Your View: Feb. 13 | Opinion

It is especially applicable today in light of the COVID-19 virus and the subsequent overreaction, lockdown and fear-mongering. Life is put on hold and the social and economic scars are incomprehensible. The souls of our children are not given an opportunity to live.

Teen suicides are elevated. How high? None of us will ever know because the release of those statistics does not fit with the official dialogue. It is deliberately withheld and censored. Only those who attempted suicides and fail would be going through an emergency room. The others would go directly to the morgue. I would be willing to bet that the suicides outpace the COVID-19 deaths by a wide margin in our children and grandchildren.

Children, normal children, are not afraid of their lungs filling with fluids. It is understandably so, because the odds of them not drowning in their own fluids are 99.99% in their favor. They are not afraid of dying, otherwise, they would not be standing on their head on a bicycle careening down goose-bump hill.

Yes, grandmothers and grandfathers represent a whole new “ballgame.” They are definitely susceptible to COVID-19 viral infection and that is where the majority of deaths occur. The loneliness and grief of isolation needs to be considered too. They desperately need to make their “peace” with the world before they die.

The “state of emergency” is not going to end soon. The tyrants are enjoying their newfound power too much. The false state of emergency will continue as long as we allow it. It will only end when we push back.

Looking in my crystal ball, I see a new state and national emergency appearing on the horizon after the COVID-19 emergency is milked to its last drop and laid to rest. A federal judge will have ruled that since the levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide are too high those with internal combustion engines will not be able to use them. An exemption will be allowed if you are going to shop at Walmart or Home Depot but otherwise, they will say “buy an electric vehicle if you want to go anywhere.”

Council must listen to HUB concerns

I am requesting the Montrose City Council accept the Planning Commission’s Feb. 3 recommendations.

I am requesting the Montrose City Council deny the financial incentives and reverse the fee waivers, totaling over $2.3 million.

I am requesting the Montrose City Council listen to and understand the surrounding citizens concerns regarding lower property values, increased taxes to Montrose City taxpayers to pay for infrastructure, utilities, road maintenance and city services.

Please understand that the results of the traffic study completed by the developer, does not make sense from a logical prospective.

• It was done during COVID. Most homeowners in Cobble Creek are not venturing out of our community.

• We travel only for doctor/dentist appointments and grocery store trips. No dinners out with friends or to restaurants. No trips to the rec center. Prior to COVID personally went to the rec center three times a week; now, none.

• The golf course was closed during this study. No outside golfers coming in to play.

• Not all homeowners are here in the winter. This is the time our snowbirds have left Montrose for warmer areas.

• There is the concern that due to lower property values, charitable donations may decline. Cobble Creek is the most giving community I have ever lived in during my 70+ years. Why throw away an already proven asset of those who have invested in this city for an unknown asset of residents who, for the most part, will be transient.

Please give value to the concerns and opinions of the citizens of your city.

Carbon farming? “The kind of thing to make soil scientists and climate changers swoon,” according to Michael Cox who is still coming to terms with science and climate change. And can’t resist taking a poke at the assumed possible actions of the present administration. But there is more.

The film, “Kiss the Ground,” available online, does a wonderful job laying out the climate situation and the several important ways that climate change can be reversed. Among the most important and promising is carbon farming, also known as regenerative agriculture, which shows (reminds) us that nature through the fundamental process of photosynthesis, powered by the sun, converts water and carbon dioxide into living plant matter, the basis for all life and the agriculture that feeds us.

Fundamental in this system is the soil which not only provides the minerals the plants need from the ground but also creates and maintains the massive life system in the soil itself. This process has created in the soil the largest reservoir of carbon on earth.

Nothing speaks practicality like the bottom line. Gabe Brown is a well known regenerative farmer in North Dakota.He tells of the field of his conventional-farmer neighbor, just across the fence from a field of his, both planted in field corn. The yield in bushels per acre was close to the same in both fields. His neighbor lost $1 on every bushel. Gabe made $4 on every bushel. Why the difference? The neighbor spent tens of thousands of dollars on synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. Gabe’s field provided all those things naturally and automatically. And Gabe made many fewer passes with his tractor and machinery and so had a fraction of the diesel fuel cost.

So how does the neighbor stay in business? That year was not particularly unusual. So what’s going on? A recent report said that over 30% of agricultural income nationally came from the federal government. And so it seems that taxpayers have been subsidizing things that are not good for the land, the farmers and the rest of us.

It’s estimated that less than 5% of U.S. farmland is presently under regenerative agriculture. We all benefit with every increase, and if we could surprise ourselves and get a large proportion cared for in that way, the future for us all would be brighter.

Many needs outweigh amphitheater

I can point to at least 100 other things more urgently needed than an amphitheater at Cerise Park, especially at the cost of $3.2 million.

A good number of them would be in the park system – for example, a passable road to our mountain park, Buckhorn Lakes. The one thing least needed right now is another public gathering venue – indoor or outdoor.

Amphitheater money could be better spent elsewhere

I would think that the potential funds might be better spent on improving the city’s infrastructure, like repairing and repaving the many lousy roads around town, a round-about on Niagara and Hillcrest, etc.