Facility doesn't belong in Queen Anne's

In regard to Paul West's article in Sunday's Sun, "The battle is joined in Queen Anne's" (Jan. 17), I would like to add a few comments. As trustee of my family's farm, which borders the Hunt Ray farm where the Foreign Affairs Training Center is proposed to be built, I am legally bound to protect the interest and value of our farm. Those interests are threatened by the proposed facility in the following ways.

My greatest concern is for the safety of my two children, who play outside of our back door only 500 yards from where ordnance will be tested. Detonation of 3-pound bombs and other firearms will not be silent, and the impact on all of us, especially our girls, would be horrendous. How would continuous ordnance testing on the Eastern Shore's sandy soil affect the foundation of my home, built in 1858? In addition, the facility is adjacent to Tuckahoe State Park, where people come to learn about the environment and enjoy the sound of frogs in the ponds and birds in the woods. That would be drowned out by the sounds of automatic weapons. Our peaceful, quiet landscape would be shattered.

Anne Eastman, Centreville

Developers misrepresent stormwater rules

In his Jan. 18 piece, "New Md. rules on stormwater assailed," Tim Wheeler describes the content of a Smart Growth Task Force meeting at the Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) where members of the development community came out to oppose new regulations aimed at tightening pollution control standards on redevelopment sites.

Having been at the meeting, I wasn't surprised so much by the overwhelming sentiment from the development community; they don't want to have to pay the cost of making their projects pollute less. What did surprise me was the willful and repeated misrepresentation of the new guidelines being set forth by MDE. In almost every case study presented, developers claimed the new regulations would cut into the density of their development. What they failed to acknowledge is that the new regulations have a flexibility that allows for off-site mitigation or for the developer to pay a "fee-in-lieu" if stormwater management can't reasonably be handled on the site. Density can still be achieved, smart growth can be preserved, but dollars will be passed to the local jurisdictions to assist with targeted restoration of degraded creeks and streams.

Most astonishing of all, however, were the local government staffers who called for a weakening of the new regulations. If you happen to live in Baltimore City or Baltimore or Howard counties, I would ask that you put in a call to your planning department to ask why high-level bureaucrats were testifying before MDE to weaken pollution regulations on developers, forcing taxpayers to pick up the tab for the environmental consequences of their projects.

We have a multibillion-dollar backlog of restoration work that needs to be accomplished in order to clean up the Chesapeake Bay. We can't get clean rivers and a clean bay without everyone picking up their fair share of the cost. Gutting these regulations would be a huge step in the wrong direction.

Erik Michelsen, Edgewater

The writer is executive director of the South River Federation.

King dreams unfulfilled

It is laudable that children remembered the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. at Port Discovery with crafts, quilting squares and music ("Artful tribute to King," Jan. 18).

Other than that, not much was said about Mr. King, possibly due to the fact that we have an articulate, attractive African-American as president of the United States.

Mr. King's goals and aspirations may seem irrelevant and outdated, but while some issues, such as public accommodations, have seen vast improvement, there are other areas championed by Mr. King that have seen little change - economic justice and an end to poverty, universal health care, the beginning of the end of the deadly arms race, as well as the ongoing maiming and killing in Iraq and Afghanistan.

These wars and the constant preparation for them result in astronomical costs, squandering tax dollars that could be used to improve U.S. infrastructure, not to mention rebuild the shattered country of Haiti.

Just beginning to shift the funding from war to human needs would result in a dramatic change in our society, a change that would benefit the United States and the entire planet.

Lee Lears, Annapolis

Kirwan: Extra compensation based on performance

A Jan. 18 Sun article on salaries of higher education officials reported that I had refused to accept a deferred compensation payment ("State university presidents' pay in middle of the pack"). This is not correct. The Sun based this on information released this week by the Chronicle of Higher Education that shows that I received a deferred compensation payment in 2008 but not in 2009. However, this change actually stems from the University System of Maryland Board of Regents' conversion of my deferred compensation to a multi-year performance payment. If I leave before the end of my contract, I would receive no payment. If I complete my contract, the regents will determine how much, if any, of the payment I would receive based on their assessment of my performance.

William E. Kirwan, Adelphi

The writer is chancellor of the University System of Maryland.