Water authority’s pricing not productive
To the editor:
Making businesses, churches, etc., pay for a large portion of the water authority’s capital projects just because they have larger meters is a big mistake (“Water bill sinks saloon,” Monday Review-Journal). This approach will cause some of them to go out of business while doing little to encourage conservation.
The cost should be allocated totally on consumption.
Why the Southern Nevada Water Authority took on the $800 million intake project baffles me, anyway. Southern Nevada will presumably get its 5 percent allocation of the additional water provided by the lower intake only when lake levels drop, but the 95 percent who grow cotton and alfalfa in the desert are paying nothing.
If we started purchasing some of the growers’ water, we wouldn’t need billions of dollars worth of pipelines, desalinization plants, etc., to support more consumption. Supply and demand would solve the shortage for a whole lot less money.
Tom Keller
Henderson
Worth the price
To the editor:
Esther Cepeda’s Sunday commentary, “Avoiding the union label,” was very one-sided. Here’s another side:
It’s dangerous for working people to vote for policies designed to kill unions just because they don’t want to pay union dues that might help elect candidates who share union objectives. We know that salaries and benefits are first to be cut to maximize corporate profits and shareholder dividends. Without unions to fight for collective bargaining to give workers a say, we know what will happen.
Without unions, when workers complain about wage and benefit cuts, they’ll be on their own.
Without the labor movement, we never would have had minimum wage laws, child labor laws, overtime pay, workers’ comp, health or pension benefits, the weekend, unemployment insurance, etc.
And without unions, these workers’ rights will disappear.
Isn’t it worth the price of union dues to keep them and protect workers?
Linda Turner
Henderson
Emotional bankruptcy
To the editor:
In his excellent letter to the editor on zombie imagery and his thoughts on the “collective malaise” of our society, Cody Neyocks has hit the proverbial nail on the head.
Years ago, the late social critic Vance Packard referred to us as a nation of strangers. That defines us today more than ever. We have met emotional bankruptcy, and it is us.
I suspect a major factor that perpetuates our lost selves is the increased mobility that is prevalent in our cities across America. Here in our valley one can observe for-sale signs and moving trucks on a daily basis. Garage doors are opened and closed without a wave to a neighbor. We have descended into our own microcosms and fail to achieve the happiness that we crave.
The divorce rate for those over the age of 50 has skyrocketed, and the fabric of close family ties is disappearing before our eyes.
The downward spiral of our economy in recent years necessitates working long hours, leaving little time or energy to connect with others.
It is said that one indulges only in the level of intimacy which he or she tolerates. Can’t we start shedding our cloaks of anonymity and chance the risk of connection to benefit all of us?
A word of support or an act of kindness given to someone may mean more than we could imagine.
Joan Harper
Las Vegas
