Letters to the editor: 11/29/01

Red Cross should return Sept. 11 donations

To the Editor:

Several weeks ago I listened with dismay as the American Red Cross announced blithely that they were going to use the money that they have collected for the victims of Sept. 11 for other general expense purposes. They expected they would do this as they had been for years and nobody would complain. This is the way they have been operating for years without anybody seeming to complain.

This time the public outcry was deafening. Even the Red Cross found it hard to ignore. They then announced that they would use the money for the victims.

I was surprised at this turn of events. I have been following the Red Cross for more than 40 years, and I have never seen them use 95 percent of the funds they collected for anything except their own and administrative expense. (Translation: Exorbitant salaries, expense accounts and club memberships.)

This week they announced that they are going to set up boards to check every bill and administer how the victims spend the money. That is saying the same thing but putting a different spin to it. Again they are planning on using the money for general and administrative expenses, and not giving it to the victims.

At this point about the only thing that can be done is for people to ask the Red Cross to return their donations. They gave it to the Red Cross for a specific purpose. They are not using it for that purpose, and people are entitled to their money back. They can then give to a group with integrity and hopefully help the victims as they intended in the beginning.

Sincerely,

Fred August

Dillsboro

Bypass would be bad for business

To the Editor:

Having just returned from traveling the Cherohala Skyway to Tellico Plains, I recently reread with great interest Mr. Walter Kulash's presentation to the Sylva Town Board concerning the southern bypass proposal (The Sylva Herald, Oct. 11).

Going-out-of-business signs were throughout the town of Tellico Plains, so I asked the owner of a local gas station why he was closing.

When I had been in the town earlier, everyone was looking forward to Skyway opening. They believed it would be the town's economic salvation. He said that when they built the skyway they also built a bypass around the town. You can see the bypass from the town, but the bypass continues about half a mile where it joins U.S. Highway 68. On either side of that intersection are large chain convenience stores, gas stations, restaurants, motels and a retail mall. You can hear the "sucking sound of dollars" flying down the bypass starving local businesses.

This traffic used to pass through their town, and while it caused some major congestion at times, this through traffic was the "goose that laid the golden egg."

Consider the impact of Highway 74 bypasses on Rutherforton, Spindale, Forest City and Shelby. In 30 years the Rutherfordton-Forest City bypass has gone from no stoplights to eight stoplights and Shelby has gone from two stoplights to 13 stoplights and the bypass has become a "strip city" that stretches from the western city limits to the Gaston County line.

Large malls and fast food chains have located on both bypasses; national retail and convenience store chains occupy the new traffic corridor. Even the new car dealerships relocated onto the bypasses. Traffic crawls down the bypasses, while in town there are empty storefronts and closed locally-owned businesses. Some moved to the bypass as the auto dealers have done, others waited too long and could not afford the ever rising land prices.

Mr. Kulash has not given a clear solution to our traffic problems, he has reminded us clearly that the solution being considered will not achieve the desired result and will be destructive to our unique local economy.

Sincerely,

Joe Hurt

Sylva

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