Mailbag - Sept. 6, 2001

Don’t shorten parade, but educate boaters

With everyone’s busy lives during holiday time, an every night

participation in this seven-day event is near impossible (“Changes afloat

for boat parade,” Saturday). The five nights is a nice compromise. Our

family is out on our dock every night cheering during the Christmas Boat

Parade as it passes by. And the nights we are upstairs wrapping gifts, we

hear, “‘Where are you, Christmas Tree?” (Gay dons a lighted Tannenbaum)

But shortening the route is totally unnecessary. Here’s why it takes

so long:

* Lack of courtesy: Boaters who are not registered to be in the parade

cut in and out whenever they want, leaving huge gaps. Boaters back out of

their docks during the parade with near misses, again leaving huge gaps

since parade participants must slam their boats in reverse or try to

dodge them and go around.

* Unregistered boaters in the parade: They don’t know the route and

make up their own, leaving out whole sections of the bayfront. And they

feel no obligation to complete the parade, so they just turn out, leaving

a gap.

* Parade etiquette: Get the word out, no one cuts into the parade.

Private boats, charters, and sightseers need to courteously wait for the

parade to pass. Don’t think your three toots of the horn means that the

paraders can stop for you.

* Charter boats: Some take out three charters each evening of the

parade. They cut into the parade causing havoc and then they cut out,

leaving huge gaps. Solution: Parade officials assign charters boats

locations in the harbor for viewing the parade.

You can do that entire route in less than two hours. How can you leave

out the areas with less parties or less permanent residents? When you

have gone quite a stretch without yelling “Merry Christmas” and you spot

that single little hand waving excitedly from a two-story home, you know

you’ve made their evening.

We say educate the boaters and put back the portions of the bayfront

you cut out.

Maybe next year, we can get the S.S. Michigan back into the parade.

Our first year, she only made five nights without springing an oil leak

and ...!

BILL KELLY and GAY WASSALL-KELLY

Balboa Peninsula

Government should know its borders

Once again intrusive government polices without flexibility and

compassion, ripping the peace from the living quarters of an American

citizen, the only living quarters he has ever known (“Resident trying to

save his bedroom,” Tuesday).

Yes, our proactive government policies intrude into our peaceful

coexistence to tell us what to do and how to do it, when we can do it,

and how we had done it in the past was wrong.

Let’s make a man pay a fine because he bought a house many years ago

that does not meet today’s antiseptic standards. Or maybe we should put

him and his family in jail if he doesn’t change his bedroom to a garage,

or can’t afford to add a garage on his property.

What is wrong in our community with our government institutions,

especially with our code and law enforcement agencies, is the inability

to be humane, understanding, flexible and reasonable when warranted.

Instead, the executors of our rules and regulations follow an almost

Nazi-era mentality to enforcing unwavering and, at times, unjust laws.

PAUL JAMES BALDWIN

Newport Beach