County offers plenty to do without building rec center

I am a Bonner County property owner, I am also a single mother of eight children, five of whom still live at home. It has been with dismay that I have read in the paper of a group that is trying to form a recreation center at the taxpayers' expense. Every year I struggle to make ends meet; my expenses go up and my income usually goes down, I want to beg the community to take in account people like me who can't afford to fund the wants and pleasures of a few adults who are saying this is for the kids!

All of my children have been raised in Bonner County, my oldest is 28, my youngest is 5. We have skated when the weather has permitted the formation of solid ice on our creek, or on the lake near Sand Creek. We never felt deprived not skating the rest of the time. Bonner County affords us with surroundings that gives us activities that don't cost anything right in our own back yard. We swim when it warms up in the Spring, SWAC has also taught my children to swim through swim lesson for non-members. I can afford those sessions from time to time for a child or two; the rest of the time we swim in the lake and love it. Please think of the old folks who live in this county that aren't going to use a rec center and who struggle to pay taxes, too. They have lived here all their lives and found a quality of life worth living at their own expense without a recreation center. Others can, too.

SANDY WEISZ

Sandpoint