DIALOGUE

Graffiti terrorist

In Saturday’s Inquirer — the front page, no less — was an article (“Paint & Memory”) with a full-color picture of an urban terrorist of the 1960s and beyond known as Cornbread. I use the term terrorist as you couldn't go past an aluminum light pole, wall, bridge, truck, bus, subway car, tunnel, or anything momentarily stationary without his slashing signature demanding that we all look at him. The thousands of dollars of damage plus the general diminishing of the quality of life in North Philly that he and his imitators wreaked upon our neighborhoods cannot be ignored, and to see him “honored” in this way sickens me.

|Ron Stoloff, Blue Bell, rstoloff@comcast.net

Gun-free zone

In his recent op-ed, George Parry trotted out tired gun lobby tropes, relying on mistaken “facts” and discredited research to argue that the only way to deal with gun violence is with more guns. Some real facts:

First, the municipal building in Virginia Beach did not prohibit employees from carrying guns. In Virginia, municipalities are barred by the state from regulating firearms in their buildings and on their property — just like in Pennsylvania. In the last few years, there have been two fatal shootings in municipal buildings in Pennsylvania, places where guns are allowed, just like in Virginia.

Second, most mass shooters choose their targets because of a connection to the place -— their school, workplace, or where they can find the specific target of their anger or dismay. Until the afternoon of the shooting, the shooter in Virginia Beach worked in the building he targeted.

Third, it is extremely rare that an armed civilian stops an active shooter. Most shooters are stopped by suicide, intervention of unarmed civilians, or the arrival of police. The myth of the “good guy with a gun” is just that — a myth.

Data clearly show that in jurisdictions with weaker gun laws, more guns per capita, and more people carrying guns, there is more gun violence. America has a gun violence problem. We need laws that reduce the number of guns available to those who should not have them while we all work together to end the culture of hate and violence that has consumed our country.

|Shira Goodman, executive director, CeaseFirePA, info@ceasefirepa.org

Benefit of ABLE accounts

Working alongside people with disabilities and their families, advocates successfully lobbied for the enactment of the Achieving a Better Life Experience (ABLE) Act in 2017, which encourages independence, autonomy, and self-determination by dovetailing with existing public benefits. ABLE savings accounts can be an extremely powerful financial tool, allowing those with disabilities to exercise self-determination and autonomy without impacting their eligibility for benefit programs. Contributions to an ABLE account can be made by families and friends who want to support those with special needs now and in the future, and no formal trust document or administration is required.

ABLE accounts are coming into their own. A federal agency recently published a formal notice acknowledging ABLE funds do not affect eligibility for housing assistance. Pennsylvania offers additional protections, including no Medicaid reimbursement requirement upon the beneficiary's death. To ensure ABLE’s continued success, these accounts need higher visibility and enrollment. For more information, see the National Resource Center at ABLENRC.org and for Pennsylvania specifically, www.PAABLE.gov.

|Linda M. Anderson, Media

SEPTA rankles riders

Jason Laughlin’s terrific profile of SEPTA board chairman Pasquale M. “Pat” Deon (“The powerful conductor of area’s transit,” June 2) is an illuminating look at the Bucks County Republican who has shaped our city’s transit system for two decades while barely listening to the riders who depend on it.

At a March board meeting, board members praised Pat for running SEPTA “like a business.” Two actions stand out to me, as a member of the Philly Transit Riders Union, as particularly business-like: attempting to depress wages of SEPTA employees through the use of subcontractors, and instituting a fare payment system where those that have less are expected to pay more. With SEPTA Key, they’ve brought the familiar stress of private bank account minimums to public transit: If you can’t afford to have money set aside, it’ll cost you. SEPTA is not a business, it’s a public good. We need stable funding through fair taxation, not cost-cutting measures that threaten middle-class jobs of riders and workers.

|Nat Lownes, Philadelphia, nat@phillytru.org