Students living off-campus need more oversight

College and university officials in the Baltimore area need to pay attention to the most recent tragedy at the University of Maryland ("Killing makes safety a bigger issue at UM," Nov. 17).

For the last five years, my neighborhood has been actively engaged in preventing a similar occurrence.

Because we live in an area dense with institutions of higher learning, there is always a market of fun-loving students eager to be exploited by greedy landlords. The students live in overcrowded, sub-standard and unsafe houses while wreaking havoc (trash, traffic, drinking, noise) on taxpaying homeowners.

Their irresponsible behavior also acts as a magnet for others who want to behave badly in an unsupervised setting.

Safety is our utmost concern. Last year, Towson University students living two houses down from me assaulted Baltimore police officers as they attempted to break up a party at 3 a.m. Several weeks ago, a young man asking for quiet in the wee hours of the morning was assaulted by Loyola College students, one of whom was my next-door neighbor.

The schools accept the tuition of these students yet leave the management of their behavior to neighborhood associations, municipal agencies, courts and the overburdened Baltimore Police Department.

Schools should hold off-campus students to the same standards of behavior as those living on campus. And, if schools do not accept certain behavior, what makes them think neighborhoods will?

Must another person die before a long overdue change in student management occurs?

Bobbie Smith

Baltimore

Black Americans can't forget Jim Crow

I believe that reparations for black Americans are long overdue, not for slavery but for the 100 years that followed it ("Setup for reparations discussions anything but fair for the con side," Nov. 24).

I'm not quite 50 years old, but I still vividly remember the "colored only" and "white only" signs located throughout the South: You can't go here, you can't go there, you can't work here, you can't play there.

These Jim Crow laws truly hindered my parents, along with millions of other colored folks, from reaching the American dream. They were not lazy, they worked hard every day. Yet they were denied first-class citizenship.

Many white Americans keep telling us to just "get over it." Do we dare tell Jewish-Americans to get over the Holocaust? And why should I "get over" or forget about what my parents and millions of other Southern black Americans went through and endured living as second-class citizens in this great country?

I'll go to my grave believing that America has yet to pay, not for slavery, but for the 100 years after.

Pamela A. Hairston

Washington

Secretive trials set ominous precedent

I think it is a shameful disgrace that our government is using the court system to secretly incarcerate presumed terrorists while violating their human rights.

If al-Qaida is a serious threat to America's democracy, I want to know about it. But as an American citizen, I do not want my government to conduct a secret court system to hold terrorists of color who are deemed to be enemies of the state.

And as an Afro-centric feminist, I fear that what is secretly being done to terrorists right now will be a legal reality for me tomorrow.

Larnell Custis Butler

Baltimore

Trading our health for fatter profits

Lowering the requirements for older industrial facilities to upgrade their pollution controls when they expand output is one more step by the Bush administration to trade the health and well-being of citizens for greater business profits ("White House pulls back on clean air rules," Nov. 23).

And it is laughable to say that relaxing pollution regulations will encourage such industries to pursue cost-efficient ways to cut pollution on their own. If this were the case, we would not have needed the laws in the first place.

The fox is truly in the henhouse at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency!

David L. Pollitt

Forest Hill

Street-corner offices help take back city

Kudos to City Councilman Keiffer J. Mitchell for his program to set up a temporary office on street corners in an effort to drive away drug dealers ("Mayor, staff meet on troubled corner," Nov. 27).

Wouldn't it be wonderful for the entire City Council to embark and continue such a program to show their support for taking back our corners?

The mayor has shown his support, and an invitation to state and federal representatives, particularly those who influence programs and funds that help address such problems, would surely be effective.

Fred Thompson

Baltimore

Target criminals, not gun owners

The Sun's senseless anti-gun blather continues unabated. The catalyst for its most recent foray -- "Sniping gun laws" (editorial, Nov. 19) -- is, of course, the Beltway sniper. The target is, as usual, the law-abiding gun owner.

The Sun begs for even more restrictions on gun ownership, claiming that they will close some imaginary loophole in our existing laws. At the same time the editorial, for the most part, blithely ignores the fact that someone intent on committing an illegal act is not likely to obey any law that interferes with this objective.

Today the focus is the AR-15. Tomorrow it will be the Remington rifle in your uncle's closet.

Can't The Sun get it straight? It's the criminals, stupid.

W.C. Harsanyi

Pasadena

Dancing on grave of Camelot is sad

Although Jacqueline Kennedy compared the 1,000 days of the Kennedy administration to Camelot some 39 years ago, Kennedy-haters are still dancing on John F. Kennedy's grave with glee as they map the so-called downfall of Camelot ("Images of Camelot faring into the mist," Opinion * Commentary, Nov. 26).

It's sad how some people's lives depend on the destruction of other people's lives and reputations, especially their perceived political enemies.

Michael S. Eckenrode

Baltimore

Graziano's efforts deserve applause

It was wonderful at last to see The Sun give recognition to the hard work Housing Commissioner Paul T. Graziano has done on behalf of Baltimore ("The organization man," editorial, Nov. 22).

Having worked with the previous administration, I have been pleasantly surprised with his accessibility, knowledge and integrity. He has worked with us to create programs that strengthen our neighborhoods and provide expanded housing choices for our public housing residents.

Mr. Graziano is truly an unsung hero.

Caroline Queale

Baltimore