Shorr’s hiring is significant
Re: “Will downtown library go the way of City Hall? Director talks of reimagining the building, which also gets little maintenance attention,” by Robert Wilonsky, Nov. 12 Opinion.
Regarding Wilonsky’s column on the future of the J. Erik Jonsson Central Library, Manya Shorr, the current library director, was brought in for a reason, and I think that reason is her expertise in navigating public reaction to the closing of a beloved public institution.
She has a track record — the elephant in the room, as she said. It looks to me like Dallas city officials are copying the Fort Worth playbook, full speed ahead. Promote the idea that the building is too big, it’s outdated, it’ll cost a bloody fortune to fix it, nobody uses it, too many homeless hanging about, the internet has all the answers you’re looking for anyway, the land the library sits on is worth a fortune, and furthermore, who reads books anymore!
It’s all painfully familiar because we — Fort Worth — wrote the playbook and Shorr held the pen. What she and they don’t mention, of course, is that once the main repository of a community’s institutional memory is cut out, once the lobotomy is performed, the patient is still alive, but never the same as before, and that may be the true goal of this disturbing trend in Texas.
Opinion
Scott Grant Barker, Saginaw
Why downtown for homeless site?
The foundational problems of downtown Dallas largely revolve around the homeless infrastructure and its population. Many lobbied hard and unsuccessfully in 2005 against the campaign of Tom Dunning and Mike Rawlings to build a $25 million homeless shelter in downtown Dallas. The predictable exaggerated rise of crime and fear among residents and workers downtown since then has been well documented.
If you want to solve the challenge of maintaining any continuing interest of people wanting to live, work or play in downtown Dallas, the solution seems simple: Move and improve the homeless infrastructure outside of downtown. It should never have been championed to be there by Laura Miller, Rawlings and Dunning in the first place.
My generalized thoughts would be to build new “best in class” homeless infrastructure somewhere in the general area of the Stemmons Corridor, perhaps in the general neighborhood of our county health facilities.
We have to address the needs of our homeless population. We don’t need or have to do it in downtown Dallas.
Ted Stone, Dallas
Reminds of a punchline
Finally, President Donald Trump gets it. Tariffs on goods we don’t or can’t produce here are a bad idea. We consumers are paying this tax and for no possible good outcome. Not now or in the future.
It reminds me of an episode from a favorite sitcom from the ’70s, a show called WKRP in Cincinnati. The station manager had ordered the dropping of live turkeys from a helicopter for a Thanksgiving Day giveaway.
Following the news of the chaos, panic and inhumane end to the turkeys, the station manager famously quoted, “As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly!”
David McDonald, Heath
Don’t forget the heart of the matter
Re: “Growth of clean energy,” by Richard Howe, Wednesday Letters.
I am writing to support Howe for his clear-eyed assessment of the clean energy transition. He correctly highlights the economic and national security imperatives of this transition — the logical and practical reasons from our “head.” I would gently like to add that this transition is also a matter of the “heart.”
By moving away from combustion and pollution, we are not just securing our own global standing but we are actively caring for the health of our neighbors and stewarding the planet for our children.
To build a future that is both secure and just, we need both the head and the heart working together. Thank you for giving space to this vital conversation.
Hiba Malik, Temple
Comparison to think about
One reader’s two cents on the death of the penny: yes, it costs nearly four cents to make one, but once minted, the penny’s mission is to consistently recirculate for the sake of exactness when paying for a purchase with cash.
On the other hand, the cost of making a single bitcoin is 4,227 gallons of water, which is approximately equivalent to the amount of water needed to fill a backyard swimming pool. Unfortunately, not all the water used in the production of bitcoin can be recirculated.
A penny for your thoughts on which coin has more value.
Frances Baldwin, McKinney
Yes, more marching bands!
Re:“Give high school bands space,” by James Outlaw Urech, Oct. 24 Letters.
I appreciated Urech’s letter about the need to see more marching band stories. A person seconded. I’m thirding!
Then on Nov. 14, what do I see? A story about Flower Mound’s band doing a tribute to Pablo Picasso! I wish I could’ve seen their performance.
Every year since my youngest was in the marching band, I would go to the UIL marching band competitions even after he graduated. I missed it this year due to conflicts. If only they would televise the competition. It’s not the same as in person, but we can’t always be there.
I could watch marching bands all day, and I have. Ever since the Cowboys faltered in the 1990s, I’m all about marching bands at halftime. But they’re never on TV. Can I get a second on this?
Meryl K. Evans, Plano