Growth in San Luis Obispo

I am ecstatic to learn that the citizens of San Luis Obispo are aware and confronting the development problems within their county. Each day I read more and more about other communities combatting the development disease that seems to have infected our state. The money-hungry developers are like insects feeding upon our countrysides and depriving us of our preferred slower-paced lifestyles. They sweep through our towns and turn them into cities overnight, leaving traffic problems pollution, and treeless hillsides in their wake.

Once again, money is the bottom line. But, as we all know, money cannot buy oak silhouetted sunsets, heron rookeries atop ancient sycamores, streams rambling through green valleys or forested hillsides with blue backdrops. Even our own state bird, the California quail, is a rare sight. Maybe we should have made our state bird the bald eagle--the one on the back of the dollar bill.

DEANNA VOELKER

Springville