To the editor:

I’ve never believed that there was such a thing as selfish or lazy, only self-destructive. Right now we are watching as an industry which selfishly sought to gain wealth at the expense of the faceless masses must now ask those same people for a bailout. These people are rightly wary of coming to the rescue of these companies. Our government didn’t want to work to prevent this crisis and is now faced with the greater challenge of pulling our economy out of this slide.

We in Lawrence are being faced with similar questions of public funding (the T and high school athletic facilities). When faced with such questions we need to see how these funds can enrich the experience of all of Lawrence rather than how inaction can enrich our bank accounts. While you might not be a high school athlete or rider of the T, I ask you to think about how these projects enrich the living experience of those you share a community with.

Now think of how much more enriched your life is with the roundabouts, speed humps and dual turn lanes that have been added to West Lawrence (publicly funded projects that were not held up for public scrutiny like the T and new fields have been). But now at least we have the infrastructure in place to allow a new Wal-Mart to come to town. Spending money to facilitate corporate growth rather than to enrich the lives of people, sound familiar?

Christopher Enneking,
Lawrence