Let’s keep it sweet and simple

To the editor:

With regard to this year’s Callicoon Street Fair, I would like to say that I am outraged at the unnecessary debates that have surrounded this once colorful, enjoyable event.

Since being introduced to this town as a young child, I have always looked forward to the street fair. It was the highlight of my summer, as it is for many people in surrounding areas. However, this year’s fair, and the days leading up to it were, to say the least, disappointing. It was rumored all over town that it was to have limitations and restrictions put on it of a kind that had never been enforced before. There were a number of local vendors who were asked not to attend the fair, as they have in years past, because their merchandise did not meet new standards, such as that anything that was not homemade was not allowed to be sold. There were ridiculous regulations such as being charged a newly increased $45 fee to sell one’s merchandise—that is, if it met the criteria.

It is my belief that a tradition like this should not be altered to be something it was not intended to be. This fair has always been a source of delight for this community-minded area. This year’s fair was anything but community minded. We are a small country town, which is the reason behind our popularity. If people want Greenwich Village, they know where to find it.

Jessica Taylor

Damascus, PA

Rowdy refuse

To the editor:

On Saturday, August 12, the Times-Herald Record ran a brief story about how the usual August Woodstock “reunion” at the Roy Howard property on Route 17B in the Town of Bethel was not happening this year in compliance with a court order.

I found the following excerpt interesting:

“A Bethel constable on Route 17B turned cars away yesterday. Many of the partygoers went to a campground at Skinners Falls near Narrowsburg, authorities say.”

I can report that many of the “partygoers” did, in fact, swoop down on a field on the banks of the Delaware River at Skinners Falls. They set up tents and a bandstand and proceeded to favor the surrounding countryside with a “concert” on Friday night, August 11. The music was not in the Brahams’ Lullaby genre. Around 11:30 p.m., several police cars arrived on the scene and the music immediately ceased.

The following evening the band struck up the always-soothing “Born In The USA,” accompanied by much hooting and gleeful, loud shenanigans by the “partygoers.” The music ended around 10:30 p.m. and the field appeared pretty empty on Sunday.

If history is any guide, they’ll again show up on our doorstep next year looking for a hospitable venue for their August rites. Every person I’ve spoken with about what happened here is upset that this took place at all. The sound echoed up and down the river valley, rudely disturbing people and, no doubt, wildlife.

My question to the National Park Service: was this any less polluting to the river environment than if they’d poured pails of PCBs all over the shoreline? Why didn’t you act?

My question to the officials of the Town of Cochecton is: are you going to place a sign at the town line on Route 17B next year that reads:

“Give me your tired, your poor,

Your befuddled masses yearning to misfits be,

The rowdy refuse of your Bethel shore.

Send these, the hopeless, township-tossed to me,

We lift our lamp beside the golden door!”

Or, are you going to look very carefully at your zoning laws and enforce them if they preclude such gatherings and amend them if necessary, to prevent an encore performance?

Bob Wasserman

Milanville, PA

Government weather modification: are we seeing it here?

To the editor:

Around 5:00 p.m. on July 20, I noticed an unusual and dense grid-like cloud formation consisting of about 50 by 50 horizontal and vertical white stripes. I was not the only one to see it: others in the Poconos and several people in Queens, NY saw the same thing. Everyone I’ve spoken to who saw this grid concluded that the formation was by no means natural. The next day, a four-day torrent burst loose. (See www.spiritcaller.net/chemtrls/chemtrls-1.htm for pictures similar to what was visible in the sky on July 20.)

Cloud-seeding has been part of the “Weather Modification Research and Technology Transfer Authorization Act of 2005” since October 1, 2005, a suspiciously non-specific act whose stated purpose is “to develop and implement a comprehensive and coordinated national weather modification policy and a national cooperative Federal and State program of weather modification research and development.” Duties of the governing board include: “(2) assessments and evaluations of the efficacy of weather modification, both purposeful (including cloud-seeding operations) and inadvertent (including downwind effects and anthropogenic effects).” The target is to be able to control the weather by 2014.

Could formations such as the one observed on July 20 be related to this program? Certainly, taxpayers have a right to know more about how and where weather-control experiments are being conducted. Under this act, the sky has become a laboratory for operations that could affect global weather conditions as well as humanity’s health. The metals that are being seeded eventually are collected in our reservoirs and soil. How are they affecting the environment and human life? Are they related to the severe and erratic weather patterns we’ve been subjected to, including the hurricanes? Are military purposes an objective?

The fact that the general public has not been informed about the Weather Modification Act gives rise to serious doubt about a beneficial nature of its operations and demands scrutiny.

More information can be found in this useful article by Mary-Sue Haliburton of Pure Energy Systems News: www.pureenergysystems.com/news/2005/09/06/9600160_Weather_Modification/index.html

Marinza Bruineman

Masthope, PA