DATE: Sunday, March 30, 1997                TAG: 9703280014

SECTION: COMMENTARY              PAGE: J4   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Letter

                                            LENGTH:  100 lines

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR - THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT

WILDLIFE REFUGE

Beach's isolation is its own reward

I have no sympathy for those residents of Carova Beach who wish to drive through the Back Bay Wildlife Refuge in order to get to Virginia Beach. Having worked at Nags Head during the summers of 1977 and 1978, I have an appreciation for Carova Beach, Corolla and Duck before directors for the N.C. Department of Transportation wrong-headedly opened up these communities to paved roads and therefore to development.

Whereas each of these communities now has some palatial homes, not being able to see in this area any longer a deserted beach or these communities in their formerly pristine state is a net loss for future generations of North Carolinians and Virginians.

As for residents of Carova Beach specifically, this is a decision they've made to live in a community whose difficult access is what makes it special.

Hal Sharpe

Littleton, N.C., March 25, 1997

Let's not disturb beach peace

This letter is in reference to the March 24 article, ``Carova Beach residents want a road out.''

The beach at Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge and False Cape State Park is special because it is uncrowded and natural. This stretch of beach should be protected against additional motor-vehicle traffic. Vehicles on the beach smash seashells and disturb the peacefulness for the wildlife and for visitors to False Cape Park.

The people who have chosen to live in Carova, N.C., should not be allowed to drive their vehicles on Virginia's undeveloped beach.

COST OF LIVING

Blue Dogs plan penalizes good work

I was disheartened to read your endorsement (editorial, March 24) of the ``Blue Dogs'' proposal to modify military cost-of-living allowances (COLAs).

The average military retired pay in 1996 was $1,547 a month. Under the Blue Dogs proposal, every military retiree would have gotten the same $32.50 a month COLA last January. For a retired four-star admiral, that would have represented a COLA of only 0.5 percent. For a retired E-9, it's a 1.3 percent COLA. The 60 current military retirees who were court-martialed and reduced in grade to E-1 before retiring would get the same $32.50 a month COLA. For them it's a 7.4 percent increase - more than triple the average percentage increase.

A flat-rate COLA represents a performance penalty, pure and simple. It rewards most those meeting the barest minimum standards for retirement, and penalizes most those who serve longest and compete most successfully for promotion. Over time, decades of flat-rate COLAs would deter the best and brightest from serving extended careers. That just doesn't make sense for retirement systems that are supposed to reward extended service and competitive performance.

Yes, we need to scale back entitlements, but we do not need unfair proposals such as the Blue Dogs' flat-rate COLA.

James Tritten

Virginia Beach, March 24, 1997

NORFOLK

Put fish market in Nauticus

In Jane Lego's March 22 letter, she mentions several things needed to bring people to move downtown. Although she mentions elevators so you don't have to carry groceries up steps, she doesn't mention a grocery market.

Here is a solution: The first deck of Nauticus is nothing but information centers, gift shop and restaurant. Why not move these to the second deck, move the virtual adventures to the third deck (where the Titantic exhibit was)? This would put all of the exhibits on one floor, the only paid-admissions floor.

What better use of the first floor than a marketplace? Charge vendors for space to sell meats and produce, thus bringing in revenue to help support the upstairs maritime center. Let fishing boats dock at the basins to bring in and sell the area's wonderful fresh fish and seafood.

It's a natural! The amazing thing is it didn't take a bunch of overpaid consultants to plan it.

D. E. Dabbs

Virginia Beach, March 22, 1997

BETTING

Nothing off-track about horse racing

Your March 22 Perspectives column on off-track betting was off. Kerry Dougherty states that each time a person walks into the Colonial Downs parlor they spend an average of $211. Actually, this figure is the average ``handle,'' or amount wagered, per visit. Approximately 85 percent of this is returned as winnings. Her friends and co-workers who guessed that on average a person spends $25-$30 per visit were correct.

Ms. Dougherty contrasts off-track betting with the TPC golf course in the works. To play a round of golf at this course will cost $75 and take about five hours. The thoroughbred racing fan will spend about five hours at the off-track facility and spend about $35. Apparently it is acceptable to spend $75 on golf (plus clubs, balls, gloves, etc.), but if you spend $35 on an afternoon of watching horses race you are ``betting your rent, food and child support money.''

As a passionate fan of both golf and horse racing, I can think of nothing better than a morning on a TPC course followed by an afternoon of beautiful thoroughbreds thundering ``down the stretch.''

Jeff B. Arthur

Chesapeake, March 25, 1997

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