Mailbag: City funds are being misdirected

Maybe it would have been better for Burbank to let him take the job with Austin Energy. With so many people out of work, I am sure you could have found a competent person to run our facility at Davis' previous salary.

It is gratifying to know that city employees in Redondo Beach, Signal Hill, Santa Fe Springs and Bellflower have reduced their pay or declined merit bonuses in these hard economic times.

Betty Vanole

Burbank

Don't aspire to be a transportation hub

Every single time a plane takes off from Bob Hope Airport, or a train pulls out from one of our train stations, an unholy amount of poisonous gas belches out into our immediate atmosphere. A similar noxious mixture is emitted by the thousands of cars, trucks, cabs and livery vehicles that drop goods and people off at the terminals every day.

With our backs up against the Verdugo Mountains on the east and the prevailing winds coming in from the west, that ominous fuming soup has little choice but to fall directly on our front lawns, shops, schools and playgrounds.

Recently, a story on the Leader website announced that La Cañada Flintridge had the highest life expectancy of any city in Los Angeles County (87.8 years), and Burbank was a distant 37th (81.2 years). Funny, I don't hear La Cañada clamoring to make itself into a "transportation hub" any time soon, do you?

I would assume that the No. 1 transportation complex this side of Chicago would be L.A. International Airport. Have you been by there lately? It's one ugly pile of filthy warehouses, dingy brown-tinged hotels and gargantuan traffic jams.

Is this the great future the Burbank City Council envisions for our city? Then God help us all.

Richard J. Tafilaw

Burbank