Letters to the Editor – Surf park, stadium name, social media, health care, sports costs

McKinney forgets drought
Re: “Plans to build $200M surf park in pipeline — Officials say proposed development could break ground next year,” Tuesday Metro & Business story.
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Although the drought conditions in Texas are real, Mayor George Fuller and McKinney city leaders are considering the development of Cannon Beach, a 35-acre development that includes a surf lagoon and resort-style hotel with an outdoor pool on top. What amount of water would this type of entertainment destination require?
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McKinney’s water is supplied by the North Texas Municipal Water District, which is also the supplier of most of the surrounding cities. In recent years, there has been much talk of the North Texas water shortage, asking citizens to restrict their water usage.
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Lake Lavon is presently three feet low. The proposed Marvin Nichols Reservoir has met opposition when its purpose is to supply more water to the North Texas Municipal Water District.
McKinney leaders need to consider how this project would impact the all-too-real water shortage in North Texas.
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Steve Dawson, Garland
Government stuck
It appears the only thing more dysfunctional than the Texas Legislature is the Dallas City Council.
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Clarence Mandoiza, Plano
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Arlington vs. Dallas
The Arlington mayor wanting AT&T Stadium to be named Arlington is a wrong approach. The FIFA World Cup is just that — a world event. The World Cup will bring millions to the local economy. And area residents should want to attract as many visitors as possible.
Dallas is well known on the world stage, Arlington is not. We can thank J.R. Ewing for that.
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Gary Tutt, McKinney
Don’t abdicate to tech
Re: “Approve Social Media Protections for Kids — Texas needs parental controls and age limits,” Monday editorial.
No question that powerful social media algorithms present us with a huge challenge. The last century has presented us with one case after another in which our technological advancements leaped beyond our social, moral and ethical capacity to manage them.
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Corporations created those algorithms and use them to manipulate our behavior, as ad agencies have done for decades. The difference is that these algorithms are more powerful than commercials.
So should we ask the federal government to regulate and control those algorithms? If you think they are problematic now, imagine them in the hands of a president or party with despotic, even fascist ambitions.
For that matter, could even a benevolent president resist the temptation to use these algorithms to bend our beliefs to align with theirs? Consider the four faces on Mount Rushmore. Yeah, they’d all do it.
Eventually the government probably will wrest control of these tools from the private sector. Before that happens, I pray we educate ourselves and our children how to experience them without abdicating our intelligence to them.
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Andy Shaw, Dallas/Lake Highlands
Health care woes not new
Re: “Deal with health care’s split identity — A public good or a commodity? Nation must reckon with a fractured system,” by Tom Banning, Wednesday Opinion.
I would like to remind everybody that the first time that there was a warning to Washington about rising health care costs becoming a serious problem or even a crisis was during the Reagan administration. The only time that an attempt was made before the Obama administration actually managed to get some improvements was during the Clinton administration. That attempt was doomed by his selection of Hillary Clinton to lead the effort, which devolved into an attack on her and ignored the real problem.
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During all those years, health care costs continued to rise at an unsustainable rate until the original warning eventually came to pass. The crisis is now upon us. Employers were forced to increase the costs paid by the employees for years until the people finally started feeling enough pain to start to complain, loudly, about it.
At this point I would like to remind people that this did not occur during the last four or even eight years. It has been happening for over 40 years now.
And you forgot to mention the most important problem of health care as a commodity — many people die because they can’t afford even marginal health care. They can get free emergency treatment at taxpayer costs, but after the emergency is handled, any further treatment to mitigate or cure the underlying problem won’t be available for free and the outcome from that is mostly not good.
Gary Stewart, Dallas
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School sports tickets soar
I am a retired public school teacher. Living on a comfortable but fixed income, I am no longer able to afford tickets to Cowboys, Rangers, Mavericks or Stars games. As of last weekend, I’m now unable to afford tickets to my granddaughter’s basketball games. Her fifth grade team played in a tournament last Saturday at a public middle school in Coppell.
My wife and I drove 70 miles hoping to enjoy one game. Upon seeing the highly inflated ticket price of $15 per person ($30 for both of us), we turned around and headed for the parking lot. Granted, the ticket price was the same for one or several games but it is apparent that event promoters, even at the elementary and middle school level, have turned affordable family entertainment into a “for-profit” enterprise.
Gary Murphey, Runaway Bay
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This calls for haiku
Re: “Three things Dallas must do to get on track — Bogged down City Council needs to go back to basics,” by Sharon Grigsby, Sunday Metro column.
I think we can all agree it’s high time for a haiku, as long as this doesn’t reinspire the Limerick Guy.
City manager
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System sunders councilmen
And stomps civic bloom
Jason Nancarrow, Dallas
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