Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

Let's leave lizards to live in peace

By LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Published December 10, 2006

Some residents upset by Lizardman's hunting Dec. 3

I read with interest about the "Lizardman." I have peered out my front window at 5 a.m. to see him rummaging in the shrubs across the street.

What concerns me is that his alleged trespassing is equaled or indeed outstripped by what he is actually doing. He says he's a "do-gooder," but what "good" is he doing? At no point is St. Petersburg in danger of being overrun by 6-inch-long lizards that he sells for pennies.

Sadly, these creatures are overwhelmingly doomed to a lousy, short life, confined and not cared for properly.

They mostly wind up in pet stores up north (and sadly here as well since I recently saw some in skeletal condition at a national pet store chain) or as live food for other animals.

They need to be left alone to fill their place, indigenous or not, in our urban ecosystem.

Lizbeth Simpson, St. Petersburg

Adjunct instructor statistics incorrect

Adjuncts need a union, letter Dec. 6

A recent letter to the editor claimed that adjunct instructors make up 70 percent of the teaching staff at St. Petersburg College. The writer's claim is untrue by a wide margin.

SPC's adjunct, or part-time, instructors make up about 35 percent of our instructional staff, one of the lowest ratios of part-timers to full-timers among colleges and universities in the state.

The college's adjunct instructors are fully qualified and make a valuable contribution to the educational experience of our students. Still, St. Petersburg College takes great pride in its full-time, permanent teaching staff, a faculty that is widely respected among educators in Florida and beyond.

Amelia Carey, director, Institutional Advancement, St. Petersburg College

[Last modified December 9, 2006, 20:17:25]