LETTERS

Happy to live in Belle Glade

Wow! I have to say that I don't appreciate your assessment of a town that I love VERY much `"Welcome to beautiful Belle Glade," Oct. 5`. I have lived here all of my life with the exception of two years when I lived in Orlando to attend the University of Central Florida. Growing up, I thought I would leave Belle Glade and never return, because as a teen there wasn't a lot to entertain me and my friends. However, when I went to UCF, I realized how much I loved Belle Glade. Orlando was too crowded, impersonal and didn't have a hometown feeling to it. What we lack in conveniences, such as shopping malls, movie theaters, etc., we make up for with kind neighbors, closer families, roads not congested with traffic, safe places for our children to play and more.

I not only happily returned to Belle Glade, I married someone else from here, started a teaching career, am raising two beautiful daughters, served as a city commissioner for two years, and enjoy being able to see my parents, brothers and their families and my grandmother on a daily basis. There are pros and cons to living everywhere. I could name many bad things about Orlando, but I probably don't have to since you live there and realize them yourself, and it really wouldn't help to improve your community. It would be nice if you would have considered the damage that you could do with your article.

The next time I see that tourism in Orlando takes a hit, I will snicker and delight in the fact that what goes around, comes around. Your ignorance is evident from your article. I am happy that `writer Liz Randall` decided to leave and no longer teach our children. Disgusted with your article.

Sherrie Dulany

Ditto

Well said, right on target `re: Sherrie Dulany's comments`.

Juan Tellechea

How downright mean to call someone else's hometown (Belle Glade) a "craphole"! Besides containing errors (for example, Ken Lutz certainly did NOT attend either Lake Shore Middle or Glades Central, and Cato Fashions does also sell small petite sizes), the article seemed to emphasize the past, not the present and developments for the near future, such as a new hospital and rebuilding the nice marina destroyed by Wilma. I could rant on and on but that would only bring me down to the base level of the article. Meanwhile, kind in kind, I have some choice words for the mess that is Orlando.

Rosemary Buchanan

In reference to "Glitter and shadows" by John Thomason `Film, Sept. 14` and his review of The Black Dahlia, I always thought the real "Black Dahlia," aka Elizabeth Short, looked like one of those women in the paintings by the late yuppie artist Patrick Nagel, whose most famous painting is on the cover of the Duran Duran album Rio. Do you think John Mark Karr will confess to killing the Black Dahlia? Just kidding.

Wes Pierce

Got milk? Hope not

The point missed here is that bovine milk contains very little of what humans need, and a lot that will do bad things `"White lightning," Sept. 7`. No species needs any mammal milk after it is weaned, but desperately needs milk from its mother before that. Raw milk, pasteurized milk, matters not. Until it is pizza cheese, you are doing bad things to yourself. Some of us even die from it.

Jolyon Ramer