Reporting and public pressure necessary to push polluters to do better

Re: “Neverending cloud of concern,” Feb. 4 letters to the editor

I agree with the letter writers that much more needs to be done to bring the Suncor refinery into compliance and protect the health of the surrounding community. Unfortunately, the monetary penalties levied by our government agencies are rarely high enough, by themselves, to deter serial polluters, who write them off as a mere cost of doing business. But maybe Post reporter Noelle Phillips‘ excellent, persistent reporting is exactly what we need to keep this issue prominently in front of the public and agency officials until they do more. Some of us like to think that the court of public opinion still matters. High-quality media coverage is critical to making that true.

— David Rochlin, Denver

— Editor’s note: Rochlin is a former EPA enforcement lawyer

Fonda is not new to clean air fight

Re: “Jane Fonda pledges to join fight for cleaner air,” Feb. 2 news story

Jane Fonda did not just join the fight for cleaner air. She has been at it for a long time. She recognized that reducing carbon emissions and reducing air pollution were two sides of the same environmental coin. One reduces global heating, while the other provides tremendous health benefits that are local and begin right away. She was a big help in getting Senate Bill 1137 here in California, signed by our governor on Sept. 16, 2022, establishing setbacks of fossil fuel infrastructure from schools and neighborhoods. As a climate activist volunteer with Citizens’ Climate Lobby, I welcome Fonda’s assistance in shining a light on environmental harms and climate justice, and helping elect climate-conscious candidates pointing the way to a better future for everyone.

— Gary Stewart, Laguna Beach, Calif.

The president and the U.N. can only do so much

Re: “America is being torn between the U.N., Palestinians and Israel,” Feb. 4 commentaries

I read with great interest both articles regarding the actions taken by the United Nations regarding the War in Israel. There was much I agreed with in state Rep. Iman Jodeh’s article, but I was disappointed that she did not condemn the initial attacks by Hamas against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

Rep. Jodeh also did not speak or call for the release of the hostages taken by Hamas. Instead she implicitly warned that if President Joe Biden did not bring about or cause a cease-fire that Arab and Muslim Americans are unlikely to “back Trump but could sit out the election and not vote for Biden.”

As an elected representative, Jodeh knows that the president cannot unilaterally force Israel or Hamas to agree to a cease-fire. However, to suggest to her constituency that they should sit out the election is not in their best interest. President Biden and the secretary of state have been tirelessly working to bring about the very thing she is seeking.

Rep. Jodeh also decries the suspension of funding for the U.N. Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). Doug Friednash takes the oppositional approach that the U.S. “stop writing blank checks to the United Nations.” Friednash states that they have an ongoing bias against Israel. Both writers should realize the United Nations is not controlled or dictated to by any one country and to suggest the U.S. or the president could decide for all its members is not only uninformed but unappreciative of the challenges being faced by the world.

I have great respect for Jodeh and had the honor and privilege of knowing and working with her father Mohamed Jodeh. He was of tremendous help in the post 9-11 days and assisted me in providing information and awareness to the people of Colorado regarding the Muslim Community, thereby easing conflict and resolving differences. I recall her father as a courageous man who had actually attempted reaching out to the Jewish community. As to sitting out the election, I recall the axiom, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

— Philip Arreola, Denver

— Editor’s note: Arreola is a retired regional director of the U.S. Department of Justice.

Hamas is not democratic

Re: “Hamas was elected into power” Feb. 4 letter

The letter and its title above are technically correct but miss the point. Hamas was legitimately elected in 2006, by a plurality of 44%, among the many Palestinian factions living under the Palestine Authority in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem. That was 18 years ago. There have been no parliamentary elections since. Hamas should not be thought of as a democracy.

What is the chance that Gazans would have voted for Hamas’ October 7th attack and its aftermath?

— Steve Billig, Denver

Dim the lights on parks, open spaces

Re: “Some light reading about all the stars we cannot see in Denver,” Feb. 4 commentary

I wholeheartedly agree with Krista Kafer. She provides all the excellent reasons why we should dim or eliminate lights altogether. It puzzles me how people get their panties in a bunch over a proposed apartment project as diminishing “community character” but seem to think it’s OK to have segments of the community lit up like truck stops on an interstate highway. Further, no matter how much we profess to value our parks and open spaces, there is too much tolerance for light pollution that adversely affects insects, birds and other animals in these spaces. We need to enforce the ordinances we have or draft new ones.

— Patricia Cronenberger, Littleton

Agree to agree

Re: “The Kafer disclaimer,” Feb. 4 letter to the editor

I don’t always agree with frequent Open Forum contributor Craig Marshall Smith, but I certainly agree with his comment about The Kafer disclaimer.

— Mark Alan Kirschbaum, Evergreen

Guns and criminals don’t mix

Re: “No longer electoral kryptonite’,” Feb. 4 news story

I see in the Sunday Denver Post that our Democrats are planning more B.S. Gun laws. Like the three day waiting period. I don’t see any recommendation for longer prison sentences for gun users ( something that would work). I see the present laws haven’t stopped shoot

ings. For instance, the latest Green Valley Ranch shooting. I don’t even hear about any arrests.

We need to stop juveniles and repeat offenders from carrying guns and that should be with tougher sentences.

— Ralph Zrubek, Windsor

Well, here we go again! More new proposed gun legislation. I would like to know why Democrats are always attacking lawful gun owners and those who carry a concealed weapon(CCW). Are we causing the crime that is happening here in Colorado? I see one of the laws that they are proposing is to attach vendor codes to the sale of firearms and ammo purchased from gun dealers.

Have these lawmakers done any data collection on how many lawful gun owners and CCW committed crimes? Yet these lawmakers think these proposed 2024 gun laws are going to lower crime in this state. Why don’t lawmakers make it harder for dangerous criminals to bond out and why doesn’t the governor form a task force for auto theft that plagues this state? It has been brought by Gov. Jared Polis before. Again these ten proposed 2024 gun legislations will do very little to lower crime in this state. Please leave us lawful gun owners alone. We are not the problem with the high crime in this state.

— Dennis Kurtz, Littleton

In the article “Gun control was once ‘electoral kryptonite,’ ” you let Colorado Democrats brag about all the gun control they have previously enacted and what they intend to pass this legislative session. However, not once in the article did anyone claim any improvement to public safety because of any of this gun control.

Let me share the unsaid and uncomfortable truth. After ten years of “common-sense” gun control in Colorado, gun homicides more than doubled. Even the Gun Violence Archive notes that within the last decade, mass shootings in Colorado increased by 800 percent. 1993 is regarded as the “Summer of Violence,” when shootings, stabbings, and murder were at the state’s worst. Since 2020, Colorado has experienced four consecutive “Summers of Violence.” If this gun control is not saving lives, then what is the agenda?

— Mario Acevedo, Denver

Keep those briefs concise

Re: “Word-count limits for lawyers, explained in 1,026 words,” Feb. 4 commentary

As a retired printer, the essay by Derek H. Kiernan-Johnson brought a purr to my morning. I spent a career watching writers trying to shoehorn a thousand words into an 800-word space. Point size, pica pole … all that was missing was a reference to monospace vs. proportional type. I’ve gone over a decade never having the chance to slip those terms into a conversation, and I’ve missed ’em. As for basing anything on words, I blame high school teachers who assigned essays requiring at least X number of words. By law school, the rule evolved to keep writing until the reader cries “uncle.”

My suggestion to the courts is to scan the document, making a word count as it goes along, and then delete everything after 1,200 or 25,000 (or whatever) words.

— Harry Puncec, Lakewood