LETTERS

Mayor Oscar Goodman is hellbent to remove the mentally ill homeless people from the city parks here in Las Vegas, but he should clean up his own backyard first. What I mean is, there are just about as many homeless people sleeping around the courthouse at night as there are in the city parks during the day. I walk by the courthouse at all hours, and every night, I see people sleeping in the bushes alongside the parking lot by the freeway exit. Then there are those bushes by the ATM machine on the east side of the courthouse, not to mention the concrete benches on the south and west sides of the courthouse, where homeless people always sleep out under the stars.

And what's the deal with that little old lady who lives on the benches that face Stewart Street? She looks extremely dehydrated and very undernourished, and she appears to have little or no circulation in her legs (her skin is beginning to deteriorate). Has anyone taken the time to see if she needs medical attention?

It's no mystery that the marshals get off duty at 2 a.m. and return at 6 a.m., but damn, does that mean that the homeless people have to take over the courthouse grounds and adjacent properties at night? Can't the city hire a private security company to patrol the courthouse grounds and the Frank Wright Plaza across the street to keep these areas clear of vagrants, and safe for those of us who have to pass by at all hours of the night?

I was so looking forward to an enlightening article about what's going on now with Erin Kenny. Unfortunately, your cover article by Joshua Longobardy [August 10] did not do it. It simply rehashed what is already known. Very disappointing. The guy obviously likes the word "temerity," but didn't do much of a job digging.

For instance, the article could have drawn some light on the status of her plea-bargain deal with the feds. Are they going to exercise the option and throw her in jail, as she so richly deserves? Why did the IRS let the statute of limitations run out and therefore take no action against her unreported bribery income? What is the status of the government case against the developers, like her buddy Mr. Rhodes, and the others that were bribing her? Is the government building a case against them?

These are the unanswered questions that inquiring minds would like to have addressed.

Editor's note: Those are good questions. Our story was conceived and presented as an attempt to get a handle on her character, not as an update on her case. Not that we didn't ask. The feds' answer amounted to, See our previous statements on the matter.

I try to read your paper regularly, but have not kept up too religiously this summer. (Could be I've had too much fun to be religious?) Anyway, please forgive my neglect. It cost me, as I missed a great article on the 27th of July [The Politics of a Prostitution Sting] ... about a woman here in Vegas who assists prostitutes to escape it, to get out, recover and restore their lives. ... I would like to know what resources exist, if any, for women here. Being a guy, I'd like to know what difference I can make in women's lives.

As for arresting johns? I've recently been having too much fun being a john, so am not thrilled by her suggestion and wish to avoid that. I am willing to behave if I could honestly help women get out of our skin trade here. It actually annoys me, but the flesh is weak, even mine. Come to think of it, I am new at Sin City stuff like drugs, alcohol abuse and other social ills. I want to know how to help loved ones overcome addictions, too. Southern Nevada seems really lean in the give-a-damn social-safety-net type of public agencies and programs I'm used to seeing in major cities. For a metro area as large and growing as Vegas, it surprises me that so much of its civic conduct is no better than SOL, now out of town or off to prison. Not big on compassion, you know what I mean? Thanks for listening.

... Nothing has irked me to the point of writing in—until Joshua Longobardy's prostitution article. I was interested in reading the piece, after Damon Hodge's recent article on the same topic. But once again, Longobardy showed how green he really is. The first few paragraphs were offensive, badly written and seemed to have nothing to do with what the headline promised—an exploration on whether prostitution laws are empowering or hurting women. Longobardy indulged his own base interests, describing sex workers using sexist and racist language. "Little kittens"? Women who'll give "subpar head" for 10 bucks? Did he research that personally? How do you evaluate the quality of head, Longobardy? And what the fuck does that have to do with empowering women? I especially enjoyed his division of sex workers by race: White girls only show up on leaflets, their modesty checked by little stars. Black girls stick to Tropicana. Latinas go to seedy motels. And "China girls" give happy ending massages. China girl? Where are the editors on this? Listen up, Longobardy, unless you're David Bowie, you've got no business calling anyone a China girl.

Unfortunately, those who were able to get past the first few paragraphs were not rewarded with a well-thought-out or provocative article. What happened to journalistic integrity? What happened to giving voice to the voiceless? In this article, Longobardy had a chance to give marginalized sex workers a voice, a chance he squandered in favor of salacious descriptions of sex on the street. There is a difference between provocative journalism, the stuff that makes people think twice, pushes them to evaluate their own opinions and preconceptions and, if done well, changes a few minds. The real story here lies in the questions asked by Kate Hausbeck: "Are criminalization policies doing anything to stop prostitution? Are they protecting and empowering women? Are they making our communities safer?" These were the questions Longobardy had a duty to answer. ... In a way, his article is a true reflection of the Weekly—you pretend to give an authentic, alternative voice to Las Vegas but you don't.

How can you even run an article like that, without looking at yourselves, the advertising you run, pages and pages of scantily clad women pushing sex? Do you really think there is any distance between those women in the all-nude revues and the sex workers Longobardy described? It's a blurry line. As editors, you did a disservice to those women, to Longobardy and to your readers by not sitting the kid down and giving him what for.

• Contrary to our August 3 report on the city's new homeless-feeding laws, only one person was cited for violating the law on July 31, not two.

• In our article on Boulder City ("Small Town Politics," July 20), we misspelled Linda Henry Schrick's name. We apologize.