LETTERS What's missing in the parks

IT'S WONDERFUL that the Fairmount Park Conservancy has been awarded $1.5 million to help continue the restoration work in Fairmount Park.

However, the new initials for the Natural Land Restoration and Environmental Education Program (NLREEP) administering the restoration should be NLRP.

Why the missing EE? Because the environmental education component was eliminated from this new grant. The forest will be restored, but the public, especially school kids, will be losing education. You can fix the woods, but if folks don't learn how to care for them, there goes all your hard work.

Pennypack, Wissahickon and Cobbs Creek Environmental Centers have education staffs whose positions will end June 30. The future of environmental education from these centers does not look good.

Michael Maurer, Philadelphia

The sins of the clubs

I do not understand the attraction of the Delaware Avenue clubs. They are havens for the drunken and disorderly.

I have been to a few clubs over the years, and all that I have seen is fighting, public drunkenness, drug use, and drunk-driving accidents.

These clubs do not care about the neighborhood. All they want is your money. They must be held accountable for their patrons' actions.

The citizens of Fishtown and Northern Liberties deserve better. They have to put up with these idiots every weekend.

What will it take - someone sitting in their living room and having a stray bullet come through their window and an innocent person getting killed?

Lawrence Collins, Philadelphia

Olympics, R.I.P.

It's time to end the Olympics.

They've been ruined by commercialism, professionalism and politics. They can't be fixed. It's been a (mostly) nice 106-year run, but it's clearly over.

Stephen Cornell, Hatboro