Letters to the Editor

Doesn’t Trust Voting Without a Paper Trail

Don't take my word for it, just read the experts like Avi Rubin, David Dill, Rebecca Mercuri, Beverly Harris, Lynn Landes, Victoria Collier, and True Majority, on the internet, and on major media outlets. These machines can only be trusted when the source code is made public, and the machines produce voter-verified paper ballots (paper ballots that can be verified at the time of voting, but are immediately stored in a box that cannot be accessed by the voter, but can be tangibly recounted in case of doubt).

The phony "proprietary'" assertions made by the makers of these machines should be a giveaway. The links to the Republican Party by the owners of these machines is undemocratic, at least.

Other countries that use these machines do not have "proprietary rights" to the software that govern the innards of the machines-- the difference between the U.S. "models" and the foreign models (Venezuela, Brazil, Australia, New Zealand, so far). They have "open source" access to what makes the machines tick, so that experts and citizens can verify the trustworthiness of the machines beforehand. Elections in these countries have been uncontested because of the "open source" honesty, recognized by international, impartial authorities. Not so in Maryland, Georgia, Florida and Ohio.

What about Fairfax County?

That is my answer to Ms. Taylor's blind faith in the "new voting machine technology."

Danielle Greene; Falls Church

Demographic Trends Shape City’s Paradigm

The value of the series is that provides this empirical groundwork, and clearly illustrates how these trends are not just stand-alone neat-o factoids. Rather, Bates shows, for example, how the aging of the population and affordable housing are fundamentally related; and shows the direct link between immigration and education.

As much as we want easy answers, the important issues that affect our city are complicated. Hopefully, this series will help inform those discussions.

Rob Puentes; Falls Church

N-P Launched Debate on How To Thwart Gangs

The devotion of time and resources by local governments toward providing youth attractive options to minimize gang outreach efforts should rest high atop the wish list of every Northern Virginia resident. Strong support of diverse athletic programs and properly funding each locality's athletic infrastructure would be good first step in addition to other in-school, after-school and community programs and services.

As an athlete who has participated in organized sport for 28 years since age 5, the most instant, enduring and consistent reward has been a strong sense of belonging and peer-group affirmation. In several instances, whether transitioning from elementary school to middle/high school or from there to collegiate life, my athletic team served as a head start toward identifying friends and acquaintances, many of whom have now become lifetime companions. I hesitate to think of how very different and challenging my inroads to acceptance would have been if I did not have this group of "escorts" from my athletic teams to vouch for me and to make further introductions to others in those tense hallways teaming with social confrontation and temptation.

Young New Americans face double jeopardy due to language and cultural stigmas in this environment. Faced with these dilemmas, I imagine many of them gladly accept the first peer group that extends an outstretched hand, although in the long run it may end up a deadly alliance. Athletic teams successfully counter-balance these initiatives in an environment that minimizes these barriers. A team striving toward common goals and learning together provides no better mechanism to identify mutual interests regardless of origin. Look no further than the current Olympic Games to find races, genders and religions of all varieties arm-in-arm in the interest of healthy competition and sportsmanship.

I use athletic programs as a demonstration of what has worked in my experience and not a sole source silver bullet for combating gang recruitment. Academic clubs and other after-school programs, activities and organizations I believe have the same positive effect. The quest to decrease gang violence and recruitment also must include serious efforts to surmount the roadblocks to acceptance as a youth such as ESOL classes and a variety of creative methods to halt gang violence.

I have been recently disappointed with policies that raise the bar of participation in these programs, such as increasing the cost for organized athletic programs to utilize County fields or reserving those fields for "organized" teams only. Community use of these facilities is equally important. For those who can least afford the costs of jerseys, transportation to athletic events and the additional time to fundraise, these facilities appear off limits when they become available to the highest bidder and widen the divide between those with access and those without, increasing skepticism as to who local governments are here to represent.

Violent, extremist gangs and organizations typically draw from those in the community that start life without a leg to stand on and never receive a leg up. It is up to those of us who've been fortunate enough to experience the assistance and collective acceptance of others to provide positive experiences where possible. Policies that provide financial, language and community barriers to entry are inequitable and cost everyone. As I learned in the youth mentoring movement, a dollar invested in mentoring programs usually avoided a three-dollar cost in drug addiction, teen pregnancy and future incarceration costs to governments. For me, the same idea applies in circumstances where our policies prohibit activities that are able to change the course of one's life at an early age.

No community in this region is exempt from this discussion or untouched by the ill effect of gang violence and recruitment. Gang recruitment deserves a regional approach, resources and commitment. I am pleased to see regional task forces taking a hands-on approach to this issue, albeit focused primarily on law enforcement activity. Hopefully local governments will likewise invest in solutions such as programs that can act as the "first responders" to a youth desiring acceptance before the gang life succeeds in attracting vulnerable young children when it is too late.

Benjamin Kelahan; Falls Church