While the recent tragedy at the Forum was an extreme tragedy, once again, there is an outcry to ban or limit guns. The recent letter from Mr. Madrigal exhibits the belief that no one should be allowed to carry a gun even if they have a concealed permit.

His statement was that to protect yourself from a crazy person, just call the police. I’ve got news for you, by the time you compose yourself enough to call the police, minutes will have passed. By the time police arrive, more time will have passed.

An active shooter — regardless of the weapon — can kill or injure many people. I prefer to be the sheepdog who takes out the “crazy” and to save myself and those around me. It’s laughable to think a criminal will obey the law and not use a gun simply because of an ordinance.

Concealed carry persons pass a background check, and I know of no case where they have turned “crazy” and used a weapon illegally. We have the Second Amendment for a reason. You might ask yourself why no foreign country has been able to invade us. Revolutionary war comes to mind. If you don’t want to have a gun good for you. I get that.

— Owen Herzberg, Sisters

Jerry Rudloff claims there is “so much at stake” if he and his neighbors lose their “small stream” (spoiler alert — it’s a canal). These people feel entitled to this water feature (another term I often hear from the anti-piping chorus), but they have zero entitlement to the canal, the easement through which it runs, or the water in it.

Piping the canal not only solves for seepage (that water leaking into your aquifer is not yours — it belongs to someone else) but also evaporation, both of which cause a substantial amount of water to be wasted. The water savings alone makes piping a no-brainer. Piping the canal will also mean a significant decrease in the amount of weed seed that gets into the water and is then transported into other people’s yards, gardens, and pastures.

Piping also solves a significant liability issue as people and animals cannot fall into a canal when it is piped.

Finally, piping allows the water authority to begin to automate and measure delivery, which is virtually impossible in today’s open canal environment.

— David Jankowski, Bend

Did you ever live next door to a thoughtless neighbor? One who wouldn’t turn his music down late at night.

The guy, let’s call him Hayden, blasts his stereo so loud that you can’t shut it out.

As the evening progresses, he tends to turn it up louder. Close the windows, close the door, turn up your own TV, put on headphones. The bass and drums come right through it all.

You want to sit outside and enjoy the cool Bend evening. Forget about it. Open up and let the breeze waft through. Not gonna happen. You just keep everything closed up and turn on the subtitles.

If you complain, Hayden just ignores it. If you talk to the building manager, you learn that Hayden has “connections.” He’s Just. Too. Important. Besides, he “always goes to bed at 10.”

Well, I don’t want Hayden to lose his music. Some of it is kinda nice. I just want him to turn the damn knob to the left. Keep it to himself.

He’s like the neighbor who throws his lawn clippings over the fence to your lot. It’s nice that he mows his lawn. But you don’t want to clean up after him.

If any of this sounds familiar, it’s because we live with it dozens of evenings a year. It’s time to put some reasonable limits on Hayden’s volume control. He can have his music, and we can have the quiet enjoyment of our homes on summer evenings in Bend.

— Greg Byrne, Bend

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