Keep Sharp Park golf course and the levy

From the Pacifica Tribune, Letters-to-the-editor, 12/15/11, "Sharp Park golf course".

"Editor:  (This letter was sent to the mayor of San Francisco). 

Let me tell you a story about controlling the environment:  We go to a summer place in the Mendocino mountains. There is a cabin and well water but no swimming pool. I wanted one, so we put in a round pool 3 feet deep and 12 feet diameter. It attracted mosquitoes. Then frogs' eggs appeared and then we heard the sound of frogs. I loved it. But the mosquitoes were a problem so I bought goldfish to eat the mosquito larvae and they did . But they also ate the frog eggs. The water was getting too dirty to bathe in but I enjoyed the goldfish. We were gone for a while and then returned to the property and the pool was empty. An animal had gotten into it. We saw the foot prints. They were big and looked like bear prints. 

It's hard to control nature.  If you spend a lot of money to destroy the levy which blocks the sea water from getting onto the golf course and you stop maintaining it, what will you have? It will be flooded by salt water. Frogs can't live in that. They could not have been there before the golf course was built 80 years ago. 

Regarding the cost of the golf course: please look carefully at the bookkeeping. Are they counting expenses from the other golf courses? Are they counting the expense of putting up a fence all around the course to keep the dogs out or the expense of putting in several ponds which are surrounded by fences? The ponds are there for the frogs and snakes. 

Regarding a place for everyone to enjoy and to hike. The course is surrounded by hills and trails. I think that if you want to take down a golf course, it would be best to destroy one within the boundary of San Francisco because in that case you can build housing for the people. You cannot do that in Pacifica because the property was given with a limited use restriction. It can only be used for recreational purposes.

Thank you for your serious thought in this matter. Once a decision is made and acted on there will be no reversing the deed done. More thoughts on the subject: remember when the environmentalists wanted to destroy Hetch Hetchy dam and return it to nature? They are really out there in their thinking."

Janet Breger
Pacifica 

Posted by Kathy Meeh