Letters to the Editor

Assembly's override of prison selection panel raises questions

Now that the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly has overridden the prison selection committee and selected Corrections Group North, you have to wonder why.

The borough assembly appointed a selection group to review the qualifications of the firms that proposed to build and operate a prison for the borough, which the committee did. The assembly then decided it didn't like the committee's choice and, through executive session, held its own interviews and selected a group that included Kenai Natives Associ-ation.

I wonder how many private meetings and phone calls were held between the assembly members and KNA after the prison selection group made its picks public.

I believe in local hire, but at the same time, it appears that some backroom politician has overridden the selection process.

And, by the way, how many folks know that Cornell Corrections, a member of the Corrections Group North, is also the firm that is suing Delta because it has had problems in getting its prison project moving forward?

Scott Charles

Kenai

Spaying, neutering pets will helpstop killing of unwanted animals

If there were more responsible pet owners, there wouldn't be millions of animals dying each year in animal shelters. I feel that if we would spay and neuter our pets the population of dying animals would decrease a little or a lot.

You probably want to know why you should spay and neuter your pets. One reason is your pet will live longer. Because animals have the need to mate, our pets roam the neighborhood and could be injured in fights or killed in traffic. This can be eliminated if we neuter our pets. When we neuter our pets they won't roam the neighborhood, and they'll be more focused on spending time with you and your family.

Another reason is we need to lower the number of animals dying each year in animal shelters. Right now around 11 million animals are dying each year in animal shelters around the country. In our community alone, 1,129 animals are being put to sleep each year out of that 11 million. This doesn't include the abandoned animals left in Dumpsters or in the woods.

Some people say that preventing pets from having litters is unnatural. I don't see why, since we domesticated dogs and cats. In doing that, we started this problem. Now we need to take responsibility to fix it.

I'm asking you to neuter your pets, and I'm also asking you to encourage other people to be responsible pet owners, because it is not you alone who's killing our animals -- it is everybody.

Brittany Olson, seventh grade

Nikiski