Smog Check II and Diesel Fumes

Re your Sept. 2 article on Smog Check II: I would like to know whose idea it was to make the auto repair shops rich at the expense of automobile owners in Southern California.

First, the politicians fail to ensure any type of affordable or accommodating mass transit, thereby ensuring dependence on automobiles, and now they bury their heads in the sand while the Bureau of Automotive Repairs works hand in hand with the lobbyist for the California Service Station and Automotive Repair Assn.; a lobbyist for the latter remarked, “We’re absolutely tickled that they’re finally getting this thing off the ground.” This remark is a reference to the guaranteed ping-ponging potential of motorists going from test-only sites ($60-plus) to test and repair sites ($65 to $100 for diagnosis and repairs up to $450), to referees (after the maximum amount has been spent trying to repair the vehicle to no avail), in order to obtain smog certificates.

Why doesn’t the government ask General Motors, Ford or perhaps the oil companies to pay for their messes, which continue to pollute? We’re just consumers who get caught in the middle and who will always be singled out to pay for someone else’s bad decisions.

TERRI McKINNON

Downey

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Re diesel fumes: Scientists and environmentalists tell us diesel exhaust is harmful to our health, a fact my lungs confirm whenever they spend time breathing diesel fumes. A diesel-dependent “coalition” has lobbied the state to permit the continued, virtually unfettered, use of diesel. I wonder if they could lobby my lungs to convince them there is no harm!

RICHARD SIGLER

Los Angeles