On Scott Zimbrick, commercial real estate, housing, guns, and religious wars

Zimbrick’s leadership made a difference

Scott Zimbrick was proud to have been awarded the Linn-Benton Community College Distinguished Alumnus Award in 2006. At LBCC, we were honored to have him serve on our Foundation Board of Trustees, just one of his many community leadership responsibilities.

Scott was distinguished by his character, distinguished by his compassion for those less fortunate, distinguished by his integrity, and distinguished by his loyalty to the institutions and causes that touched his heart. He was a man who honored his commitments; a man of his word.

Sometimes we hear people say “what can one person do?” Scott’s life and his significant contributions to his community give us the answer — one person can significantly improve the lives of others and can make his city a better place to live.

Scott Zimbrick lived a full life of service, leadership and civic engagement.

We will miss him.

Rita Cavin

President

Linn-Benton Community College

Plenty of vacant commercial space

Another new shopping complex on Ninth Street (“Stores break ground on Ninth,” Nov. 27)?

As I drive from one end of Corvallis to the other, one thing that sticks out in regards to commercial space is that there are many vacancies.

One sees empty business space from Timberhill to Ninth Street to downtown and Philomath Boulevard.

Why do we need more commercial development, when we can’t fill the vacant spaces we already have?

It appears as if we are putting the cart before the horse. Build a surplus of commercial spaces, have a business group like the Chamber Coalition complain that a larger population is needed to support more businesses, and then try to convince citizens that more housing is needed.

Normally, as a city grows and housing is built, then the demand for more retail space is becomes justified.

Corvallis is a college town. We have the illusion of having a population of 53,000. In reality at least 10,000 are OSU students residing here for only part of the year. Notice how empty the city is during winter break? We have no need for additional commercial space at this time.

When out-of-state businesses move into these new shopping centers they will affect the smaller local businesses that many of us support.

It appears that we are changing the character of Corvallis by this commercial sprawl. Vacant store fronts give a bad impression of our fine city.

Where do the commercial developers get the impression that more shopping centers are needed?

Dennis Marquering

Corvallis

Mid-Valley Housing Plus excellent group

Mid-Valley Housing Plus is an excellent group whose services are not duplicated by any other organization that I know of (“City approves funding for Mid-Valley Housing Plus,” Dec. 4).

I’m not entirely aware of what criteria United Way uses to make recommendations about what groups to fund, but in my opinion theirs should be only a recommendation.

I do know that some groups write better grant proposals than others. I do know that one-third of homeless people have mental health problems and when it comes to funding mental health is often a lower priority.

I applaud the City Council for their action.

Myrna Shepper

Corvallis

Americans all should be carrying firearms

We have in this country the right to bear arms. Yet the majority of Americans refuse to carry a firearm on any regular basis, therein neglecting to take responsibility for their own safety.

The effects of this apathy were seen again last Wednesday by the residents of Omaha and the rest of the nation, just as they have been many times before.

That there are such shooting sprees is, of course, not an effect of this apathy, but that such crimes are able to claim so many lives is.

It is impossible to tell how events might have unfolded had there been an armed citizen among the mall’s crowd.

It is, however, possible to say what a crowd of unarmed people were able to do to stop the shooter.

It is also possible to determine how much effect the creation of a gun free zone in the mall had in preventing violent crime.

Westroad Mall’s gun free zone was as effective as were those at Virginia Tech and Trolley Square.

It accomplished at least one thing: it created a crowd of unarmed people and announced this publicly. Victims waiting to happen, you might say.

No one in Omaha was expecting this to happen, and no one was the slightest prepared for the possibility that it could.

The fact is that no one anywhere is expecting this to happen to them, today or ever. No one expects this, but some people are prepared to meet this threat should it ever arise.

Reid Demarest

Corvallis

Many wars fought

in name of a god

In response to the latest encyclical by Pope Benedict XVI:

According to the article (“Pope’s encyclical cites hope of salvation for all,” Dec. 1) he strongly criticizes atheism as the “greatest forms of cruelty and violations of justice” ever known. Apparently the ability to be infallible also has selective amnesia with it.

Where to start? All the ancient wars (Egyptian, Roman, Greek, Babylonian, Hebrew), the Crusades (especially the children’s), the reformation wars throughout Europe, the Thirty years war, the Inquisition, World War I and II, the wars between France and England, Spain and England, all the wars fought by our nation that claims in “God We Trust,” adnauseam. Oh yes, the “God Bless America” war we’re in right now. All the wars in the name of a god are as innumerable as the sands of the seashore (to use a Biblical phrase).

Benedict then blames the French Revolution and Marx. He needs to read Letter to a Christian Nation, by Harris. Quote: “The problem with religion — as with Nazism, Stalinism, or any other totalitarian mythology — is the problem of dogma itself. I know of no society in human history that ever suffered because its people became too desirous of evidence in support of their core beliefs.”

Let us not forget all the faithful that have suffered because of the doctrine of Limbo, and indulgences.

I personally wouldn’t want to kill anyone just because they named their teddy bear after Mohammad or Jesus.

Remember: nonreligious people worldwide are 14-17 percent of the total world population; atheists are 2.4-3.8 percent.

Roger Paul

Corvallis