Letters to the Editor, Jan. 12, 2024

An attorney for Petaluma’s Youngstown tenants speaks out on behalf of all mobile home residents.|

Mobile home tenants’ plight

EDITOR: I am an attorney representing many Youngstown Mobile Home Park residents. Bill Feeney’s letter to the editor (Dec. 29) is not limited to his property, the Cottages, but addresses the sad plight of all mobile home park residents in Petaluma trapped in immobile homes they own in these parks.

Feeney says it all: “Hundreds of mobile home park residents are facing huge rent increases that they cannot afford” and are “vulnerable to significant financial hardship or the real possibility of losing their homes.” We could not have said it better.

So, mobile home park owners are powerless here? No, Feeney admits that he and his fellow owners can “protect elderly residents’ present rent levels for the duration of their tenancy.” Why isn’t this being done? He says the ordinance requiring only consumer price index-related increases (and additional increases for good cause) “mandates litigation … for park owners’ financial survival.”

Really? The sophisticated owners have filed suit in federal court, and Youngstown has twice instituted arbitration proceedings, now seeking to double the space rent of captive, elderly, fixed-income residents twice in two years after having only recently purchased the property. What are the owners seeking in this supposedly mandated litigation? The right to raise rents as much as they want. That dog don’t hunt.

Richard L. Reynolds

Petaluma

Give cyclists a break

EDITOR: When it comes to the issue of obstructions in bike lanes I am proud of our advocacy group, the Sonoma County Bicycle Coalition. Executive Director Eris Weaver does the work of 20 people to advance the cause of safe cycling, but in return, she gets a lot of flak from the non-cycling hoi polloi.

Given all the negative, snarky comments I see online, it’s no wonder there are always cars parked and garbage cans placed in bike lanes. Many people resent cyclists, or at best just don’t care about bike safety.

Cyclists can’t win. One week, everyone complains that we aren’t using the bike lanes, and the next week, they claim rights to it for their own uses. Give us a break, people.

Patrecia Graham

Petaluma

Beware the dangers of AI

EDITOR: Recently, I downloaded a trial subscription to ChatGPT. I asked it to compare Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein” with generative AI in 180 words. When I pressed “enter” it immediately responded. In 10 seconds, it was done. It was like it was waiting for the question.

If I had been willing to submit its comparison with some inflated addendum warning of an “existential threat,” ChatGPT’s conclusion is likely what you would be reading right now. It was that good. And I liked the letter I had written.

So then, what is there to worry about? I don’t know. But “be aware” and “beware” seem to be converging on the same moment. Should we be concerned that Meta, Google and Amazon are investing billions in developing this tool? The question is not rhetorical.

What’s certain? There will be a Dr. No for every Madame Curie. For every successful parsing of the human genome that results in an extended life (Frankenstein’s goal), someone will be interrogating the vulnerabilities of our social foundations to exploit its flaws. There seems a real likelihood that we will have a longer life in a dystopian world.

Maybe this is an existential threat after all.

Jeff Argentine

Petaluma

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