Mailbag: A homeless camp will create problems

I worked in homeless shelters in Santa Monica and found the homeless don’t want to be in or go to camps. They prefer being outside on their own, without any oversight.

If you vote to allow homeless to sleep at the Digestion Building and then the police to enforce this, you’re making a bad situation worse and wasting $200,000, plus the added enforcement costs created by more unnecessary work for the police, to enforce.

Please revisit the original issue and see what it will take to overturn the original agreement, and fight the suit.

Having a nighttime homeless camp at the digestion building will be an insult to the festival patrons coming out at 10:30 p.m. to see this.

Look into seeing what it will take to over turn the original agreement, and fight the suit.

LOU VOLPANO

Laguna Beach

Fish stocks appear depleted

Riding the wave of current letters to the editor regarding Marine Protected Areas I have an ocean observation to report.

As a leader of a walking group, I spend considerable time on Laguna’s beaches walking low and high tide. In the past 10 years I have seen a steady decline in the winter birds’ feeding frenzies on schools of bait fish “” sardines, mackerel, grunion etc.

In the past I would come to a halt in the sand mesmerized by the sight of rafts of birds from pelicans to gulls, grebes to cormorants dive-bombing the water as it churned with fish upon which these birds feasted.

I no longer see this event. It makes me wonder if those large schools of fish have vanished from our shores.

Are we seeing sea mammals being rescued or dying due to a lack of sufficient food? Have you noticed that the pelicans fly overhead in smaller squadrons and don’t land in our water and gulp fish like they used to?

I have come to believe our coastal ocean needs the replenishment that a Marine Reserve would provide and think it should encompass all of Laguna Beach.

CHARLOTTE MASARIK

Laguna Beach

Animal rescue funds stolen from pet store

In a former edition, there was a note in the police section that a pet store had its “tip jar” stolen (Police Files, Aug. 21). That store was Animal Crackers on South Coast Highway. The thief took the donation box (not the tip jar) containing cash and checks for rescue dogs and cats.

Shame on them! It is so hard to raise funds for these homeless pets and this was such a setback, especially now in this economy. I have three dogs and a cat from Animal Crackers rescue, and they are so loving. Thanks for correcting this information.

CAROL LEHMAN

Aliso Vijeo