By Roger Gitlin Good Morning, Crescent City Mayor Ron Gastineau: Yesterday, I sent you two pictures of abandoned shopping carts along Front Street, one directly in front of the Chamber of Commerce office. I observed these carts in the abandoned status for at least 48 and as long as 96 hours ( four days). As is my practice, I picked up both carts, one filled with unsightly trash and returned the obviously stolen items to an overwhelmed retailer who deploys staff and resources to retrieve his carts. I will continue to help clean up my City. As I have brought this problem to your attention at a recent City Council meeting, I must not have been speaking directly into the dais microphone because I am uncertain whether you were listening to me. I will try to speak up the next time I address the Council. Mr. Mayor, a community that turns a blind eye to this kind of blight, fails to prioritize the exigency of this obnoxious human-created problem shouldn't be surprised when visitors and locals alike express revulsion and disdain this problem in not aggressively addressed. I know I am of that opinion and as a member of the Board of Directors of the Chamber of Commerce / Visitors Bureau, I would think my colleagues would feel similarly. If your response is to crack down on businesses which offer shopping carts for the convenience of its shoppers, it would be a very shorted-sighted response. These retailers are overwhelmed in attempting to retrieve their stolen property and asking them to do yet more will only raise the cost of their product when one goes to the cash register. It is my hope, with leadership and resolve, you as Mayor and the rest of Council take a more proactive approach to those individuals who continue to act irresponsibly by stigmatizing our community as one that doesn't care what visitors and locals think and who express extreme displeasure at a perceived apathetic position on the issues of abandoned shopping carts and blight in general. Writing as a citizen and voter in the City of Crescent City, I am Most Sincerely, Roger Gitlin