Ravenstahl should create jobs instead of taxes

Concerning the article "Ravenstahl Says He Has the Votes to Pass Pittsburgh Tuition Tax" (Nov. 19 Web): Once again, the government has mismanaged funds and looks to create a new tax to compensate the shortfall. Oh, how I wish that every time I suffered a financial backslide I could petition my employer to bequeath funds from the coffer. The quandary is, eventually you will bankrupt the system.

My daughter attends Duquesne University because we live within commuting distance. To stay in the dorm at the school would cost thousands more. Students' chances of procuring employment are less than auspicious, but job or not, they are obligated within six months to begin paying back loans.

Now, the mayor wants to put this tax on them. Between the constant inflation of college tuition and now a possible levy on education, I commission the mayor to effectuate jobs that provide a self-sustaining wage where no education is de rigueur!

CAROL J. CZAPIK
Castle Shannon

Clueless officials

In regard to the mayor's announcement of his intention to tax tuition on area colleges and the first alternative to an already ridiculous proposition ("Councilman Wants Colleges to Pay City Based on Land Value," Nov. 12), I'd like to remind our elected officials what our colleges already do for the community, since it seems like some people have forgotten.

Colleges educate the next generation of business, government and community leaders, and they generate millions of dollars of research and development revenue for the area each year. Colleges provide their own security and transportation to students at no cost to the city of Pittsburgh, and they voluntarily donate millions of dollars each year to various charitable causes.

College students give back to the community through volunteering, interning and often working at local establishments to pay their already sky-high tuition bills. Students' decision to live in off-campus housing provides regular revenue to local real estate and utility companies. Finally, college students give back to the community by staying in the community after graduation.

My question to all the kids in the City-County Building: Exactly how should our colleges support the city more? Councilman Ricky Burgess' idea that university endowments could be used to pay taxes to the city only reinforces his and his colleagues' cluelessness. Instead of looking to colleges and their students to fix the city's debt, why can't our leaders look to themselves?

JULIA JOHNSON
Oakland

A step further

So, the mayor/city is basing the whole argument for the tuition tax on the fact that if you use services that the city provides, you should help foot the bill.

OK, I can go along with this if the reverse is applied. I live in Shaler; I use its roads, etc., and if needed, the police and fire services. And I help pay for these through my municipal taxes. And here's the if! If it's reasonable to help pay for the municipal services because you use or might use them, then you shouldn't have to pay for public services that you don't and won't use!

Get rid of school property taxes for those who don't and won't use the public schools.

TOM KANHOFER
Shaler

They create woes

I'm looking forward to next year's mid-term election, which won't be pretty. Our politicians can't solve anything. The purpose of government is to solve problems, not create them.

TOM BURNS
Rosslyn Farms

This isn't renewal

I opened the Post-Gazette Web site on Wednesday and read the following headlines: "Two TVs in Every Room! Ground Broken for New Hotel"; "Whole Foods Plans North Hills Store"; and "Kuhn's Backs Out of Hill District Supermarket."

Is this what Pittsburgh's latest "renaissance" provides? Closed libraries and schools; penthouse condominiums; $19 million in sound cannons, tear gas and rubber bullets; 30 years with no grocery store? Pittsburgh's third renaissance is looking even worse than its first.

PATRICK VITALE
Murrysville

A special tribute

Just wanted to pass along my appreciation for a simple act. For Veterans Day, my niece's class in Oregon mailed handwritten postcards thanking veterans for their service. Reading the cards brought tears to my eyes. These cards made this Veterans Day very special.

A simple thank you goes a long way. These children understand that Veterans Day is something more than a day to get a good deal on a mattress.

GUY WOLF
Scott

The writer served in the U.S. Navy from 1976 to 1998.

Let's defeat AIDS

This Dec. 1 marks the 21st anniversary of World AIDS Day, a day where the global community joins to raise awareness of the global AIDS pandemic.

I am astounded at what a difference two decades of effective advocacy and research can make. Thanks to smart investments in the fight against AIDS around the world, deaths from the disease have declined in recent years, dropping from 2.2 million in 2005 to 2.1 million in 2007. This is the first time such a decline has occurred in the history of the pandemic.

However, despite great strides, we still have a long journey ahead of us. The need for treatment greatly outpaces the response, and so, for every two people who have access to much-needed antiretroviral drugs, there are five others who do not have that opportunity. We must continue to encourage our legislators to support effective investments if we hope to resume making great progress in the fight against AIDS.

World AIDS Day is a commemoration for those millions of lives we have lost to this disease, but also a celebration of those millions of lives that have been saved over the past two decades. Let us use this day to provoke more needed progress, but also to remind ourselves that this fight can -- and will -- be won.

BRIAN THOMAS
ONE Pittsburgh Volunteer Coordinator
Bloomfield

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