Letters to the Editor
Some think Pahrump needs a town board – I think not
In reference to Dr.Tom Waters’ letter that Pahrump needs a town board, I must disagree.
The issue at hand involves Nye County not collecting room tax late fees for three years, some of which are due to the Pahrump Township. Dr. Tom contends that “we would have discovered this problem in year one.” Well, perhaps but not likely. The other towns didn’t realize it until the folks up in Tonopah noticed that ‘hey, we’re missing some money.’
So Dr. Tom says, let’s form a town board and this’ll never happen again. Of course, they’ll need to hire a town manager and they don’t come cheap. And they’ll need to hire a treasurer/comptroller/recorder with health plans and PERS contributions. And a couple of extra office staff to deal with the additional workload. Oh, and don’t forget to hire an attorney on retainer to keep everybody out of legal trouble. And we’ll need office space for the new board members. And maybe a couple of vehicles for “official use only.” And on and on.
Pahrump is in a unique situation, politically. Yes, other towns have their own boards but Pahrump Valley holds four of the five commission districts and part of the fifth. All five commissioners have homes here in the valley and the commission meetings are mainly held here. The vast majority of residents live here. There’s certainly no lack of political power in Pahrump. A new town board would simply be redundant and offer nothing of value.
So I say to Dr. Tom, fagetaboutit. It’s a waste of time.
Richard Bushart
Violent action was uncalled for in Kirk assassination
I really didn’t know much about him and just thought he was a smart, clean-cut guy, and a bit of an anomaly being so young. Apparently, he was very well known with younger people, well-liked and respected by many and also hated by some enough to assassinate him for the words he spoke, which seemed to influence many of these people and bring them into the world of reality, reason, and responsibility.
Us older people were not his target audience and he seemed to understand his generation and younger people much better than many of us, that is the way they look at today’s world, the good, the bad, the challenge issues, and problems they face.
Since he was assassinated, I took a deeper look at the ways and things he addressed — these things younger people face — and learned many of his detractors took his words, statements, and intentions, either completely out of context or outright lied about him, calling him a fascist, racist, homophobe, and etc.
I was unable to find a single time he was outright disrespectful to anyone who challenged his thoughts or opinions on any subject. On the contrary, he was very kind and sensitive especially to those he felt were confused about the message he was trying to convey to them. Yes, he was firm in his stances of principles and certainly didn’t bring everyone around to his thoughts, but I’d guess he at least made most start thinking and believing that there are other ways and other solutions than what they believed before. The sad reality of humans, there have been and likely always will be those, some even very intelligent that are influenced by others to take violent action against those being portrayed as threatening to them in some manner while those doing the incitement to violence in clever covert ways, play and proclaim innocence and even reverse fault to the victims. Kinda like the rape victim [who] is at fault because of her dress because after all, the rapist can’t be expected to control himself.
David Jaronik
