The MTA and Fixing Schools

* Re “New Math a Minus for Education,” Jan. 23.

I must take exception to Scott Harris’ denigration of the marvelous new MTA headquarters. He lamented the deplorable condition of public schools at a time when we find money for a proud new public building. He is absolutely right about the need to fix the schools but is wrong to link their plight with another branch of local government.

As a subcontractor to the MTA, I often visit their building. The upper floors are filled with the same workaday cubicles found in many government office complexes. They are adequate and economical and are anything but lavish. The MTA workers are not treated to any unusual comfort at all. But the lobby and public spaces contain public art that we, the visitors and public, can be proud of.

Our public buildings represent who we are as a community, as public buildings have through the ages. Our City Hall, library and other public buildings are built to serve the community for perhaps 75 to 100 years. They should be monuments that we can take pride in, monuments that distinguish Los Angeles among major cities.

Yes, fix the schools. Commit money and other resources, because nothing is as important to our community as our future, and our schools are our future. But let’s not create a landscape of permanent, drab, barren, sackcloth-and-ashes public buildings as penance in the meantime.

NAT B. READ

Glendale

Read, head of Read Communications, handles community relations for the construction management of the Pasadena Blue Line.

* An old Chinese proverb states that “a picture is worth a thousand words.” If that is true, the two contrasting pictures must be worth at least 10,000 words. What a powerful illustration of our priorities in this city: bureaucracy over education.

I can only hope that sometime in the future the monies spent on “the portrait of opulence” and the possibility of a new sports stadium will be second to adequate buildings and teaching materials for our public schools.

ALICE AKINS

Hollywood

* Scott Harris’ comparison of conditions at downtown publicly funded palaces and a San Fernando Valley public school reminds of reporter Peter Arnett’s story during the Vietnam War. That award-winning journalist drew a stark comparison between the afternoon of a U.S. general on his way to a Saigon country club and that of a U.S. enlisted man on his way to a nighttime patrol in the jungles of Vietnam.

Hopefully the story of improving the physical environment, including cleaner and cooler air, in our public schools will have a happier ending. Parents and others are working toward that goal: Private fund-raising, such as Campaign Cool in the Valley, must continue while politicians and voters contemplate what to do about bond issues.

RON BITZER

North Hollywood