Save the Pasadena library

Every great civilization, society and city has had or still has a great library. Our city, which we love, was founded first with a library. This center of our city is now in need of our help.

The Central Library will remain closed until it can be seismically retrofitted. The 97-year-old building designed by Myron Hunt, and listed on the National Register of Historic Landmarks, also needs to be updated to satisfy the needs of Pasadena residents. Central Library is the cornerstone of our public library system and offers vital support to the nine branch libraries. Without Central Library there will be reduced services at all of the branches. I love our local Linda Vista Branch Library and the programs and services they offer and would hate to see these programs eliminated due to lack of funds. “Public libraries are America’s open universities, they’re free, they’re accessible, and they open up worlds of possibilities to people who otherwise would be confined to ignorance,” said the great writer Octavia Butler, who grew up using Pasadena’s libraries. Central Library is the third part of the historic heart of our city and the last of the three to be retrofitted and improved. Time is now to support the library and vote yes on Measure PL!

— Marlene Decker, Pasadena

Too much library tax

I like libraries, but I’m not willing to pay $100 more in property tax every year for the renovations to the Pasadena Library. $200 million to do the job is ridiculous — that’s equal to the cost of a five-story office building or twice what it cost to renovate the Sahara Casino in Las Vegas. The money is really for city pensions. The city is having trouble paying pensions promised to retired workers — that’s money that could have gone to the library. Measure PL should be called Measure UPL for unfunded pension liabilities. Wall Street Journal, June 26, 2022: “Pension funds plunge into risker bets, just as markets are struggling.”

— Matthew Okada, Pasadena

Enthusiastic exaggeration

If I were Hitler I would definitely hire as press agents those letter writers excusing Trump’s scary words as enthusiastic exaggeration. Was it playful exaggeration that launched an attack on our Capitol, that fired up hatred against innocent, legal Haitian immigrants, that asked officials in Georgia to steal the vote? Is it exaggeration when he threatens to cut off federal aid to California firefighters, to undermine the regulations that keep our food safe and stop big corporations from ripping us and the environment off? I’d take those words seriously.

— Dave Matson, Pasadena

Committed to the truth

The recent letters regarding the Charlottesville narrative of the Democratic Party have demonstrated the importance of searching for the truth. A political partisan previously believing a falsity on an important matter, being exposed to the truth and, to his credit, being open enough to consider it, has had his point of view changed. My appeal has been precisely this, to those committed to the truth, not to those who, for political purposes, recite narratives whether or not they are true.

As my grandmother used to say when she taught us bridge, “Let us review the bidding.” We have now reached the point where we are agreed that the expressly stated charge upon which Biden based his candidacy in 2020 is not true, that the same charge Harris repeated in the recent debate is not true, and that the same charge repeated by others over the past several years is not true. We are admonished to not conclude these were “lies,” because we cannot prove “intent.” (Does this test also apply to assertions about Republicans?) So let us just leave it at that. They have all repeatedly asserted things that are false, regarding an important matter.

— Rich Mason, Altadena

Taken too literally

I find it very disturbing that two letters were published saying that Donald Trump shouldn’t be taken too literally as to what he says. One letter writer said Trump “does not outright intentionally lie, but he always exaggerates,” the other writer says Trump is “funny as the Don Rickles of politics.” Really? Is it “Don Rickles funny” when Trump proclaimed on Fox that there is “an enemy within” including “radical-left lunatics” and then names two examples of the “enemy,” Adam Schiff and Nancy Pelosi? And furthermore suggesting that the military could be used against these “enemies”? Regardless of what his delusional minions may say, Trump sounds quite serious. He means what he says. These threats of bodily harm against his political opponents using the government armed forces that he would have access to should he be elected as president need to be taken seriously. Trump has made no secret of his desire to exercise new dictatorial powers in violation of the U.S. Constitution. What else does he need to say for people to believe him when he signals his desire to end American democracy?

— William Stremel, South Pasadena