Scalping
I read with interest recent articles on the crackdown on scalping at Camden Yards.
As a long time Rolling Stones fan, I decided I wanted great tickets to their concert Aug. 1 at RFK stadium. I spent the night on line before tickets went on sale.
I was about the 300th person on line at the first ticket outlet that was to open.
With a six-seat maximum for ticket purchase, I should easily have ended up with seats in the first 25 rows.
Instead, the best available were in the upper deck. There must have been conservatively 30,000 seats in front of me.
This is the kind of organized ticket scalping that should be cracked down on.
John Blom
Baltimore
Bad Choice
On July 31, you printed a letter to the editor entitled, "Like It or Not, Bentley's a Winner." Richard Gross (the letter writer) comments on a letter that I wrote questioning Barry Rascovar's motives for endorsing Rep. Helen Delich Bentley. Mr. Cross tries to play a numbers game to show that Mrs. Bentley's win is a fact.
He bases his conclusion on an early poll that has more to do with name recognition than positions on the issues.
Early polls are just that -- early polls. At their best, they are forecasts of which way the wind may blow. At this stage of the race, the wind is only a breeze and therefore not much of a barometer of events to come . . . .
He infers that only Mrs. Bentley can beat Parris Glendening. There is a quantum leap of logic in this statement that I do not understand.
I believe the Republican team most likely to beat Mr. Glendening is the one which is least like him and his running mate.
In 1990, Bill Shepard (with only modest GOP help) caused the now famous second term Schaefer temper tantrum. How did he do that? Simply by daring to run against Gov. William Donald Schaefer and getting a lot of votes in the process . . . .
There are three reasons I think Mrs. Bentley is a bad choice. . . .
First, Governor Schaefer says that he would vote for her if he was a Republican.
Wow! Would her administration be a continuation of his? Is he so frightened of Mr. Shepard or Ellen Sauerbrey that he feels obliged to endorse a candidate from a rival party?
Second, her selection of Sen. Howard Denis, R-Montgomery, proves her ability to yield to political expediencies without consideration of philosophical values.
The lieutenant governor should mesh philosophically with the governor. Only Bill Shepard has a running mate that compliments him philosophically and has depth of executive experience to "be the governor" if he becomes disabled or dies in office.
Finally, we find ourselves in the sad state of losing a senior seat in Congress so the incumbent can run for governor.
At best, she was a reluctant bride. She knew she had a secure seat in Congress. Her knowledge of national issues is strong. Her knowledge of state issues is weak . . .
J. M. Evans
Westminster
Let Frazier Alone
The media recently reported a prime example of one of the major problems with what was once a first class Police Department: micro-management from City Hall and the news media.
Commissioner Thomas Frazier was hired to try to straighten out a city Police Department mired in racism, favoritism and incompetence.
As he attempts to move people around for the betterment of the department as a whole, he is battled by special interest groups and politicians.
Let the man do the job he was hired to do. If at the end of his term, what he has done isn't liked by the politicians, then they can, by law, replace him, but no one can work or make any difference, when he has to bow to City Hall.
Various groups of people, from his honor the mayor to the NAACP, need to learn that race, by itself, is not a qualification for any position. The sooner this is learned by all the sooner all can start getting along better.
After 21 years with the Baltimore City Police Department, I am well aware of what the total interference from City Hall, and especially the mayor's office, of this administration has done to undermine and destroy the department.
I am not particularly a fan of Commissioner Frazier, but he has to be allowed to do the job he was hired to do.
This is not simply a matter of whether or not Maj. Barry Powell should be moved from the Northwest District, but does the police commissioner have the authority to make transfers without going through the mayor's office and pleasing all of the special interest groups.
Conversely, it is not a prerogative of members of the command staff to host public meetings to bring pressure upon the police commissioner because they're not happy with an assignment, as Major Powell did . . .
The police department is a quasi-military organization, not a democracy. This is necessary to protect our greater democracy, which members of the department are sworn to protect.
John G. Cree Jr.
Joppa
The writer is a retired city police sergeant.
Trapping Nutria
Michael Horst's Aug. 7 letter "Killing Nutria" was fraught with factual errors and misleading comments.
Mr. Horst accused Cathy Liss of "patent nonsense" for saying that these animals should not suffer in leghold traps, when according to Mr. Horst, most trappers use conibear traps to kill nutria. Yet the International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies reports that most trappers do indeed use leghold traps for nutria.
Mr. Horst went on to claim that the leghold trap is humane if used in a "drowning set"-- yet animals held under water in such sets may struggle for up to 15 minutes before finally succumbing.
Mr. Horst says trapping keeps diseases such as rabies, distemper and parvo-viruses in check -- yet scientists who study these diseases say that control of disease by control of furbearers is simply not effective.
Tangentially, Mr. Horst suggested that if bird watchers purchased duck stamps, the "problem" would be solved -- yet the "problem" is a loss of marsh habitat, blamed on nutria.
Marsh loss is caused principally by sea level rise and the lack of sedimentary material to counteract these natural changes.
The natural habits of nutria, muskrat and other wildlife contribute to these losses; so do preventable human activities such as marsh burning and construction. The eradication of nutria would fail to halt marsh loss.
Moreover, species eradication programs routinely fail, serve no other verifiable purpose than to support a declining trapping industry and usually do so with tax dollars.
Dale Bartlett
Washington
The writer is wildlife and habitat protection research associate, the Humane Society of the U.S.
War Over Valley Churches
Recent articles and letters in The Sun concerning St. Mary's Orthodox Church in Baltimore County omit some important facts.
Baltimore County's zoning regulations specifically allow the construction of churches in the county, even in areas where other types of construction may be prohibited. Most people are neither surprised nor bothered by this.
Churches are usually attractive buildings, they provide a service to the community and, due to the infrequency and nature of their use, they generally are less stressful on the environment than virtually any other type of building.
For many years, the corridor between Interstate 83 and Falls Road has experienced development. Several hundred homes have been built from the beltway to Belfast Road.
A few years ago, the Orthodox, Catholic and Presbyterian residents of the area announced plans to build churches. A small group of area residents decided to oppose these churches and contested their zoning.
In each of the three cases, the legal right of the citizens of this community to build churches in their own neighborhoods was upheld by the responsible county agencies, the Zoning Commission, the Baltimore County Board of Appeals and the Baltimore County Circuit Court.
Undeterred, the opponents have now pressed appeals on two churches to the Maryland Court of Special Appeals.
Although they have won every argument on every level, the members of these churches have been forced to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars defending their legal rights.
It has become all too obvious that the opponents, aware of this fact, are hopeful of winning by waging a war of attrition. The recent developments at St. Mary's Orthodox Church are a case in point.
The parishioners of St. Mary's want to build a courtyard next to the hall they currently use for their religious services.
Their opponents have admitted that although they have no objection to this proposal, they will contest it unless St. Mary's agrees never to build a church.
While tacitly admitting they have no hope of winning their case on legal merits, they are now trying to impose their will on the community by attempting to bankrupt this small parish with endless legal bills. Some would call this blackmail.
The people who oppose the construction of these three churches are offended when they are accused of prejudice. They claim that their only concern is the stress on well water and septic fields.
Yet several of them have written to support the conversion of a nearby historic building into a restaurant, a use far more damaging to the environment than a church can ever be.
Nor can any of them be seen acting against a development of 20 new homes just a few hundred yards from St. Mary's. Each of these homes will generate more sewage and draw on more well water than will the church.
Edward J. Veilleux
Hunt Valley
The writer represents the Catholic Community of St. Francis Xavier.