douglas County, these programs are supported by the room tax fund which for several reasons has been on the decline for many years. Our commissioners have recognized that this fund is not capable of supporting these programs but none of them have even come up with an idea of how to correct the problem.

In fact, they haven't even provided definitive direction to the county manager to work on this predicament. The Douglas County youth and seniors make up approximately one-half of our county population yet it seems that their voices are never heard. I am sure that if they were real estate developers, ranchers or owned an aircraft they would have the attention of the commissioners. It's a shame that our youth and seniors have no political clout but it would be nice if the current candidates would convey how they will support this unheralded half of our population.

Paul Lockwood

Minden

Editor:

Something happened last night (June 16, 2008) at this facility (Carson Valley Residential Care Center) which has me still shaking my head in disbelief.

The ambulance was called, and as usual, a fire truck drove right behind it. It sat there, motor on, burning the taxpayers' gasoline, all of the time the paramedics were in the facility taking out someone who had died.

I may be in my 90s, but I fail to see the logic in what happened. If laws were written when gas was cheap, maybe they need to be rewritten. Just a thought.

Elizabeth T. Lee

Gardnerville

Editor:

The United States does not have any big oil companies - Exxon-Mobile is only the 14th largest in the world and therefore has minimal control over the price of gasoline (supply and demand).

Ninety-four percent of the worlds oil supply is owned by foreign governments or government-sponsored monopolies that dominate the supply of oil.

The United States actually has vast petroleum reserves.

It would be possible for American oil companies to develop those reserves and deliver at the pump to American consumers at much lower prices while creating thousands of jobs, preferable to sending endless billions of dollars to Saudi Arabia, Venezuela and Russia.

Why does it happen? Because the Democratic party, aided by a few liberal Republicans, deliberately helps keep gas prices high putting most of the proven energy areas off limits to development.

On June 26, 2008, HR 6251 failed to pass, 91 percent with Democrats in favor 95 percent Republicans against - it would have restricted domestic exploration even further.

The Democrats reason that currently there are 45.5 million acres of federal on-shore lands that have been leased to oil and gas companies, yet 31 million of these acres are not producing.

Additionally, there are 33 million acres leased in the outer-continental shelf that are also not producing.

Could it be that there are limited proven reserves in these areas?

Opening up more land to drilling would only reward big oil companies, which have already amassed over $600 billion in profits since 2000 and provide little price relief to consumers.

They also stress clean energy alternatives, but these will not be available in significant quantities for years.

United States oil production 2006 (Heritage Foundation) 34 percent United States; 12 percent Canada; 9 percent Mexico; 45 percent OPEC and others.

Cost of gasoline estimated at $3.15/gallon - state and local taxes 12 percent; distribution and marketing 14 percent; refining costs 23 percent; crude oil 50 percent.

At $4.50 per gallon - crude oil cost in excess of 60 percent. Profit margin for oil companies is approx. 9 percent vs. 10 to 25 percent for other major industries.

Drilling in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge estimates by U.S. Geological Survey point that drilling there would produce up to 16 billion barrels of crude.

In 1995, congress approved drilling on 1.5 million acres, but President Clinton vetoed the measure (actually, only 2,000 acres would be involved in drilling).

U.S. Mineral Management estimates that there are 86 billion barrels of oil and 420 trillion cubic feet of natural gas that can be found on the United States outer-continental shelf.

We need to drill now - current surveys indicate a 57 percent approval for drilling - both ANWR and off-shore - immediately.

The Department of Interior estimates on the oil shale (Green river formation - Colorado, Utah, Wyoming) have 1.5 to 1.8 trillion barrels of recoverable oil. Shell Oil scientists conducted small scale field tests and reflected on a large scale possibilities production at $30 a barrel.

The BLM released a draft Environmental Impact Statement for commercial leasing program December 2007.

The congressional Democrats tried unsuccessfully to delay the study and the leasing program, which were mandated in the 2005 Energy Policy Act, passed when Republicans controlled the congress (source: Durango Herald - Jan. 6, 2008).

Are the liberals in congress anxious to see this oil for American consumers?

They have indicated that increased domestic production would not affect prices for a decade and then a very minimal few cents per gallon. They also said the same thing in 1995 when President Clinton vetoed ANWR.

Mark Tarvainen

Gardnerville

Editor:

Tookula Choir " Minden, Germany to Minden. The Town of Minden would like to thank the families that hosted the 63 member Tookula Choir from Minden, Germany in late June. The families that made the weekend special for all the participants at the barbecue and the concert were David and Terry Adams, Pat and Ana Andrews, Betty Bailey, John and Beth Cressaty, Anje de Knijf and Jason Kolenut, David and Barbara Goetsch, Chris and Mary Gourlay, Jerry and Darlene Gregory, Pat Hopkins, George and Judy Keele, Christine Leising, Rob and Cindy Maxwell, Skip and Veronica Pardee, Bruce and Nancy Park, Steve and Peggy Ristorcelli, Jo and Woodie Ross, Tamy Sabo, P.J. Sapp, Rick and Brenda Stein, John and Mary Ann Warren, Jeanne and John Whited, Lorraine Willert, Gary and Judy Williams, Gary and Gail Woodcock, and Mike and Sally Wiley. Thanks also go to Steve Ream and Alex Whited for their help and entertainment.

Everyone was treated to a delicious picnic prepared by Kinder Deli and barbecue on Saturday evening and an absolutely fabulous concert on Sunday night by the Tookula Choir.

The town board would also like to thank Judy Williams for coordinating the host family stays, Chuck Wayne of Wayne's Music for loaning instruments for the choir and The Record-Courier for their support.

The Minden Town staff included Kirt Benson, Trish Koepnick, Carol Aldax and Sheila Byington.

Minden Town Board

Minden