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Town board must enforce parking
To the Editor:
I agree with Livingston Kelley’s comment that parking has been discussed with little progress for 35 years in downtown Sylva. That is because it is talked about and not enforced by the town.
I spent 43 years on Main Street, and I can assure you there is only one way to solve this problem. Most employees and employers will never use the parking lot behind Peebles without daily, hourly, constant and effective ticketing, which is already the law.
How many people would pay their taxes, drive speed limits, or not squat on other’s people’s property without the government enforcing the laws and penalties for abusing them?
What people should do has nothing to do with reality and human nature. Other than garbage pickup and police protection, this may be the most important service the town of Sylva can offer downtown for the taxes we pay.
If we do establish a tax district for downtown, we need absolute guarantees from the town board that the law will be enforced. It’s a fair trade.
Free parking is available. People must be made to use it. In most other towns there are large monthly charges for workers and employers to park in parking garages and lots.
The town has been nice enough to buy and pave two lots to offer free parking only a few blocks, if that much, away from work.
If it takes tire locks, if it takes the stickers on bumpers that every university uses, whatever it takes, just do it once and for all. Period.
David Schulman
Asheville
Animals deserve humane treatment
To the Editor:
I am a resident of Sylva, and it saddens me to see how some people treat their animals. Recently I had an occasion to call animal control because of a dog that cried and howled.
I went to look at the dog and I was horrified to find a full-grown pit bull left to starve to death on a 3-foot chain attached to the side of a house. The dog was in horrible shape, and it probably weighed 15 pounds, or maybe less.
I feel like the people that owned this dog should be fined and have to spend some time in jail. Animal control came the day after I called them and took the dog away. It was probably put to sleep.
Shame on the people who owned that dog. The sad thing is they have another dog in their house. I hope they never get angry at their children.
Carolyn Levy
Sylva
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