Tolling I-80 will dig us deeper into a hole

As a member of the Pennsylvania General Assembly who voted against Act 44 of 2007 and opposed the tolling of Interstate 80, I must respond to your editorial "Road Warrior: Pennsylvania Must Fight for I-80 Tolling" (March 25).

Your editorial is misguided in the notion that Act 44 - and the tolling of I-80 - is the best solution for transportation funding needs in Pennsylvania. Just last week, we learned that due to the struggling economy, fewer people are traveling on the Pennsylvania Turnpike and other toll roads around the country. If I-80 is tolled, it may produce even less revenue than expected.

This year, Act 44 will provide more money for mass transit than for roads and bridges. Far fewer people use mass transit than travel our highways. We will not solve the transportation funding problem until mass transit agencies shoulder an equitable share of the burden.

There are many reasons why I-80 should not be tolled, ranging from legal questions about tolling roads built with federal funding to the devastating financial impact on residents and businesses along the I-80 corridor. Haven't Western and rural Pennsylvania suffered enough? Why is there no interest in adding tolls to highways in urban areas of Pennsylvania?

It is true that hundreds of millions of additional dollars are needed to maintain our roads and bridges. Rather than divide our commonwealth, we must look to creative solutions for funding that fairly distribute costs and benefits. Tolling I-80 is poor public policy that will only dig our state deeper into the hole.

STATE REP. DICK STEVENSON

Grove City

The writer is co-chairman of the House Republican Policy Committee, Task Force on Infrastructure.

Expand ‘Promise’

I would like to take a moment to praise the Pittsburgh Promise program and the benefits for the Pittsburgh community. I am a local high school teacher and feel education, family and faith are the best way to overcome life's obstacles and to achieve success.

I have seen many people leave the city for life in the suburbs for various reasons, mostly educational. My wife and I send our kids to a private, Catholic school in the South Hills. We feel it's important for our children to be taught in a school in which their faith helps guide their education. I have lots of friends who teach in local city schools and they do a wonderful job!

My point is, if Pittsburgh is to become a leader in education, why limit the "Pittsburgh Promise" to public school students only? The city consists of a lot of great educational institutions, not just public institutions. A lot of families believe faith is an important aspect to a well- rounded education. A lot of families I know love the city life, but end up moving out because of the price of a private education can be steep.

How much more attractive does the city look when you can look for an education for your children (regardless of the type) and know if you're a city taxpayer, you are eligible for the scholarship program?

There are plenty of families that think as we do and feel our beliefs in private school shouldn't be the determining factor in making the "Pittsburgh Promise" open to all city residents!

MIKE ORSI

Beechview

The LCB model

Thank you, columnist Tony Norman, for your incisive critique of the insane war on drugs ("Stop the Drug War Now, More Than Ever," March 24). Recently National Public Radio quoted a Mexican security expert affirming Mr. Norman's argument: "You are trying to fight the invisible hand of the market with the long arm of the law and historically the invisible hand wins."

Prohibition is the opposite of regulation. By prohibiting a "vice" that people want to indulge, be it gambling, tobacco, alcohol or any other intoxicant, the government simply hands control of that market to criminals.

Just how would we start regulating and taxing drugs like marijuana here in Pennsylvania? I would propose utilizing our much-maligned Liquor Control Board. The state is never going to relinquish its cash cow and it is starving for a new revenue stream. Complain all you will about the PLCB, but the state store system is designed to strictly control both the customer, the product and the revenue. It accomplishes its mission very well and thus would be the perfect vehicle to distribute and tax intoxicants, taking the market away from thugs and providing the cash to mitigate the inevitable damages. Just like we do now with booze.

ROBERT STEFFES

Aliquippa

A saner policy

Regarding Tony Norman's March 24 column ("Stop the Drug War Now, More Than Ever"):

There is a middle ground between drug prohibition and blanket legalization. Switzerland's heroin maintenance program has been shown to reduce disease, death and crime among chronic users. Providing addicts with standardized doses in a clinical setting eliminates many of the problems associated with heroin use.

The success of the Swiss program has inspired pilot heroin maintenance projects in Canada, Germany, Spain, Denmark and the Netherlands. If expanded, prescription heroin maintenance would deprive organized crime of a core client base. This would render illegal heroin trafficking unprofitable and spare future generations addiction.

Marijuana should be taxed and regulated like alcohol, only without the ubiquitous advertising. Separating the hard and soft drug markets is critical. As long as marijuana distribution is controlled by organized crime, consumers of the most popular illicit drug will continue to come into contact with sellers of addictive drugs like cocaine. Given that marijuana is arguably safer than legal alcohol, it makes no sense to waste tax dollars on failed policies that finance organized crime and facilitate hard drug use.

Drug policy reform may send the wrong message to children, but I like to think the children are more important than the message.

ROBERT SHARPE

Policy Analyst, Common Sense for Drug Policy

Washington, D.C.

Americans, do we really want socialism?

I am amazed that almost no one has commented on the government getting its hands deeper into everyone's daily and financial situations. We should be hesitant to allow the federal government to be in a position where it can dictate the terms of contracts and agreements.

I (like everyone else) was livid about the AIG bonus structure. The real problem arises when this type of government "control" is allowed to take place without the say of the people!

I grow more nervous every day that I continue to hear the private business people all over the country. Does anyone know what socialism is? Do we want to become like the French? No matter if you work twice as hard as another person at the same position, you are compensated equally by your employer. Have we forgotten what made this democracy great? Hard work! I agree with the principle that if I work longer and harder than you, I should be paid as such. We are really in a bad place in this country, not only financially, but morally as well. We need to look to the underlying issues, and stop being so fast to take money from government sources.

I believe that if you are unable to maintain a profit sufficient to keep your business running, close. Please, let's not become completely dependent on Uncle Sam. We now will have the Chinese loans hanging over our heads (nothing like leverage). Think, think!

SEAN FERGUSON

North Side

Mr. DeWeese, make term limits your legacy

To state Rep. Bill DeWeese: We all thank you sincerely for your service to the public. You have done many wonderful things for Pennsylvanians while in office, but you've done quite enough now. I agree with the Post-Gazette's assessment that it's time for you -- and career politicians like you -- to go away ("Cloud Over the House: The Democrats Should Have Removed DeWeese," March 22 editorial).

We amended our U.S. Constitution so that no president could serve more than two terms of four years each. Every political position in America should have term limits.

Would you like to be remembered for decades to come? Before you leave office, sponsor (and pass) a bill that does the following:

1. Limits public service to one term of six years. That way, politicians don't have to waste time begging for money for a re-election campaign. Think how many more wonderful things you could get done for your constituents with all that extra time!

2. Restricts former public servants from working in other public service positions, or organizations doing business with government, for a minimum of 10 years after the end of their term. This will allow time for former public servants to reacquaint themselves with their old line of work or to establish themselves in a new career field.

3. Requires that all persons running for office use their own money to pay for campaigns. I know, only the wealthy will run for office. But isn't it the wealthy who pay to get their favorite candidates elected anyway?

Finally, it is arrogant to think that only you have the best ideas for helping our fellow Pennsylvanians. There are plenty of other smart, creative people in our state who could make a positive contribution -- if given the chance.

BILL McGRANE
Mt. Lebanon

Death of dreams

Reading the March 23 Post-Gazette, there were seven pages of obits for the American dream of homeownership, also known as the "sheriff's sale."

Like all obits, the sadness is heartfelt.

STEPHEN F. KISLOCK III
Beaver Falls

Changing times

When I read, in the Post-Gazette, that the Diocese of Pittsburgh was closing my former elementary school, St. Titus in Aliquippa, I felt disconsolate ("Catholic Diocese Plans to Close Four Schools," March 23). Happy memories flooded my mind from those halcyon days in the 1950s and early '60s. St. Titus' enrollment was larger than the high school, college and graduate school I subsequently attended.

Many factors have contributed to St. Titus' downfall, but the most salient and ironic truth is that the reason Catholic immigrants, initially the Irish and Germans, demanded a parochial school system be implemented -- public schools were Protestant-controlled institutions with a strong anti-Catholic agenda -- has dissipated. Finger-pointing, fund-raising and better marketing techniques won't affect the Americanization of Catholicism.

Belatedly, I want to express my enduring gratitude to all those "brides of Christ" -- the Sisters of St. Joseph -- who lovingly labored at St. Titus and touched so many lives in the process; that said, the finest teacher I ever encountered was a laywoman: my third-grade elementary preceptor, Mrs. Baldwin. The classic children's books she took the time to read to her enthralled charges fostered a love of fine literature that lives on in many of her aging disciples.

ROB BILLER
Fombell

Reagan roots

Regarding the March 24 letter from Ira Weiss ("What Would the FDR Revisionists Have Done?"): I agree with Mr. Weiss, completely. I have been waiting and wondering when someone will ask, what would President Reagan have done if he had faced the same problems as FDR? Or better yet, what would Reagan have done today to alleviate the present national and worldwide financial collapse?

Would Reagan cheer us up, tell us that the miracle of the marketplace can solve all its problems, cut taxes for the wealthy, tell us to vote with our feet and go where the work is, to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps, that government is the problem and should be reduced, that regulatory agencies are not needed, that business can regulate itself?

I wish those revisionists would tell us how Reagan would have solved our present dilemma. Of course they never will, because what the Reagan administration did 28 years ago has led us over time to the present economic disaster.

FREDERICK J. ROKASKY
Banksville

Treasury mistake

Tim Geithner is and will continue to be a poor choice for secretary of the treasury. Not because he "cheated" on his taxes. Not because he has been less than forthright on his part in AIG bonuses. Not because he is a totally ineffective communicator.

But because as president of the New York Federal Reserve Bank for five years immediately preceding his appointment as secretary of the treasury, right in the middle of our financial capital, he seemingly contributed nothing to early warnings about our current crises. To give him expanded powers ("Geithner Asks Congress for Expanded Powers," March 25) will only compound the original mistake of his appointment.

JIM WELCH
Upper St. Clair