Cover Story
Clearing the air
It’s been a long, wearing eight years for San Luis Obispo County Sheriff Pat Hedges and his department. Three in-custody deaths; a lawsuit over excessive use of force; and sharp, sometimes inaccurate media criticism have impacted the department’s image in the mind of the public. And although the department has not been incriminated in any wrongdoing,…
Community in disunity
There is something of a brouhaha boiling up over the fact that a couple of prestigious Eastern universities have risked their government funding by refusing to allow military recruiters on campus to solicit student enrollment in the services. The fact that funding for education is held hostage to the military in any way is itself…
Playing the victim is not a good argument
Robert, in response to your commentary (“This inauguration is a shamâ€? Jan. 20-27), I do give you credit for wanting to “learn to listen better and communicate more — to understand and be more understood.â€? However, for future reference do not infer that people who disagree with your political views, i.e. Bush voters, “are not…
Not this again
One more time we get a “gay-phobicâ€? diatribe by Mr. Otis Page (“Christians won’t advocate homosexuality,â€? Letters, Jan. 20-27). Mr. Page seems to be more obsessed with homosexuality than I am, and I’m gay. Mr. Page, you say that you do not hate gay people … just what they do. If this is true, why…
SLO spent $20,000 on controversial Mardi Gras ads
$5,000 went to television. $7,000 for radio. $3,000 for newspapers. $2,000 to build the web site. $3,000 to print and distribute the hundreds of posters and thousands of door hangers. “It’s simple: Mardi Gras weekend in SLO will be different this year,â€? the ads read. “Out-of-town visitors will not be tolerated. Gatherings … near campus…
We’re just trying to give kids something to do
Thank you, Ms. Owen, we are very proud of the new master plan for the Los Osos Community Park (“Nice job, ladies,â€? Letters, Jan. 20-27). Because of budget constraints and huge increases in construction costs (steel and concrete), Phase I only includes one new tennis court, the skate park, new landscaping, and several other features…
Thanks for a great visit, Paso
As a first-time visitor to Paso Robles from my home in Vancouver, British Columbia, I want to tell everyone that I was very impressed with your friendly city. Every time I went out I came back saying something nice about the people and the town. My friend suggested that I write to the paper and…
Dump in the dunes?
It’s the state of California’s job to oversee the dunes that stretch south from Oceano to San Luis Obispo’s border with Santa Barbara County. Every day, state officials collect fees, police a myriad of offroaders visiting from around the state, and try to protect the area’s remaining enclaves of sensitive flowers and plants. Those same…
Jarek Molski is a crook
Let’s face the fact that Jarek Molski is a crook and his attorney is a crook (“Can Jarek ‘The Sheriff’ Molski be stopped?â€? Jan. 20-27). Peachy Caynon Winery fixed all the problems they were sued over, yet they are being sued again because crooked Molski and his crooked attorney want money. They said it in…
Wrong again, Otis
Page is wrong that Kinz is wrong. Intolerant Christians do not hate what homosexuals do and advocate; they fear that part of themselves that would allow themselves to be full, loving beings. For whatever personal (not religious) reasons they have, they are afraid of opening themselves up to true love and what it would mean…
Doctor’s advice is just common sense
First, two things: 1) Dr. Stephen Mulder’s piece (“The seduction of American medicine,â€? Jan. 20-27) should have been positioned in the Health and Fitness section, not as a “separateâ€? commentary. 2) This is all the kind of advice you could get from Dr. Weil, at $50 a pop, lecturing soon at Sycamore Hot Springs. I’m…
What the county’s talking about this week
Ruffling feathers Days after Mandy Davis appeared in two newspaper articles advocating restrictions on hunting in the Morro Bay Estuary, she lost her job at the State Park Marina. The timing is strange, she said and there’s no way to prove the two are related but that hasn’t stopped her and others in Morro Bay…
I know what you did last sewer
James Bond had it all: He was suave, he drank on the job, he made it with lots of ladies with dirty names, he got to drive a cool car, and he could shoot people without having to go to jail for it. It’s how I’ve always wanted to live my life, and now Los…
Molski has a point
There are in excess of 400,000 laws that we can be prosecuted for; many of us have at some time been cited for a violation that, while valid, was completely irrational! This typically happens when we are driving. Why is a red sports car pulled out of the center of a group of cars going…
Mardi Gras ad gives ads a bad name
As an advertising professional, I am aghast by the recent Mardi Gras ad (Jan. 20-27, page 11). What were the marketing folks thinking? Did the advertising strategy (if there was one) say, “Let’s provoke those anti-establishment types who already have complete disregard for authority with a message that challenges them?â€? Or did it say, “Let’s…
It’s a jungle in there
The Hayes family has been living in a zoo for as long as they can remember, and now, with the help of an inheritance from Grandpa, they’re finally able to turn their animal park into an enterprising pet store. Being the animal enthusiasts that they are, it wasn’t long after they’d moved from Hermosa Beach…
Plea bargain means light sentence for SLO woman who killed her husband in 2004
A San Luis Obispo woman who shot and killed her husband in February 2004 has pleaded no contest to voluntary manslaughter. Blythe Coulter-Montanaro made national news when her late husband’s mother put up a $2-million bail for her daughter-in-law after the shooting. In March, Coulter-Montanaro pleaded not guilty to a murder charge. Since then, she’s…
