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Let's see if I got this right. There have been five injury accidents and five property damages (Oct. 21 Nevada Appeal) at Occidental and Highway 50? And no plans for a light? Are there plans for speed reduction? I understand that there has to be enough traffic coming onto the highway to warrant a light?

Someone at NHP or NDOT is not doing his job of counting cars! How many people need to be killed before something is done? Where is the NHP? Lyon County police? The speed needs to be cut down to 35 or 45 mph all the way from the Stagecoach hill to Dayton hill. I, for one, will sue the county of Lyon, NHP and NDOT if anything should happen to me or any of my family coming out of River Park. They have a chance to correct this problem and are not doing it.

Why does Lyon County need a study? Just come to Occidental with a radar gun and a traffic counter for a week, that's all they would need for a study! I would do it for free!

TONI GIOVANETTI

Dayton

Parkview family says 'thanks' at its end

Dayton Parkview Adult Residence will close Nov. 12 due to the sale of the business and property by Lawrence Fry trustee.

Dayton Parkview wants to thank the community for all its support throughout the years we have been here.

Nancy Roebuck, the owner and administrator for 18 years, regrets this closing of the facility. All residents of Dayton Parkview had to be placed in other facilities. I have had a wonderful staff who cared and gave excellent care to my residents.

We would like to thank Carson-Tahoe Hospital and the physicians of Carson City and Dayton for the wonderful care you gave the residents of Dayton Parkview Adult Residence.

We all feel we were not a facility but a loving, caring family.

nancy roebuck

Dayton

Thanks to firefighters then and now

We just wanted to thank the wonderful firefighters who arrived so promptly last night, Oct. 24, at our home off East College Parkway to get all the smoke out of our home which resulted from an accidental grease fire. When I realized that we couldn't get rid of the smoke ourselves, even with all the windows open at 11:45 p.m., Carson City's fire crews went that extra mile and then reassured us that we had made the right decision in calling them (you couldn't see one side of the living room from the other)! They also checked to make sure no other surfaces were involved or hot enough to ignite later.

We always appreciated having the fire station on East College Parkway because it lowered our home-insurance rates. We never anticipated needing these fine men for a fire.

While we're at it, three years too late, I would like to thank the Carson City EMTs who transported me from Carson-Tahoe Hospital to a second hospital I was placed in while in a long-term coma. Sorry I was out of it for the ride, but I have often thought of what a thankless job it is for these men. I was literally being sent to another hospital, with no one knowing if I would live or die, to be cared for until whatever the outcome was happened. After I was finally released from the third hospital, I was in no shape to articulate my thanks. So to the EMTs who transferred me in the middle of July 2002, thank you very much from the entire Coyner family.

PAT COYNER

Carson City

Count on Carson's firefighters to help

I just want to write a letter of appreciation to the Carson City Fire Department and all its employees.

Last Thursday, the elevator quit working at Frost Yasmer Estates on Fifth Street. This is an apartment building designed to be an Assisted Living Residence. The idea is to make "independent living" possible for people who would not otherwise have this opportunity.

When our daughter, Candy, arrived home from work, she was told that she would not be able to get into her apartment and that it would take four days for the needed repair. This was indeed a predicament.

The maintenance man called the fire department so they could carry Candy up a flight of stairs to her apartment and she would have to stay there for four days. They arrived willing and able - except, this was not an acceptable solution. There was pain involved. She needed to be able to go to work and there was a safety issue involved. The firemen solved the problem: They moved her bed to our home so she could be comfortable while she waited for the repair.

Thankfully, the repair did not take four days. She is back in her apartment now. We just want to say thank you to all the fine firemen who helped solve our impasse. They are really appreciated and are people you can count on when the chips are down!

Thank you, Carson City Fire Department!

FRED AND THEDA ROPER

Carson City

Public schools are no place to educate

The Appeal's editorial board is feeling bad because many of our students are attempting to learn the three Rs in portable classrooms. Their "gut" tells them that this may be a contributor to poor test scores because a "temporary building detracts from the educational experience." As usual it's not the curriculum or the teachers who are at fault but the atmosphere, the surroundings. Children need the proper ambiance in order to absorb their watered-down courses.

The solution is a modern age-old one: smaller class sizes. To achieve this I urge anyone who has the means to home school their children. And by means of course I mean time, money and education. By home schooling we will reduce the class sizes and thereby eliminate the horrible portable classrooms that are destroying our children's futures.

Home schooling will also reduce the number of morons with diplomas who can't find Iraq on a map or count out proper change. I know a family who has home schooled all of their many children. They are the best behaved (another benefit) intelligent kids you'd ever want to meet. And their test scores would destroy the all important self-esteem of any public educated kid their age. Their parents are not geniuses or rich. They just know that our public schools are no place to educate children.

DAVID SATTERFIELD

Carson City

NDOT needs to step up highway safety

Some attention is finally being given to the issue of horses straying onto Highway 50 in various locations ranging from Mound House to Stagecoach. Such occurrences are a phenomenon for which old-time Nevadans are familiar.

This is also a public safety issue exacerbated by suburban growth and a "new breed" of motorists.

Many if not most of our current drivers originally hail from more urban environments and are not inherently familiar with the issues of driving on "open range" highways. That yellow diamond sign displaying a silhouette of a steer or a horse reminds some of us that we are in open range and large animals could be encountered on the highway at any time. To an increasing number of newcomers such signs are little more than curiosities.

It is incumbent on the Nevada Department of Transportation to address our changing motoring environment. Since there is no practical means of permanently eliminating large wildlife such as deer and wild horses from the area, NDOT has to face current realities and take reasonable steps to help mitigate the problem. If you remove them, more will come.

NDOT reports 113 horses as having been removed from the highway corridor. Currently at least 100 have taken their place.

Three years ago NDOT installed a safety reflector system designed to deter wildlife from crossing the highway at night. This system has recently been removed to accommodate adding lanes and NDOT currently has no plans to reinstall the reflectors. A more-safety-conscious agency might instead be looking to increase reflector protection in those areas where nighttime crossings are frequent, rather than eliminate it.

Additionally it would be reasonable to consider more in-your-face signage that includes clear English phrases designed to direct the attention of less rurally acclimated drivers to those specific locations where large animals are frequently encountered on the highway.

For those of us living in the Highway 50 corridor who drive the highway regularly, and who observe the hazards and accidents, this is a no-brainer issue. We hope NDOT will adopt a more proactive attitude than currently appears to be the case.

WILLIS LAMM

Stagecoach

Misconception about pet makes it difficult to find a home

Our dogs are like family; my 2-year-old loves her "Kaisha." She even will not bathe without her. One thing, Kaisha is an American Pit, and now that we need to move, no one will let us rent due to her breed. There are no bad dogs, just their masters. Some do make them mean.

Carson City is a wonderful place to live, and I am surprised how people treat our family, due to a pet. As a single mom, Kaisha makes me sleep better at night.

So how does one get a community of people to change a misconception of the animal, and until then, how does a woman and her family find a home?

DENISE LA CLARE

Carson City

Gas taxes affect those who benefit

In the last week, I have witnessed Dayton's fire department extricating teens from the remains of 1990 vintage automobiles. These accidents at the same intersection on Highway 50 had the disabled cars in the same ditch on the north side of the road. Clearly, negotiating a left turn amid 60-plus mph traffic in both directions is a new rite of passage for today's teens.

But what has that got to do with the price of tea in China. Canada and other oil producers are now selling their oil to a new and newly wealthy customer, China. The East has accumulated many dollars by selling blue jeans to discount stores that dominate U.S. merchandising. Now these dollars are returning in the form of competition for diminishing resources, specifically oil. This competition is adding to that of existing users of oil. In my view, the United States with the largest appetite and one of the lowest gas prices in the world must get used to more of the same with respect to rising prices.

So where does that leave us in Northern Nevada? While we enjoy our low state taxes and rising property values due to the influx of new residents, limited roads with little or no alternative routes concern us. We have a choice in making road improvements or living with increasingly difficult driving experiences. The choice for road improvements will probably require increased taxation. Oil is a good target, because it directly affects those who benefit.

MICHAEL JACOBSON

Dayton

Remember men and women serving

My name is Mary Nagel and my fellow members of the Ladies of Harley (Harley Owners Group), Carson-Tahoe Chapter, and I put on a potluck dinner last night in order to put together packages to send to our service men and women serving in Iraq.

We have been planning this for months, with members purchasing items to be sent, and our director, Lisa Lynch, accepting donations for additional goodies. This all culminated in a fun-filled evening that took place at the home of two of our HOG (Harley Owners Group) members, Gil and Janice Terrebrood. Over the course of the evening we packaged more than 50 boxes of items and a thank you letters signed by the members of Ladies of Harley for our troops! These packages will be shipped next week so that our guys and gals over seas will have them to enjoy very soon.

With the holidays fast approaching I hope other groups and organizations remember the many men and women away from home and all the sacrifices they are making for every one of us. I would also like to thank the members of the Carson-Tahoe Ladies of Harley for their friendship and support.

MARY NAGEL

Carson City

Time for county to accept seniors

The Douglas County Senior Services Advisory Council will present a proposal to the county supervisors on Nov. 3 for the development of a new senior services facility for Douglas County.

More than 30 percent of the population of Douglas County was over age 55 according to the 2000 census. This percentage continues to increase as the current population grows older and more seniors move to our county. As a result, the demand for senior services has grown significantly. A recent study by the Nevada Division of Aging Services has shown that the growth rate for Meals on Wheels, congregate dining and senior transportation have all increased more than 70 percent during the last six years, yet the Douglas County Senior Service facilities have essentially remained the same.

Many of our seniors do not take advantage of senior center facilities and programs simply because they have become overcrowded. There is a waiting list for some of the programs and several recreational activities have been discontinued due to lack of space. Parking has always been a problem stretching up Meadow Lane every day. The proposed senior center will have ample kitchen and dining facilities, recreational areas, classrooms, parking and easy access.

By this letter, I don't mean to scare seniors away from the current facility. The existing senior center has a multitude of excellent recreational, educational and service programs, but it is time that Douglas County accepts the fact that the senior population is here to stay and will increase in the future. I urge all Douglas County residents to support the proposal for a new senior center.

PAUL LOCKWOOD

President, Young At Heart Senior Citizens Club