Gas Station Lauded

This letter concerns the article, “Pumps’ Demise Irks the Neighbors” dated May 11.

I am one of the 38 employees of Pat Galati’s Union station mentioned in this article. I am an American Indian and raised in Oklahoma and living in the San Fernando Valley for the past few years. I would like to tell your readers how fortunate I feel to have the opportunity to work with the Galati brothers and their manager, Lenny Bauer, because of the kind of principles they exemplify: integrity, hard work and customer satisfaction.

Their staff is a virtual United Nations, comprising German, Irish, Mexican, Central American and various Middle Eastern countries as well. Some of these employees have been working for them anywhere from one to 30 years and some became American citizens in the process.

I am returing home soon, and eventually I hope to start a business of my own on or near an Indian reservation. When I do, I hope to use the same principles that Pat and Sal Galati have used nine hours a day, six days a week for the past 30 years.

I know that we must all make “so-called” sacrifices in the name of progress. However, must we pay the price of losing one of the Valley’s oldest gas stations and busiest car washes?

My answer is an emphatic “NO!”

DWIGHT HOWE

Los Angeles

Howe is bookkeeper at Galati’s Union Oil station .