Readers write

FIFA can’t compete against expanding wars

When I was the city’s commissioner of planning and development, I was actively involved in preparations for Atlanta’s 1996 Olympics.

Citizen activists played a consequential role in shaping those preparations, including sit-ins calling for significant numbers of jobs for low-income people and infrastructure improvements for the disinvested neighborhoods that ringed most of the Games’ venues.

The jobs outcomes succeeded in raising consciousness of the importance of closing the wealth gap (still a problem).

The neighborhood planning and improvement program succeeded in bringing in transformative investment to the point that gentrification has left them unaffordable.

Tragically, though, the city experienced the Centennial Olympic Park bombing, which killed two people and injured 111 others.

And now we have FIFA, where many of the nations’ teams, already living in tinder boxes for years, have seen Russia, the United States, Israel and smaller nations light the fuse. As these nations press on and expand their wars, with no end in sight, in this era of violence, vengeance and profiteering, it makes no sense for FIFA to proceed at this time.

MIKE DOBBINS, RETIRED GEORGIA TECH PROFESSOR, COLLEGE OF DESIGN

Review of election documents shouldn’t be a problem

After reading a Daily Signal story on the FBI and Fulton County elections, I’m curious why Fulton County Commission Chairman Rob Pitts is concerned about the materials collected. Here is a quote from Pitts concerning the review of those election documents:

“Robert L. ‘Robb’ Pitts, Chairman of the Fulton County Board of Commissioners, and the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections respectfully request the return of all original seized materials and an order instructing the Respondent to maintain, but not review, any copies of the seized materials until this matter is resolved.”

Pitts doesn’t want the materials reviewed. Gee, wonder why that is? Could it be that Fulton County has failed, in every election cycle for the past 20 years, to provide election results in a timely and effective manner, ensuring that all procedures were/are followed as set forth by state law?

DEAN HEINZ, JOHNS CREEK

SAVE Act seems to target legal voters

President Donald Trump is demanding passage of the SAVE Act to protect the integrity of our elections.

He claims that voting by illegal immigrants is “rampant.” But all the data affirms that the number of non-citizens casting ballots is extremely small, and certainly far below the level to impact any races.

So if preventing non-citizens from voting isn’t the real object of the SAVE Act, what is the actual goal? Could it be to prevent legal voters from exercising their right to vote? What else could it be?