TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Letters To The Editor

ADVERTISEMENT

The Tampa Tribune

Published: June 23, 2008

Thanks For Editorial

Regarding "Building A South County Hospital" (Our Opinion, June 16):

Thanks for your cogent editorial on the necessity of building a second health care facility here in South County.

The citizenry of South County are grateful that our community leaders such as Jim Duffy on the South Shore Roundtable galvanized public opinion to support the need for a second hospital to meet population growth in South Hillsborough.

JAMES J. HARKINS IV

Sun City Center

Get It Built Soon

Thank you for recognizing the need for a second hospital in the South Shore area. This area is growing and a regional hospital is needed.

I recently spent a week in South Bay Hospital, and my care and treatment were good. I would give it an eight on a scale of 10, including the food.

I know Tampa General is against a new hospital in South Shore because they feel they will lose patients and revenue. That is unfair to the elderly in South Shore who cannot drive to TGH to visit their loved ones. If TGH is going to protest and try to block a new facility in this area, then they should provide a free shuttle service from the various South Shore communities for those residents who can no longer drive to Tampa. I would have difficulty going to visit my wife if she were a patient at TGH.

A new hospital should be approved and under construction soon. As a good ol' boy would say, "Get 'er done."

RICHARD GINGRICH

Sun City Center

Be Innovative For Change

Regarding "Bring Back the Trains" (Letters, June 14):

I wholeheartedly agree with the letter regarding the use of monorails instead of tracks on the ground. I remember reading the article in June 22, 2007 The Tampa Tribune by Ted Jackovics ("Why Can't Tampa Do This?") about someone who said he was a retired transportation engineer who spent time in Asia, which had monorails.

Why can't we do something futuristic for a change? I don't think it would cost any more than laying tracks and there wouldn't be any traffic barriers. And people who would never think of riding a train or bus would definitely ride a monorail. I don't see why they can't be in the center of every major road in the Tampa Bay area. As long as people don't have to walk too far to get where they are going after they get off the monorail, it will work.

Let's have some innovative planners for a change.

VALERIE MARCHESINI

Tampa

Rail Needed For Future

During my 50 years in Tampa I have witnessed steady, positive improvement in our quality of life, our national image and our desirability as a place to live and work. Birmingham, Baltimore and Detroit, to name a few, have all faced periods where they were on no one's list of "great places to live." Most of these cities, when faced with the grim reality of net out-migration, have made adjustments that brought them back to some level of vibrancy. By contrast, Tampa really has been on a more or less steady upward path for the past 50 or 60 years.

However, we now stand on the verge of heading in the opposite direction. If Tampa and the surrounding region do not immediately begin a full-scale effort to build a mass transit system comparable to that of any other major metropolitan area in the United States, we will be, literally, left in the dust. Never mind the fact that as a country, we are being left behind by all other rapidly developing nations in this regard, Tampa cannot under any circumstance fall further behind Charlotte, Atlanta, Dallas, San Antonio, etc., and expect to be considered a "great place to live" for much longer.

RANDALL REID

Tampa

Don't Fault HOAs

Before I put a down payment on our new home, we knew we were going to be living in a deed-restricted community. Our Realtor told us that, the sales agent for the developer told us that, there were signs at the entrance to the development that told us that. So we sat down with the developer and our assigned builder and went over the restrictions. We decided we could live with them, that they would keep the community safe, preserve the quality of life and keep the property values up. Then we put the down payment on our expensive home investment.

When I hear people complaining about deed restrictions, I am mystified. Didn't they do the same thing before investing lots of their money? If so, why are they complaining now? If they are just discovering the restrictions, chalk it up to not doing their homework. If they did read them before moving in, they should shut up or move.

Don't fault the HOA. They are just doing their job.

PAUL FRAPPOLLO

Odessa

Like 'Bridge To Nowhere'

Regarding "Airport Turkey Keeps Flying" (Our Opinion, June 13):

Thank you for printing this editorial. I feel this airport is much like the Alaskan bridge-to-nowhere project.

Hopefully, the taxpayers of Florida, teachers whose schools are being shortchanged and parents of children who are being shortchanged will step up and raise their voices. We all should remember they did not build an airport in the Everglades.

RICHARD GIBBS

Dade City

The Nation Will Survive

Now that California has legalized gay marriage, I was watching CNN and waiting to hear about an earthquake hitting San Francisco or perhaps locusts invading Sacramento or maybe even the death of the first born - or something. Nothing. So I turned to Fox News - fair and balanced and all. Nothing there either.

California appears to be still standing. I guess marriage is still as strong an institution as it ever was, California notwithstanding.

RON MEDVIN

Tampa

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT