Cleaning Out Flood Channels

* I have heard a few times that L.A. County has been waiting two years for permission to clean out the flood channels to allow them to properly do their job, that we especially need to clean them out now, before El Nin~o hits us with its massive rains.

Waiting for an answer for two years? Why don’t I hear at least a little irritation in the voice of the correspondent or county official? Are we reduced to complacency or is it a case of again just going through the motions so somebody can say (after disaster hits) that it’s somebody else’s fault?

Hey! Wake up! Take responsibility! The best time to correct something is before need, before disaster strikes. Do something! Now!

HERMAN STEINMAN

North Hollywood

* The “flood control channels” that The Times’ articles and editorials keep referring to are actually the Los Angeles River and its tributaries. The “vegetation” that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the L.A. County Department of Public Works want to bulldoze is, in fact, the last remaining Southern California riparian forests, 95% of which have already been de- stroyed.

Over the last 10 years, huge numbers of Southern Californians have begun to rediscover the pleasures of the Los Angeles River system--for bicycling, walking, jogging, birding, or simply enjoying the sound of water, wind and trees. Now, under the guise of “protecting us from El Nin~o,” Public Works and the corps are demanding the right to permanently clear-cut every living thing in the river--without public discussion, justification or notification, and without any mitigation whatsoever. By cynically whipping up El Nin~o hysteria, these two agencies are trying to regain the dominance they once had and recreate the sterile, concrete, dead channels they so deeply cherish.

LEWIS MacADAMS

Friends of the Los Angeles River

Los Angeles