Pittsburgh has many problems beyond the economy
With the closing of the 16th Street Bridge, I am now forced to travel through Downtown. Mayor Tom Murphy blames the economy on the lagging sales in our department stores and businesses. I disagree that it's all the economy.
Has Mayor Murphy traveled Downtown during the rush hour? Has he walked the streets? Has he noticed the people begging for spare change on any given corner? The gangs of youth who block sidewalks waiting for buses? Has he smelled the sweet aroma of pot being smoked on Fifth Avenue?
What about the traffic tie-ups due to the 16th Street Bridge closing and other construction projects? What about the motorists who just pull over in front of no-parking signs and those who park illegally? But the biggest problem of all are the Port Authority buses, which run red lights and block intersections; vehicles and pedestrians can't get through.
But, then again, these problems are just minor compared with the economy -- dream on, Mayor Murphy, dream on.
JOHN EHRENFELD
Spring Garden
Excuse for drunkenness
Once again, the city has used the St. Patrick's Day parade as an excuse to let a bunch of drunken slobs loose on Downtown Pittsburgh. Despite most people knowing how dangerous drunken driving is, the city has turned a blind eye to the drinking, profanity, public urination and vomiting in Market Square.
After the drunks get done drinking, they retreat to their cars and drive on our roads. Pray for the innocent people these drunks meet on the road. How can our city officials sanction this kind of behavior?
While walking past a Downtown restaurant March 15, the day of the parade, I personally witnessed eight men lined up on the side, openly urinating -- and this was while people were walking with their children. When I told a police officer about this behavior, he acted as if he could not have cared less.
This is not the way to promote Downtown. This whole so-called St. Patrick's Day celebration made me ashamed and sick.
ROBIN TROY
Spring Garden
Yes, graffiti must go
On behalf of the board of directors of the East Liberty Quarter Chamber of Commerce we congratulate and support City Council President Gene Ricciardi in his efforts to address the graffiti problem in the city of Pittsburgh. In addition to causing property damage that innocent people must suffer, graffiti is detrimental to the overall image of the city.
We express our thanks to the Graffiti Busters, who constantly remove graffiti throughout the city. Also, we stress the need for eliminating the litter problem of countless fliers stapled to trees and poles throughout the business districts.
PAUL G. BRECHT
Executive Director
East Liberty Quarter Chamber of Commerce
East Liberty
The Hill needs more help
So, what about the Hill District? Well, for one thing it's not Squirrel Hill or Fox Chapel. It's Afro-American.
We moved back to the Hill District about seven years ago and we rent. Our rent is $1,000 per month. Now, it isn't the rent we question. It's that we don't have a grocery and drugstore within walking distant of our apartment.
Have you been through the Hill at night? Did I hear you say no? In most of the places in the Hill, it is so dark that you need a flashlight to cross the street. Yea, what about the Hill?
What's wrong with this picture? Everywhere in the city new things are being built. The North Shore and South Side, including Station Square, are blooming so fast that they look like cities themselves.
What does this look like to you, City Council and Mayor Murphy? The Hill District can't even get street lights -- forget about the grocery and drugstores. They will have all the homes and apartments built in the Hill and still won't have a supermarket and drug store.
In the year 1968, the Hill District was made to look like a bomb site after the Martin Luther King Jr. assassination. This is 2003 and a good part of the Hill still looks like a bomb site.
We, the Afro-Americans who live in the Hill District, are proud of Crawford Square, the Hill House, the mini-mall and the fine buildings of developer Irv Williams and his wife. Also we are proud of Freedom Corner and its fine church, St. Benedict the Moor at Crawford Street. All this is fine, but what about the rest of Centre, Wylie, Webster and Bedford avenues?
You know, City Council and Mayor Murphy, regardless of how you fix up Downtown, the North Shore and the South Side, somebody is going to ask a tour bus driver, "Where is the Hill District?" Yea! What about the Hill? Or doesn't anyone give a damn how the Hill looks?
HERMAN A. TALLEY
Hill District
Lawrenceville tensions
Iraq is under attack. So is Lawrenceville. I remember when Lawrenceville was the Mayberry of Pittsburgh. It never was an affluent community, but the residents always were very nice and friendly. Most of them still are, which makes such constant attacks difficult to understand.
The pointless assaults the residents have been facing consist of the hurling rocks and unopened beer bottles through the windows of homes. God help anyone who might be sitting on a sofa beside the window. It could be a child. Even in America's war, our soldiers are trying not to injure innocent people.
Mayor Tom Murphy seems to be blind to the need for more police. The ones we have are doing a good job in trying to protect us, but we need more. This escalating problem must be stopped.
Pittsburgh definitely should know what is happening in Lawrenceville. The problem keeps growing, and it is a blight on our wonderful city and a constant threat to the residents who are reaching the "do what you have to do" stage. And that frightens me.
RUTH RUPP
Lawrenceville
Ill-informed protesters
I am thankful that I live in a country where anyone can speak his or her mind, even if it is in direct opposition to the nation's leader.
However, the recent anti-war protests are embarrassing to our city. I've questioned anti-war protesters, and other than saying, "Bush is after oil," they cannot support or explain their point of view.
Do they know that Saddam gained office by a coup? Do they know he has killed family members? That he gassed thousands of Kurds? That he routinely protects military targets by placing them in civilian areas? That he tortured a soccer team for performing poorly? That Iraqi soldiers were trying to surrender to the United States and defect before the war ever started?
I look forward to the day when a free Iraq tells the world that it needed help all along, and all it got were French and Russian weapons for the tyrant leader.
To the protesters, read up before you march. And how serious could you be anyway? Some of you were so ashamed that you wore ski masks; way to stand behind your beliefs!
PETE EVANS
South Side
Pittsburgh police state?
It looks like Mayor Murphy has finally found a way to keep people Downtown: Arrest them! ("Protest Turns Ugly as Police Arrest 122," March 21.)
I have seen more violence from a crowd of drunken Steelers fans than from the war protesters.
If Pittsburgh is turning into a police state, a la John Ashcroft, it's time to find a new Democratic Party to defend its citizens.
DOLORES A. TOMMARELLO
Brookline
Amid this war, please don't forget the value of dialogue
Our government has concluded that violent confrontation with Iraq is necessary because diplomatic efforts to achieve disarmament of the Saddam Hussein regime have failed. Clearly, there are many different opinions regarding the timing and purpose of this war, and debate will undoubtedly continue well into the future. We at the Pittsburgh Mediation Center write to encourage readers to keep faith in the value of dialogue despite the assertion that diplomacy in this instance failed.
The Pittsburgh Mediation Center is the leading resource for conflict resolution in Western Pennsylvania and a catalyst for promoting peaceful communities. For more than 20 years the Pittsburgh Mediation Center has been helping people in conflict resolve their problems through dialogue. We have helped clergy and their congregants, teachers and their students, police officers and the citizens they serve, neighbors and their communities, and victims and their offenders to engage in respectful dialogue that restores relationships and resolves conflicts nonviolently.
Now more than ever, all citizens should arm themselves with conflict resolution and mediation skills so that each of us can be accountable for peace at home, in the workplace and in our communities. Anyone interested in conflict resolution and mediation training or mediation services should call the Pittsburgh Mediation Center for more information.
CINDY GOODMAN-LEIB
President
GALE McGLOIN
Executive Director
Pittsburgh Mediation Center
East Liberty
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