Great news on Enloe
Dear Editor:
Enloe Dam has been out of the news since the “No on Enloe” campaign put its collective foot down last February. It was clearly demonstrated, using PUD estimates, that Enloe dam electrification would lose $1.2 million to $1.7 million annually. The $40 million- to $50 million construction price tag will require continuous rate increases that no one can afford, and creates a downward spiral of debt that could bankrupt more than just the PUD.
The ratepayers of Okanogan County have voted twice on this issue, turning out two incumbent PUD commissioners who campaigned for electrification. Recognizing the net economic losses that would result from electrification of Enloe Dam, our current commissioners told ratepayers they needed a “large federal agency with deep pockets” to assume all liability for Enloe Dam before they could walk away.
On June 30, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and National Marine Fisheries Service met with PUD Commissioner Vejraska, General Manager John Grubich and other staff, to discuss their interest in becoming the lead agency for the removal of Enloe Dam. This is great news. We may have the lead agency we have been waiting for. Interested ratepayers and local residents should contact their commissioners and let them know what you think about this proposal. We need to help the PUD make the right decisions going forward.
Joseph Enzensperger, Oroville
Who do you serve?
Dear Editor:
I confess that I am the nefarious character referred to in the letter to the editor two weeks ago from the angry man in Minnesota. He and his friend saw that I had something posted on my trip to Vietnam with Vietnam vets last April, and for some reason it made him angry (he did not actually read the essay). His friend said that he himself was a Vietnam vet and was proud of his service in the war. I replied that while in Vietnam I had seen dozens of children with the worst imaginable mental and physical disabilities from the spraying of 20 million gallons of herbicide on the forests of that country 50 years ago (3 million children have been born with severe birth defects), and I didn’t see any reason to be proud of participating in that war.
The whole truth about the war in Vietnam is now out, thanks to a book published in 2014 titled Kill Everything That Moves. It is a compilation of U.S. government documents, interviews with Vietnam veterans, and Vietnamese survivors of the war. The U.S. military had a body count competition, and troops with the highest body count got perks like more beer and weekends on the beach in Da Nang. In order to win the competition, U.S. soldiers killed as many people as possible on a daily basis. Sometimes they counted dead water buffalo and pigs as Viet Cong, but usually they just counted the bodies of dead men, women, children and babies. Sound shocking? Read the book. It will change your view of the world forever.
Why bring this up now? Because war is a farce, and it continues unabated today. I’ve been to Iraq four times recently, and I can tell you that country has been destroyed by the United States. Libya and Syria are destroyed, thanks to the U.S. military/industrial complex. Soldiers don’t “serve their country,” they serve their masters, the ultra-rich who make billions from war, over the maimed bodies and minds of the soldiers and the murder of uncountable numbers of innocents.
Dana Visalli, Twisp
The noise capital?
Dear Editor:
It looks like the Methow could have a new, distinctive brand: Noise Capital of the West. We already have the low-flying jets from the Whidbey Island Naval Air Station. The county commissioners are doing their best to ram ATVs down every road, and the ATV clubs are pushing Twisp and Winthrop to do the same. Imagine the noise when 50-100 ATV clubbers parade in front of your house or through “downtown” Winthrop.
Not to be left out, the U.S. Forest Service has already ignored its own travel planning regulations to rush to open up its roads to ATVs, bringing more noise to the national forests.
Now to top it off (pun intended), the Army wants helicopters crisscrossing the county 24/7, 365 days per year (“except federal holidays”). The Army admits it has other potential training areas, but this is the only one it wants to consider in its environmental assessment.
Here’s the good news. This could be a bonanza for the real estate brokers in the valley. The worse the noise gets, the more residents will want to sell. Prices may be depressed, and buyers may be bargain-hunting, hard of hearing people, but every turnover is a profit to the brokers. Hmmm. Maybe they could ask the military and county commissioners for a few “quiet weekends” so they could put on sales events for unsuspecting, out of area buyers.
Seriously, we should all be thinking about the future of our lovely, peaceful Methow Valley. No one outside the valley is.
Randy Brook, Twisp
