Rebutting the Rerun

I'm sure many of you were wondering if I would respond to TV Rerun's latest nonsensical letter to the editor. Well, I did in today's Daily News.

PARD's logic is flawed

T.V. Reed has descended from Sinai once more (Opinion, July 16). As usual, he has it all wrong.

The objections to the Pullman Alliance for Responsible Development are not that it is "anti-growth." Reed's arrogant litany of projects that PARD has "supported" and "opposed" reveal the truth. Pullman citizens oppose PARD because the group is a tiny, unelected body of academics who seek to impose their elitist tastes upon the whole community. We have a democratically elected City Council that administers the planning and development process through various regulations and committees. Yet after losing a City Council election and two appeals mandated by law, PARD continues a lawsuit costing taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars that has nothing to do with either responsibility or development. The real issue is that no one will kowtow to a bunch of self-important know-it-alls and they are throwing a temper tantrum.

I'm sure the owner of Moscow-Pullman Building Supply is rejoicing that a Ph.D. in sociology has endorsed his plan for an expanded store on Bishop Boulevard. Reed offers no explanation of how a 220,000-square-foot store is more "overwhelming" than a 140,000-square-foot one, nor does he offer any evidence of how Wal-Mart would create "huge traffic problems" and "impinge" on the cemetery and Moscow-Pullman Building Supply, located right next to Wal-Mart, would not. Reed also conveniently neglected to mention that the reason Duane Brelsford Jr. chose the new Moscow-Pullman Building Supply location is because, "Everybody wants to be by Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart's the fly paper."

It is interesting to note that of the projects that PARD has "opposed," all came to quick fruition except for Wal-Mart. I suppose high-powered environmental lawyers hired by labor unions are not interested in strip malls, old movie theaters, or housing developments, "responsible" or not. Without this backing, PARD would be as irrelevant as they are annoying.

Tom Forbes

Pullman

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