A ban on drive-throughs isn’t the answer

In 2019, I had the unfortunate experience of being hit by a car while walking on a sidewalk exit to a drive-through in St. Paul, which resulted in a fractured wrist. While this incident was both scary and eye-opening, I do not support the drive-through ban currently being considered by the city. In fact, I believe it’s the wrong approach.

We absolutely need to prioritize safety when designing drive-throughs — both for pedestrians and drivers. But we can’t overlook the needs of aging residents, busy families, and those with mobility challenges, for whom drive-throughs are a vital service. These aren’t just a convenience; for many, they are essential.

Drive-throughs play a crucial role in the daily lives of St. Paulites and visitors alike — whether it’s picking up a prescription, grabbing a quick meal, or getting last-minute supplies for a school project or a pet. These services provide the kind of accessibility that can’t be dismissed.

As someone who loves St. Paul, I’ve witnessed firsthand the challenges we face — crime, businesses relocating, struggles in our downtown, and the lingering effects of the pandemic. With the city’s new sales tax funding roads and parks, we can’t afford to become less convenient and risk pushing shoppers elsewhere. Rather than banning new drive-throughs or limiting improvements that could make them safer and more efficient, we should focus on big picture, thoughtful design and planning.

I’ve been involved in government long enough to know we already have the tools to approve or reject projects based on safety and merit. A broad ban is not the answer. Let’s ensure our policies are inclusive and forward-thinking, not reactionary and restrictive.

— Amy Koch, Edina

To this I offer a word of hope

The chorus of voices denouncing anti-identity politics is broad in America today. It includes people who are both left and right, intellectuals and outraged citizens. But I have a problem with the music this chorus is singing. What’s the problem? Their music seems to be an effort to cover up a threat to unconscious support for white supremacy. How can that be?

Part of the reason is forgetting or cancelling history. Since the beginning of this country White Christian northern European heterosexual male culture has been dominant. Only the members of that dominant culture were considered fully human. The full humanity of women, African Americans, Native Americans, Asian Americans, Latin Americans, and homosexual Americans was denied and suppressed. Women were incomplete and incompetent. African Americans were only three-fifths a human being. Native Americans were savages. Asian Americans and Latin Americans were alien human beings. And homosexuals were God-despised sinners who deserved to be invisible. Members of these groups have spent the length of America history to have their full humanity realized, despite denigration, discrimination, persecution, and violence. These identities didn’t count. What counted was white dominant identity.

It’s only in the last hundred years that the cry from these groups for recognition of their full humanity has begun to be heard. As this cry grows louder and their voices are heard, it disturbs the music of the dominant society. That music can no longer suppress the voices of protest. The voices of protest are disturbing what has been dominant for centuries. So, now voices among the dominant group are calling the cries of these groups for recognition of their full humanity a threat to the assumed harmony of our country. Where were the voices of protest from the dominant culture in the past for the recognition of the full humanity of these groups? They were there, but they were few and weak. Now that all these voices of protest have become many and loud, they are exposing the lie of assumed white supremacy. So, there is reaction against their disturbance of the assumed peace.

To this I offer a word of hope. As our country recognizes the full humanity of these groups, the demand for recognition will quiet, and there will be a new chorus singing the glories of our country that continues to live more fully into its assertion of the full equality of all people.

— Rev. Grant Abbott, St. Paul

Add this to the reasons why crime spiked

I read with interest “FBI says violent crime declined in 2023,” an Associated Press story printed in the Sept. 24 edition of the Pioneer Press. The primary focus of this letter is the story’s description of the cause of the major spike in violent crime in 2020. The story states: “Crime surged during the coronavirus pandemic, with homicides increasing nearly 30% in 2020 over the previous year — the largest one-year jump since the FBI began keeping records. The rise defied easy explanation, though experts said possible contributors included the massive disruption of the pandemic, gun violence, worries about the economy and intense stress.”

I am a centrist Democrat and am uncomfortable using the term “mainstream media,” but in this case I will. The description of the cause of increased violent crime in 2020 presented above is representative of most stories on the topic in the mainstream media. This description ignores the fact that law enforcement was demonized throughout the country in the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd. It is one thing to be held accountable; it is quite a different thing to be comprehensively denounced and delegitimated. This is what happened to law enforcement in 2020. In light of “defund the police” and related policy goals and perspectives, criminals knew that they had gained the upper hand against law enforcement, and they certainly made the most of it. To think otherwise is woefully naïve.

— Peter Langworthy, St. Paul