My safety net.
And we should not forget the killing of two fine NY City Police Officers and the shooting of a dedicated NY State Trooper in the last couple weeks. Please don't tell me as Mayor Bloomberg did on TV last night that, "guns kill people". If that is so then let us send our guns and ammo with instructions to Iraq and keep our young military folks at home. Do cars kill people? Do kitchen knives kill people? Do people kill people?
Glenn T. Anderson
Olivebridge, NY

Dear Editor,
Thoughts on the 24 November 2005 “ON THE TRAIL “ article.
When a comrade or loved one falls it is a compelling reaction for those left standing to try and help the fallen one. The urge to do so is stronger than the instinct to save one’s own life.
Your hunting party killed two deer walking together .The second one because it failed to move fast enough after the first was shot.
We can only guess at the bond that had been forged between the two. We can only speculate on the number of sunrises and sunsets they had seen, how many miles they had walked together, how many close calls they had seen each other through. However formed, the strength and depth of this bond is evidenced by the unwillingness of one to leave the other behind. It was a hesitation that proved to be fatal.
In your article you make it sound like a mistake, and I guess it was. And in the world where these deer lived mistakes are unforgiving. Still, I think we can agree that it was a noble and honorable thing to do… far more noble and honorable than taking aim and pulling the trigger.
Greg Perantoni
Saugerties, NY

Dear Editor,
Once again, when the chips are down, Dean Gitter resorts to what he does best: distorting facts and sowing fear to get what he wants. Mr. Gitter’s letter in the Phoenicia Times last week is just the most recent example of his willingness to spread false and misleading information in an attempt to divide a community. It is what people do when the case they are arguing is weak; Mr. Gitter no doubt hopes that skewing the facts will shift the focus away from the numerous adverse environmental impacts created by his ill-placed and oversized resort.
To restate yet again for the record, the Catskill Preservation Coalition (CPC), of which the Catskill Heritage Alliance (CHA) is a member, has steadfastly supported expansion of the Belleayre Mountain Ski Center. One reason we are opposed to Mr. Gitter’s proposed mega-resort is that it would draw water from the same source as the ski center and could thus limit an expanded center’s ability to serve its growing public.
And again for the record: neither the CHA nor the CPC opposes the development of tourism in the Central Catskills. In fact, the Coalition endorses the regional development proposal recently released by U.S. Congressman Maurice Hinchey. The Hinchey proposal, based on Mr. Gitter’s resort plan, envisages a scaled-down development package which would spur regional growth—including the expansion of the ski center—while protecting the very resources essential to the character of the Central Catskills and the drinking water supply of nine million people.
It is perhaps not coincidental that Mr. Gitter should again float these falsehoods at this time. He is currently appealing a ruling by an independent DEC Judge that found against his mega-resort proposal on 12 of 16 issues following a comprehensive pre-“trial” hearing. That is a significant legal obstacle, and Mr. Gitter will likely be left with the prospect of several more years of adjudication.
The writing is on the wall. If Mr. Gitter really cares about the Central Catskills and its communities—as he claims—it is time for him to reconsider the Hinchey alternative, scale down his proposal, and get on with development. The only one who should be ashamed is Mr. Gitter.
Susanna Margolis
Chairman, Catskill Heritage Alliance
Fleischmanns, NY

Dear Editor,
The election is over and the voters have spoken. For me this is now a time for reflection and analysis.
During the last year or so I have spent a great deal of time and energy, as a county legislator, focused on getting the new Ulster County Jail completed in the most expeditious manner. Unfortunately, I was so tuned in to this activity that I neglected to hear the real questions people were asking about the jail project.
What people want to know is how the jail project got so off track, so over budget and who was responsible for these circumstances. In other words, the old questions of who, what, when, where and why. These are questions that need to be answered for the benefit of the legislature, so that these mistakes are not made on any future projects and to answer all the questions that the people of Ulster County are rightly asking.
Therefore, I suggest the following course of action to the Ulster County Legislature.
Appoint a "Blue Ribbon Commission" to investigate all aspects of this project from its initial inception... planning, property acquisition, contract letting, construction phase, etc.... to the present time.
This commission should be fully insulated from any potential political pressure. It should not become a political circus - objective information is the goal.
The commission should be composed of two Democratic legislators and two Republican legislators to provide the necessary link to the legislature. In addition, there should be five non-legislative persons of appropriate knowledge, experience and political diversity to give the public the necessary confidence in the commission's work.
The commission should be adequately funded, given the power to subpoena material, to take sworn testimony and to engage independent, proper legal council when necessary.
This will not be an easy task; there will be no instant answers. It is an activity that needs to be done now while information and memories are still fresh.
Michael Stock
Majority Leader of the
Ulster County legislature
Woodstock, NY

Dear Editor,
Administrative Law judge Richard Wissler has been attacked for his ruling on the proposed Belleayre Resort at Catskill Park, but his decision to hear twelve issues was a responsible one. As Judge Wissler writes in his ruling, issues are to be tried if they are substantive, and "An issue is substantive if there is sufficient doubt about the Applicant's ability to meet statutory or regulatory criteria . . . such that a reasonable person would require further inquiry." Many reasonable people think that polluted runoff from two eighteen-hole golf courses, a brook going dry, area wells being pulled down, increased traffic on Route 28, light and noise pollution near wilderness areas and harm to streams that support spawning trout are substantive issues requiring further inquiry. The project as proposed is simply way out of scale for a Catskills mountaintop. Only Mr. Gitter's intransigence has kept it alive in its present form. His public outbursts, in which he makes all kind of wild statements, indicate how worried he's become.
And he should be worried. There are many compelling reasons for scaling back his proposal from two mega-resort complexes to one, as Congressman Hinchey has recommended. It's to be hoped that Mr. Gitter will accept a compromise, subject to environmental review, that will give him and his backers some of what they want while minimizing negative impacts on the Catskill Park and neighboring communities. Even if, on appeal, only some of the twelve issues end up being adjudicated, that will still be an extremely lengthy and costly process that serves no one's interests, especially his.
Norman Turner
Co-chair, Conservation Committee
Catskill Mountains Chapter of
Trout Unlimited
New Paltzm NY

Dear Editor,
People who live near Saugerties or near Ellenville may not realize that an Indian gambling casino in either will wound communities for fifty miles around. A casino's sphere of strong, malignant influence - increased gambling addiction and crime, decreased local non-casino business - will certainly include a wide circle of communities even if one alone has to pay for the traffic lights, connect the sewers, supply the water and watch Main Street wither. Moreover, not all 3,000-plus new employees coming from afar, many with school-age children, will enroll their children in the schools of the host town, which will be the main recipient of payoffs from the casino.
This letter is to neighbors in the Hudson Valley who are today as unaware about the consequences of casinos in Ulster and adjacent counties as I was three months ago. Learning what has happened in other communities of our state and neighboring states has horrified me. Predicted benefits to the host town are illusory. Commercial gambling casinos create or enable gambling addiction in individuals, while hooking government on donations contingent on government's kowtowing to them. Indian casinos pay no property or school taxes. They follow no state or local regulations except as they feel like it.
This letter does not detail what is so bad about a large commercial casino. For that, read the Padavan report "All Gambling, All the Time" which can be found at www.nocasinoeriecounty.org or look at a web site of one of the groups in New York State that treat the epidemic such as www.nosaugertiescasino.org or www.upstate-citizens.org or www.dontgambleourfuture.org or cagnyinf.org. www.ncalg.org is the web site of the National Coalition against Legalized Gambling.
The way casinos reach and aggrandize and hide behind laws you never knew about, if you think your town is safe because Saugerties or Ellenville are twenty, even fifty, miles away, you are wrong. If you think that Ellenville or Saugerties or Ulster are off the hook if the site-shoppers go elsewhere in 2006, you are wrong again. "Success" elsewhere will only bring them back one day, unless state and federal lawmakers and judges act in common sense to halt this epidemic. Senator George Voinovich (R-OH) has introduced S. 1518 to amend the Indian Gaming Rights Act so that IGRA cannot, as it now does, pre-empt a state's constitutional prohibition against commercial casino gambling. This bill needs sponsors in the U.S. Senate. You can write to ours, or you can go to http://capwiz.com/congressorg to email them.
Stephen Shafer MD, MPH
Saugerties, NY