To the editor:

Tonight, our city commissioners will decide whether to pour more poisonous herbicides on the places where our children tumble, crawl, and play tag and catch. According to the parks and recreation staff, it will cost an additional $58,600 to hire people to weed or cut grasses around poles and fences.

But how much will the herbicides cost and the vehicles and the gas to speed around squirting the chemicals at every flower bed, light pole or sign post in every park across the city? And the cost of those herbicides and gas are only the short-term costs. The long-term effects on youngsters who have romped around in the stuff year after year is yet to come.

And why do we do it? Because parks and recreation thinks people don’t want to see a few tall sprigs of vegetation. But is this putting-green mentality worth the hazards to all living creatures, especially our children?

Pat Kehde,

Lawrence