Corporate Sponsors for National Parks

* As long as Congress places a higher value on tobacco plants than ancient pines and alpine flowers, it is going to entertain corporate wishes to purchase the goodwill of our national parks through corporate sponsorship (Sept. 16).

This generation has a mandate to care for our nation’s treasures, not exploit them. Those in Congress who say that this trust must pay its own way ignore that our parklands are at the heart of tourist-driven economies and recreational industries across the nation. They create employment and revenue far beyond their boundaries and well in excess of their cost.

BILL GREWE

Ventura

* The proposal to solicit corporate sponsorship for our national parks is imaginative, but not nearly as much as it might be. The Department of Defense budget is so much larger than that of the park service--why not adapt the proposition to aid in support of that always underfunded agency?

Imagine if our cruise missiles or “smart” bombs bore the message “brought to you by”--followed by the name and logo of the contractor who had built it? Our aircraft carriers might have comparable messages painted on their sides; imagine the countless thousands of people who would scan the skies or seas and read the inspiring message. Think of the publicity that would bring to so many of the corporations which have contributed to building our weapons!

ADOLPH B. AMSTER

Ridgecrest