I’d like to think that it was my recent column dated that
triggered Lori Stuenkel’s front-page article in The Dispatch
published Feb. 6 regarding the Gilroy post office.
I’d like to think that it was my recent column dated that triggered Lori Stuenkel’s front-page article in The Dispatch published Feb. 6 regarding the Gilroy post office.
I must add however, my amusement when she wrote, “During a ‘mystery shopper’ audit this week, the post office received a perfect score. The total wait time: 45 seconds.”
A perfect score? Ha! Somebody is kidding themselves if they think that one “audit” can fairly represent an accurate picture of the wait time at the post office.
That’s hardly a real audit, which of course, includes various samplings, not just one. I go there often enough on different days and different times to know that 45 seconds is the exception, not the rule.
And I’ll bet that anyone who uses the post office on a regular basis waits a lot longer than 45 seconds for service.
And oh yes, it’s great to know that Gilroy might (but don’t bet on it) have a new post office in 15 years.
By then, the cost of a first-class stamp will probably be $3 and Social Security will have gone belly up and we’ll all be speaking Spanish in place of English.
My Jan. 20 column got the attention of one reader who e-mailed me saying “Thanks for your mention of boom cars … boom cars are an international problem. Not only do boom cars damage hearing and produce disease … conditions in the primary and ‘second-hand’ hearers, but they promote violence.”
Yeah, they make people outside the car that have to hear this audio garbage become violent, such as “I’d like to smash your stupid boom box car stereo and shut you up. And following-up on the same subject, Gilroy Assistant Police Chief Lanny Brown was kind enough to inform me that GPD does understand the issue of these cars emitting too much noise, and GPD actively enforces observed violations.
Chief Brown added that “The California Vehicle Code (CVC) section 27007 states, ‘No driver of a vehicle shall operate, or permit the operation of, any sound amplification system which can be heard outside the vehicle from 50 or more feet when the vehicle is being operated upon a highway.’ ”
Of course, the issue is for GPD being in the right place at the right time to hear the offenders, and then cite them. It appears that most local jurisdictions have some form of noise laws as well that regulate loud car stereos.
Police are concerned about loud car stereos for two main reasons: (1)they annoy some people (duh, really?), and (2) they inhibit drivers’ ability to hear emergency warning signals. That seems to be a no-brainer. But brains is another matter, particularly when some of the more interesting boom box car clubs I’ve discovered include such names as “Audible Acceleration”, “Bass Mafia”, “Play It Loud Car Audio Club”, and maybe the most fitting of all, “Noise Pollution”. Sierra Club, where are you?
I’m curious regarding what’s happened to Gilroy’s leading liberal Dispatch letter writer, Bill C. Jones.
According to my search of The Dispatch archives, Jones’ last writing was published in The Dispatch on Dec. 15.
After coming onto the Gilroy letter-writing scene to The Dispatch in April, Jones’ letter writing flurry has mysteriously ceased (as I write this anyway).
With such liberal oriented zingers like “Maybe next week I’ll send a short line just to say that I still like to irritate you.” (Jones letter, Oct. 7) I can only conclude that Jones is in hibernation, and as soon as winter ends, he’ll come out into the public letter-writing spotlight again, just like a bear waking from winter sleep, and looking for prey.
Of course, there’s always the possibility that Mr. Jones has moved to some other location where he can propagate his left wing liberal views via letters to the editor of their local newspaper. If so, then in my slanted conservative opinion, it’s Gilroy’s gain, and someplace else’s loss. Or, maybe he simply cancelled his subscription to The Dispatch, and as was suggested by one Dispatch letter writer, established his own rag sheet.
Driving down First Street recently and seeing a funeral procession entering into our local cemetery, it made me think about burials. So, here’s a question that I’ve not seen raised before in The Dispatch. What is Gilroy
going to do when both cemeteries here in town are filled-up and there’s no more “residential” space available in them?
I’d guess if you’re planning to reside there upon your earthly decease, you had better insure that you’ve got the title to a plot of ground there now. It appears that available space is running out. And, unless I miss my guess, there doesn’t seem to be any more land in Gilroy for another cemetery. And forget the issue of how you define cemetery land. Even by any other name like “high-density residential”, the point is, even if land is located for such usage, who wants a new cemetery across from their back yard? I know I wouldn’t. Besides, such land use might disturb the salamanders.
