County road crew eager, responsive
I live out at Diamond Bell Ranch which for years had a major drainage problem after it rains. The road in front of both of my driveways would get flooded out, leaving a mini-Grand Canyon impassable ditch in front of them. This resulted in me loading about 30 wheelbarrows of dirt in order to fill the ditch or having my kind neighbor fill the ditch using his tractor. Then this week the Pima County road department came out and graded the road.
Crew chief Orozco went out of his way to keep me informed of what they were doing and said I should have almost no runoff in front of my house from now on. I found the crew chief to be knowledgeable and very enthusiastic about his mission. Having been in HR management for over 35 years, I can tell a good employee when I see how they perform their duties. Crew chief Orozco is a good employee.
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Andrew Gullo
Three Points
Treatments options
aren’t being discussed
One of the biggest disappointments in the media reporting and medical response to the COVID-19 virus is the lack of information about treatment options. We are daily inundated with data about the number of cases when we should be asking about the data surrounding the number of deaths. What have we learned since March? What treatment protocols do they follow in South Korea, one of the so-called success stories? What is Dr. Anthony Fauci doing every day to investigate how other countries deal with serious patients? Are there medications that minimize the symptoms and allow the patient to recover? Is a ventilator the only option when breathing difficulty arises? Are there any older vaccines that might slow the progress or minimize the effects of the virus? The focus should be on treatment and recovery statistics, not the overwhelming emphasis on cases. But that sense of success and living through this pandemic doesn’t sell like the fear of more new cases.
Al Oakland
Foothills
Harris is Biden’s
best VP option
If Joe Biden doesn’t choose Kamala Harris (a relatively young, extremely capable former prosecutor and a woman of color) as his running mate in November, he’ll be missing the opportunity of a lifetime. And we citizens will be missing the opportunity to restore reasonable, forward-thinking, Constitution-based leadership to our country.
In a nutshell: Let’s opt for hope over havoc.
Janice McGinnis
East side
Painful process made
bearable at St. Mary’s
In an era where there are so many stories to tell, today I make the decision to foremost focus on giving my infinite thanks to several people who not only did their duty as medical health professionals but brought human warmth to their workplace, thereby making the impossible possible.
My dad entered St. Mary’s Hospital on July 5. he was diagnosed with COVID-19. All the staff workers who were in charge of my dad directly and indirectly did everything possible to help us keep in touch with him by various technological methods available. All these nurses went above and beyond their duties and gave my dad and us the chance to tell him how much we loved him, and we were able to say goodbye. This is love of humanity. I want you to know that you made this process bearable.
Thanks to the team of Drs. Lykins, Berner and Ortiz, and nurses Alicia Encinas, Jenn Serrano, Jessica and Sam. And all nurses not named. Thanks to everyone!
Sara Ratliff
Vail
Enlightening resources available at the library
Dismantling systemic racism starts with taking a stand. The Black Lives Matter page on the library’s website is not a political stance, but a humanitarian statement encouraging an ongoing shift toward humaneness and kindness, and a desire that all people get to flourish.
Alongside the American Library Association and the Urban Libraries Council, the library will continue to offer resources that enlighten the public of the evils of racism, promote tolerance, advance inclusiveness and diversity of ideas, and serve as a platform for freedom of expression.
The library has always been, and will always remain, a place where anyone — regardless of race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or religion — can come to study history and learn from accomplishments and mistakes. We currently have in circulation books by Burgess Owens, Shelby Steele and Thomas Sowell.
The Black Lives Matter Community Read featured titles selected by the vendor, OverDrive. It’s an opportunity to join a conversation. We invite you to read and participate.
Holly Schaffer, Pima County Public Library community relations
Downtown
If schools don’t fully
reopen, refund is in order
If the public schools, for instance TUSD, do not fully reopen and operate classes online/remotely, then taxpayers should demand a partial refund of property taxes. Remote and on-line instruction and lack of social interaction is not an equivalent education. The taxpayers are being cheated.
William Long
Foothills
Too bad there’s no
Bill of Responsibilities
When the founders of our nation were drafting the Bill of Rights, it probably didn’t occur to them that there was a need for a Bill of Responsibilities. That would seem too obvious to any adult of their day. Now, not so much. There is a small but loud anti-mask group that seems to insist on rights without acknowledging responsibility. This is an attitude you wouldn’t expect to see beyond adolescence.
One of the best analogies to our duty to wear a mask is the air-raid drills of WWII. The people endangering their fellow citizens by refusing to turn out their lights were roundly ostracized by their fellow citizens and fined by the government.
The difference between then and now was a strong leadership that actually led and whose priority was the safety of the Americans vs. the safety of their jobs. They forcefully made it a point that blackout was everyone’s patriotic duty, just as wearing a mask is today.
Guy Rovella
East side
Tucson Mountains area threatened by rezoning
As winter residents of Pima County and the Tucson Mountains area, I want to express my deep concern about the proposed rezoning for the Tucson Mountains area that, if passed, will permanently alter this irreplaceable gem. The Tucson Mountains are a treasure of endless beauty, wildlife, vegetation, trails and unspoiled wilderness that are unique to our area of Tucson.
We chose to live in this part of Tucson precisely for this reason, and we have friends who did the same. It feels like a crime that it could be taken away from us for commercial and housing development that will inevitably change the landscape and natural habitat permanently.
Counties can always appropriate land for development, but they can never give it back. I hope Pima County will reconsider this rezoning proposal and allow the Tucson Mountains area to exist as it always has, in peace and beauty.
Marta Fahrenz
Southwest side
Anti-mask mentality
beyond maddening
Re: the July 20 article “Mask rules don’t sit well with many in Arizona.”
As a former ED/ICU nurse of 20+ years, I know of nurses and front-line workers who are dying of COVID-19. I’m angry about the mentality of some Arizonans to “mind your own business,” “let us do our own thing,” and “get out of our way.” Arizona ICU’s are overflowing with COVID-19 patients, so perhaps you should arrange now to be cared for by medical personnel who share your mindset (pssst, they won’t be easy to find). After all, why should professionals risk their lives and critical PPE on individuals who are hell-bent on highlighting the “oppressive nature of masks”? Please remember that when someone you love is admitted with life-threatening COVID-19 symptoms and you won’t be allowed to be near them.
Stephanie Frederick, RN, M.Ed.
North side
Response from Diebolt
about old reprimands
The Star’s running of an article about reprimands I received 11 years ago in the County Attorney’s Office requires my response. I have tried 315-plus felony jury trials, including murders, robberies and repeat offenders. In the midst of all those trials, I did make some unintentional errors.
One of the biggest concerns is the email issue. I have never viewed pornography in my professional or personal life. I did receive emails with inappropriate jokes. I did not download or save the contents. I was the recipient of the emails. I did fail to block or report them to administration as required by policy.
I decided to run a straightforward campaign on the issues and not use personal attacks. I will continue to do so. I am a qualified candidate for county attorney because I know what it takes to do the job, as a professional, using only facts and without an ego. I will move forward, without a personal agenda, to address Pima County’s crime and injustices.
Mark Diebolt
Foothills
Vote because your life depends on it
I am 21 years old and I live with a number of chronic health conditions (T1 diabetes, hypothyroidism, PCOS). I am all too familiar with the shortfalls of our health-care system, having cried tears of frustration while expressing my excruciating pain to doctors who rarely offered me anything, besides gas-lit condescension. At 14, I told my pediatrician I couldn’t climb a flight of stairs without collapsing. She looked at my mom and recommended a drug test.
Even with the private insurance that I’m lucky to have, I have perpetually had to fight for the type of insulin I need – fighting for coverage of hormonal treatments and nausea medicine is even more onerous. After all the fighting, it’s offensive to see politicians crusading to make illnesses more difficult to deal with and treatments more expensive for people like me. Every day, my pain is exacerbated by representatives who have traded our livelihoods to pharmaceutical donors in return for money in their pockets. Vote — our lives depend on it.
Nikki Campbell
Downtown
Feds recoil from virus
but not from protests
As retired ASU faculty who taught public policy, I see serious issues today around the proper roles of federal and state governments in response to current crisis situations. The pandemic affected the entire country. State and local officials expected federal authorities to provide key resources in an equitable, coordinated way to address public health needs—PPE, COVID-19 tests, respirators. Instead, the Trump administration declared the states to be in charge of the response to the pandemic, leading to competition for crucial supplies. No national plan has ever emerged. Insistent demands to open schools are unaccompanied by resources. However, in the isolated case of continuing civil unrest in Portland, Trump has sent federal law enforcement units without consent from the city or state, at great expense, interfering in local law enforcement activities, with unidentifiable personnel intervening harshly beyond the boundaries of the buildings they might rightly protect. What kind of country have we become?
Ann Nichols
Foothills
