Saratoga News

Letters

Questions to think about

Having watched the Saratoga City Council and the Planning Commission during the past 11 years, I have questions:

What is a typical Saratoga-style neighborhood? Is it Brookview, Argonaut or Quito? Or maybe Mt. Eden Estates, Tollgate or Parker Ranch? Why must one man go through the election process to get a lot line adjustment when lot line adjustments are a matter of course to other developers?

What makes a "compatible development"? Is it Pinn Brothers at Nelson Gardens, or is it Old Oak Way and Quarry Road? Is it buses, trucks and bicycles on Pierce Road and through the Villa Montalvo neighborhood?

What properties will be developed and which protected? How are the Saratoga, Quarry and Calabazas creeks environmentally protected? What is the plan for displaced wildlife, or are they simply inconveniences to those who live here? Who is responsible when hillsides slide, roads fail and creeks flood, and how will they be secured?

When poorly planned development compromises neighborhoods, are they then earmarked for further ruin? If an old homeowner lives adjacent to a new development, must he accept insensitive "spec" building that diminishes his life quality? If Highway 85 was on the map, why were houses built right up next to it?

Does city planning include consideration of school enrollment and traffic management? What public services are being improved as the city collects revenue from new development? Are there plans for increased fire prevention, emergency escape corridors, earthquake safety and crime prevention and enforcement to meet the needs of the expanding population?

Do those making decisions know Saratoga's history, and do they recognize the spirit of Measure G when they subdivide agricultural parcels and open space into housing tracts? Like those who served before them, will our City Council and Planning Commission be gone when time demands accountability? Will those who follow them be saying, "It is not our fault; we were not there then," to excuse liability for the consequences of capricious development of the 1990s?

Luanne Nieman
Padero Court

City Council is out of touch

I just came home from attending a City Council meeting. The few times that I have attended, I have never come home as upset with the City Council as I am tonight. I went to show my displeasure regarding the increase of user fees for Congress Springs Park to the AYSO soccer league.

I had asked the gentleman who is in charge of city parks a question about how many sports fields Saratoga has. He couldn't give me an answer; I answered it for him. He is supposed to be in charge of the parks?

I also asked what was going to happen to Congress Springs Park if the sports leagues could not pay the increase in user fees (from $1,500 to $14,400 per year), as well as the families who couldn't afford the increase in fees, which would be $12 per child for next year along with increases every year. Councilmember Paul Jacobs answered, "Who in Saratoga couldn't afford the increase?"

When I answered that there are families who might not be able to handle the increase due to financial problems or because they have several children in the league, Jacobs answered, "Who can't afford the price of a pizza?" I don't know when the last time is that Mr. Jacobs bought a pizza, but it costs more than $12 these days to feed a family with pizza for dinner.

Just how out of touch with reality is he? I just couldn't believe how insensitive Mr. Jacobs was regarding any of the items that were brought up in the meeting April 21. I sure hope that he doesn't run for re-election because I know for sure that there were a lot of people present who will not vote for him.

Catherine Mayer
Saratoga

Any filter is better than no filter at all

So "pornography doesn't just pop up"? I used a search engine to research "FBI anti-porn," and many of the titles did "pop up" with graphics. One graphic showed two nude women in full color illustrating a lurid title. This graphic included movements I can't describe and an invitation to "click" on anatomy I won't mention to see what can't be said in a family newspaper. Time to have this offensive graphic pop up: 45 seconds, well within the library's patron-use limit.

While no filter blocks all pornography, the best child protection is safer than nothing. Doing what we can sends kids the "safer" message that extreme sex and violence is wrong--not fun, not freedom and not what the public funds libraries to give to children. Why should libraries give kids pornography they'll be suspended for taking to school in violation of the school's sexual harassment policy? Kids are punished for streaking nude across the Saratoga High School quad, but have a right to violent Net sex at the library? Confusing, isn't it? All public institutions should honor, sustain and obey the law, including California Penal Code 313.1, making it a crime to give children and minors obscene materials.

Those who don't like this law are free to run a "Porn for Kids" campaign to either elect a legislature that would require libraries to give pornography to children or pass a ballot initiative making kiddie-porn legal. Until then, public officials should protect children from sexual harassment and abuse, including at libraries. I applaud the Library Commission's recent decision to install child-protective Internet filters at all child library terminals.

Teri Jones
Riesling Court

Drivers need to just slow down

On Tuesday morning, while loading the kids in the car for school, my husband, three children and neighbors witnessed a speeding car kill a six-month-old puppy that was in our care. The car must have been going 40 mph down Beaumont Avenue when it hit the dog.

The atrocity of seeing something so innocent killed so brutally will never be forgotten by any of us who were there. The driver, probably in shock, kept going. How did she know that she didn't hit a person? Was the extra time she made by speeding worth killing a family pet?

If there is a lesson to be learned, it is that we can all afford to slow down. Our residential neighborhood needs to be protected. If every aspect of our lives seems to be so busy and fast-paced, let's make our cars the one place where we slow down, take a breath and remember our humanity.

Jill Rollinson
Beaumont Avenue

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