Corte Madera commitment is challenge to state plan

I am a junior at Tamalpais High School working as an intern at 350 Marin, a climate-advocacy organization. I am responding to the article published Feb. 9 with the headline, “Corte Madera council supports countywide electrification plan.”

I really appreciate the attention given to this important issue. I think it helps to support the idea that the reduction of greenhouse-gas emissions will lead to many environmental and health benefits. I am encouraged that Corte Madera has an electrification roadmap, but am concerned that California officials are making it more difficult to electrify buildings due to the state’s high electric rates.

California’s rates are among the highest in the country. People are more likely to make the switch from fossil fuels if electric rates are low, so we need to find a way to reduce them. I urge Senate President Pro Tempore Mike McGuire, Assemblymember Damon Connolly and Gov. Gavin Newsom to find alternative ways to pay for ratepayer-funded programs like wildfire prevention and low-income support.

It is unfair and regressive to rely on electric rates to fund statewide programs that do not relate to the generation and distribution of electricity. Doing so makes it unaffordable to switch to renewable and clean energy for many residents.

State officials need to find a way to pay for these programs, either through the state budget or with revenue from the cap-and-trade program. Clean energy should be accessible to every resident regardless of socioeconomic status.

I’m hopeful we can turn these goals into lasting change for our community and the planet.

— Sarah Cormier, Mill Valley

Taxation without representation is back

I owe more on taxes this year than last year. In the past, I never minded paying what I owed — knowing my taxes would go to supporting my priorities: education, the arts, veterans, the disenfranchised and the support of free democracies. Now, however, all are threatened by plans of systematic gutting by the presidential administration and the U.S. Department of Government Efficiency.

It appears to me that I no longer have representation for my tax dollars. If you also feel you are being taxed without representation, that your tax dollars don’t support American causes, let’s “throw the tea into the harbor” as our predecessors did with the Boston Tea Party in 1773 as part of the lead up to the American Revolution.

When we pay our taxes this April 15, I think we should acknowledge that we are doing it in opposition to the decisions of our presidential administration, DOGE and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

— Jeanie Jacobson, Novato

Tesla, SpaceX should return $38B to the US

Before Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency is allowed to slash one more dollar from the federal budget, the tech CEO should reimburse the U.S. taxpayers for the $38 billion in government contracts, loans, subsidies, and tax credits his companies, Tesla and SpaceX, received to prop them up.

— Jan Gross, San Rafael

California Democrats need to own up to failures

In a recently published letter to the editor, a self-described “lifelong Democrat” wrote that, “Democrats have sat back and done little” in response to President Donald Trump. As someone who is registered “no party preference,” it always amazes me that members of the Democratic Party, which is the dominant party in California, are so quick to bash others outside the party.

I think Democrats should be outraged at their own leaders in California, whose plans to encourage the building of enough affordable housing here have failed miserably. Where is the outrage for spending $24 billion on homelessness during Gov. Gavin Newsom’s time in office, yet the number of homeless people is virtually unchanged?

Democrats should be angry at its leadership in California for continuing to spend billions on a bullet train that is expected to open, partially complete, 13 years after the entire project was originally scheduled to be done and is currently $100 billion over budget. Where are the consequences for the bureaucrats that allowed corruption to waste billions (I recall reading about prisoners scamming the state out of billions of welfare benefits during the COVID-19 pandemic)?

There have been many other oversights and missteps along the way. The list is long. I think the author’s angst should be directed first to our local leaders.

— Mark Hall, Novato