Our hospitals need experienced nurses
I applaud Katherine Petersen for her coverage of the nurses at El Camino Hospital (The Sun, July 17). I am a registered nurse at another Bay Area community hospital, and I strongly support the actions of the Professional Resources for Nurses union and the informational picketing campaign. It is difficult not to react emotionally on this issue. I would like to state my views in as factual a manner as possible.
Patients come to the hospital for expert medical and surgical care. Patients also expect competent nursing care. That care involves more than the mere performance of fragmented tasks. It means close observation for small signs that could signal a deterioration in a patient's condition. It involves calling a sleeping physician and being competent and persuasive enough to get an appropriate order for treatment.
Changes in care-delivery systems have replaced professional, experienced nurses with "assistive" personnel at the bedside. Shortsighted changes designed to save money are not always examined for the impact they may have on patient health and safety. Discharging new mothers early following delivery is one such example of cost-cutting changes.
It is a fact that most experienced nurses in this part of the country earn gross annual salaries in excess of $50,000 annually. It is also a fact, although it is rarely published, that executives in the health care industry command far higher salaries. Annual salaries and stock options totaling over
$1 million are not uncommon.
It is also a fact that health care has been one of the highest for-profit industries for the last few years. Profits have risen steadily while the number of uninsured and underinsured Americans remains extremely high. Businesses have a right to turn a profit. However, ethical standards must always be maintained, especially for those businesses concerned with health care.
I hope there will soon be an end to the problems at Camino Healthcare in regard to the nurses who provide care for patients there.
Colleen O'Leary-Kelly
Sunnyvale
Sunnyvale residents deserve 'peace' dividend
R. Vitale asks opponents of commercial freight at Moffett to consider the alternatives (The Sun, Aug. 7, 1996). That is precisely what we are asking of city and local government. Let us remember the U.S. Navy decided to shut down the Naval Air Station. NASA itself is moving all of its own research aircraft out of Moffett. So what is NASA doing running a federal airfield? It should stick to planning how to confirm microfossil life on Mars.
The local citizenry, having done our share in supporting decades of Navy operations in support of our country's defense, are entitled also to a peace dividend in compensation for the loss of the Navy. Neither NASA nor Lockheed Martin requires it (or they would pay for it), and I've never heard anyone in the valley say they're not getting their overnight FedEx on time.
We do not deserve to be subjected to nighttime cargo flights for FedEx, no matter how many times per year. It would establish a precedent for commercial operations that would lead to the destruction of the quality of life in Sunnyvale.
Possible alternatives abound, and the region's needs for space to accommodate them are acute. Neither Hamilton A.F.B. nor Alameda N.A.S. were considered as "airports forever." Fort Ord has a new state university, housing and industrial and open space park land to show for its "defense reconversion." Surely, the inventive minds of our region can come up with myriad uses for this valuable local land resource that will aid the local economy many times more than Moffett Federal Airfield would ever do with its "few hundred jobs."
I think Vitale's vision of Moffett as FedEx's "new hub for West Coast operations" would be a horror to 95 percent of the citizens of Sunnyvale. Even the "scare alternative" he holds out of civil aviation looks a lot more attractive to the citizenry than 24-hour commercial jets. After all, for all the hoopla about Reid-Hillview, there has never been a citizen injury in the surrounding communities. Sunnyvale has, fortunately, not built housing right up to the end of the runway as was done at Reid-Hillview. If you want to see hoopla from an incensed citizenry, just wait until the cargo planes start coming over Sunnyvale at 4 a.m. How many times per week do you think it is O.K. to be awakened at that hour?
Jeffrey M. Weiss
weiss@unix.sri.com
Council ignored us on Moffett vote
Once again the [majority of the] Sunnyvale City Council listened to, but did not hear, the citizens of Sunnyvale. We refer to the July 30 Sunnyvale City Council meeting, when the issue was: "Consideration of an Advisory Ballot Measure on Federally Sponsored Air Cargo Operations at Moffett Field."
Decisions at public hearings like a council meeting are to be made on information and/or testimony presented at that hearing. By our unofficial count, the citizen testimony was on the order of 2-1 in favor of putting the measure on the ballot in the next election. The cost for doing this would be approximately $5,000, an inexpensive way to get the feelings of the total voting population of Sunnyvale.
The majority of the council--Mayor Robin Parker and Councilmembers Pat Vorreiter, Jack Walker and Manuel Valerio--voted in opposition to the stated wished of the citizens. We are being denied our right to vote on what we consider to be a most important issue regarding Moffett Field. They say that the issue is premature. Well, we have been discussing and arguing this for a year now. They say that "all the facts are not yet known."
NASA has tossed in a delaying ploy, suggesting a Community Advisory Committee to " ...review all possibilities within our Comprehensive Use Plan for Moffett." Well now, isn't that a nice limited objective for this committee? They think a committee could be put together now (or after someone defines the scope in full and gets a report out by January 1997). So what do we do then? Have another long series of community meetings to argue the same point? Have a special "election" with the same issue or the ballot? This time the election costs could run as high as $150,000 because there would be no known agencies out there doing anything that would result in a sharing of costs.
The basic idea of a Community Advisory Committee is a good one, but the scope/objective of such a committee has to include a much broader consideration of alternatives than those offered by NASA's Comprehensive Use Plan. Our feeling is that NASA cannot be fully trusted on this one, and thus their membership should be a minor position that will provide information only. We have yet to see NASA Administrator Dan Goldin's signature on any statement that NASA would not take any unilateral action regarding Moffett.
We are dealing with a large government bureaucracy with a fiscal year '97 budget of a little more than $13 billion that cannot find $3.5 million to operate Moffett Federal Airfield. Astounding! They waste that much in a week. They have probably wasted that much trying to sell air cargo to the Mountain View and Sunnyvale communities over the past year. NASA's Dr. Ken Munechika's sole mission in life right now is to get rid of or get the field on a "paying basis."
By the way, Mountain View had this same item on its council agenda for that same Tuesday. Guess what? They voted to put the measure on their ballot so the citizens can make their voices heard. Good for you, Mountain View.
The majority members of our Sunnyvale City Council were implored by the citizens to reconsider their vote, based on the Mountain View action, at the council meeting on Aug. 6. Once again, this same solid majority listened to the citizens and did not hear them. Or is that vice versa? It is too bad that we have to wait three years to oust those who do not listen to hear us.
We wonder now if this "Gang of Four" will allow the City Council to affirm that no unilateral action will be taken by them regarding the advisory committee's recommendation without a citizens' advisory vote.
Charles E. Priddy
Bonnie C. Priddy
Sunnyvale
This article appeared in the Sunnyvale Sun, August 14, 1996.
©1996 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.