The Virginian-Pilot
                             THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Sunday, March 17, 1996                 TAG: 9603160112
SECTION: SUFFOLK SUN              PAGE: 06   EDITION: FINAL 
                                             LENGTH: Medium:   81 lines

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR - SUFFOLK

Suffolk must step back to look to its future

As Suffolk marches on to the 21st century, perhaps it should consider dropping a couple of its marketing slogans such as ``Surprising Suffolk'' and ``Suffolk - The Heartbeat of Hampton Roads,'' and adopting a new one, ``Suffolk - Where Hindsight is 20-20.''

Our city council and city management believe we can solve a problem by talking ad nauseum. They also believe that all of the knowledge and wisdom in our city is concentrated in the hallowed halls of city hall.

Our city now finds itself in a dilemma: We cannot provide the basic services of schools, fire protection, etc., to many of our long-time residents, yet we now confront providing services to the thousands of homes approved by present and past councils.

How did we come to this point? Shortsightedness of our elective representatives, poor management and refusing to listen to the voices of citizens.

I quote from two letters to the editor, published in 1989-90:

``With all the problems facing the city on water, taxes, education, basic services, etc., it is time to stop faulting past mistakes made 5-10 years ago and face reality. A good beginning would be to put a halt to housing developments. . . . If Suffolk is to progress and be a city and not a bedroom community, then . . . the city government has to make a decision.''

From the other: ``What is wrong with placing a moratorium on developers? It's not a sign of weakness for Suffolk to admit that it is over its head and that the city needs to take time to gain control of the situation. This would show more wisdom than continuing down the path of making a bad situation worse.''

These quotes are from letters by one who has been labeled by management as a ``Chronic Malcontent.'' There are other citizens who have expressed their concerns on controlling growth over the years, but it has fallen on deaf ears.

Just last week, a citizen wrote in a letter to the editor that council should declare a moratorium on residential development. Will it, too, fall on deaf ears?

Talmadge C. Jones

Harbor Road

Suffolk Recycling responses

I was disappointed to read in a recent letter to the editor of the Compass (community news section for Norfolk) that he now throws his recyclables into the trash so as ``not to help scavengers.''

Recycling is an issue that affects every inhabitant of this planet. We are running out of landfill space, and through recycling we can conserve our natural resources. Some cities mandate recyclables be placed in appropriate containers. Those who don't comply are fined.

I was placing my recyclables at curbside early one morning when a young woman asked if she could have my aluminum cans. Her son's school was collecting aluminum. A scavenger? I hardly think so. Sensible? Yes! Even if she were doing this to supplement her income, why label her a scavenger? At least she wasn't sitting at home waiting for a handout.

Not recycling in all probability won't affect me or Mr. McMahon, but what about our great-grandchildren? Pitch in and give future generations a hand.

Cathy Moxley

Louisiana Drive

Norfolk

It never ceases to amaze me how shortsighted people can be. The letter writer states that he no longer recycles cans because ``scavengers'' were getting them before the SPSA collectors. In other words, he would rather let trash dumps continue to pile up at an alarming rate than let a person of lesser means make a couple of cents recycling his cans.

We could learn a lot from the Native American philosophy of weighing every action by how it will affect the earth and their descendants generations hence. If everyone thought as this letter writer does, the Earth would be no place to live 20 years down the road, let alone in several generations.

Michele Starck Dinsmore

Graydon Avenue

Norfolk by CNB