Letters to the editor

Enthusiasm, activities plentiful at Senior Center

I’d like to thank Hali Bernstein Saylor, our new editor of the Boulder City Review, for mentioning in her editorial on Feb. 13 the Senior Center’s hosting “A Little Night Music.” If you did not attend, you missed out on a fabulous evening of entertainment!

In addition to the entertainers who Mrs. Saylor generously highlighted in her column, I want to let everyone know that Justin Keough was our Elvis impersonator and emcee. I’d also like to publicly thank some of those behind the scenes who played an invaluable role.

Carla Morgan provided the sound system, which made the music that much better. Board member Susan Johnson had the vision for this extraordinary evening and organized the entertainment and refreshments. A special thanks to Rose Ann Miele, president of the Senior Center board, for her unfailing and enthusiastic support for the Senior Center. Additionally, Tammy Copelan, executive director, has given the Senior Center a new energy.

Come by and join us for lunch and see “what’s happenin’ ” at the Senior Center Boulder City.

Peggy Leavitt

City land not protected

Concerning the closure of dry lake for July Fourth (Las Vegas Review-Journal, Feb. 17), City Manager David Fraser is quoted as saying, “We had to do something about it. I don’t think people realize that this is city land we’re talking about. It’s not some federal park or state park, and yet people act like it is.”

The article describes the problems the city faces each year concerning safety issues and the cleanup necessary afterward, which is paid for by the citizens of Boulder City. Many of us have watched the effects of unregulated recreation on desert lands owned and “protected” by Boulder City for years.

To say that people are using the dry lake bed as if it were a federal or state park is ridiculous. Recreational activities on federal and state lands are regulated, for safety reasons and to protect them for all of us to enjoy.

July Fourth at the dry lake is just one day in the life of a year-round problem. Dust? Check the Internet for all the information available from the National Park Service and the Bureau of Land Management about not breaking the soil crust.

The soils around Boulder City are a mess. It’s hard to walk in the desert without finding bullet casings, tire tracks and illegal dump sites.

People flock here every weekend to participate in activities that aren’t permitted or are limited on nearby federal and state lands. People aren’t “acting as though they are at a national or state park” when they recreate on Boulder City lands, Mr. Fraser, they are impacting those lands because the city allows it.

Barbara Raulston

Residents should support ban on marijuana dispensaries

In Boulder City, America yet lives! Because, on Feb. 25 the city council will vote whether to ban medical marijuana dispensaries, grow houses, state labs and other facilities associated with marijuana. I strongly encourage them to vote no.

And I urge Boulder City anti-marijuana residents to come out that day in full force to speak up in support of the ban. Let your voices be heard. In doing so you become the leader in Clark County as the first city to ban marijuana.

Fact: America is in a moral decline. And our children are being seduced into lives of crimes that will ruin them forever. Further, this licentious mentality is causing America to spiral downward into a morass of moral chaos.

Rightly, Mayor Roger Tobler said, allowing dispensaries would be dangerous to Boulder City and possibly attract drug cartels to the quiet, serene, safe, Norman Rockwell town. Further, City Manager David Fraser says he believes the council will approve the ban.

Fact: Despite what many think, the possession of marijuana and its cultivation are violations of federal laws. City Attorney David Olsen in his report on this issue clearly states marijuana dispensaries are incompatible with the health, safety and welfare of Boulder City. It could lead to increases in burglaries, robberies, illegal sales, cancer, fatal car crashes, etc. I agree.

Feb. 25 can be one of Boulder City’s finest hours and set the role model example for Clark County, Nevada and America. To wit: Ban marijuana.

Clyde Dinkins, Las Vegas

City’s potential ban out of step with times

I do not support recreational drug use. Neither do I support hypocrisy, cronyism or abuses of authority. The City Council’s recent effort to save the community from the evils of medical marijuana should bee seen for what it is: a pitiful attempt to avoid personal accountability.

The last time the council relied on one of City Attorney David Olsen’s legal opinions it acted to strip eight of our neighbors of their First Amendment right to petition. Now that the matter has blown up in the council’s face they would prefer you forget about it and focus your attention elsewhere.

When the city attorney is discovered to be involved in a lawsuit against the city, in violation of his employment contract, and the council does nothing, you have to wonder what they have been smoking.

Another display of smoke and mirrors is not going to cure the city’s moral and economic ills. Denying residents access to a legally approved form of medical treatment will only prolong their suffering and cause them to spend their money elsewhere.

Just this week the Fed acted to allow businesses operating marijuana dispensaries to open bank accounts for that purpose. That is a solid indicator of what we can expect from Uncle Sam in the future. Boulder City unfortunately may, by a self-serving action of the City Council, remain out of step with the times.

If the city wants to discourage substance abuse, it can ban alcohol sales at the city-owned golf courses and stop funding new bars with redevelopment agency money. What type of message is Boulder City sending to the rest of the world when an alcohol sales permit is granted to the Sunrise Rotary so it can sell beer during the Weeniefest to fund a drug/alcohol-free event for local high school students.

Dick Farmer

Past offers lessons for ban on same-sex marriage

The governor and attorney general of Nevada have decided they won’t defend the state’s common-sense ban on homosexual marriage. Evidently some people haven’t learned from the past.

In a way, weren’t we here a few thousand years ago? The ancient and primitive Greeks and Romans crassly valued homosexual relations. But eventually the people wised up (e.g., Plato condemned homosexual activity) and realized that was a mistake, and homosexual activity was again logically deemed unethical and was basically driven underground.

Now, misguided “progressives” are trying to take us back thousands of years to more primitive and decadent times, despite the fact that thinking people have known for centuries that homosexual activity is immoral and a bad legal precedent. (It’s easy to show that all the arguments homosexuals use to try to rationalize homosexual activity are seriously flawed.)

It may surprise you that some colleges like Harvard now have officially recognized student groups devoted to promoting the acceptance of BDSM, sexually deviant bondage, discipline, sadism and masochism. That’s right. If you are a student who gets turned on by smacking people around, some colleges such as Harvard have groups for you. Bizarre. (Are Neanderthals running that school?)

He who has eyes to see, let them see. The logic of heterophobic homosexuals is rapidly leading this society down a slippery slope to a more and more aberrant, disordered and irrational society.

Polygamy is coming soon. Maybe down the line we’ll see “marriage” between straight and homosexual consenting-adult incestuous people. Whoopee!

Anyone who thinks this is progress is deluding him/herself. Rome didn’t fall in a day. But it did fall. Let’s not join the race to the bottom.

Wayne Lela