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Letter: Greg Hughes’ slapstick solution to air pollution

(Rick Egan | Tribune file photo) Former House Speaker Greg Hughes answers a question during the gubernatorial debate at the 2020 Silicon Slopes Tech Summit, at the Salt Palace Convention Center, Friday, Jan. 31, 2020.

Gubernatorial candidate Greg Hughes’ plan to clean up the air along the Wasatch Front reminds me of a bit by The Three Stooges. And it seems just as laughable. The friendly stooges are sauntering, blithely, arm-in-arm toward a doorway fit for half the threesome. When they hit the opening, all of them can’t squeeze through. They step back together in frustration, look at each other, hesitating to see who is going to go first, then step forward together again only to fall back once more. At this point, the head stooge, Moe, asserts himself and with officious anger barks, “Spread out!” Then he merrily marches through first followed by his companions one by one.

Hughes, like the head stooge, proposes the answer to Wasatch Front pollution is for his developer friends to “Spread out!” Instead of trying to jam all the coming growth into the Salt Lake Valley soup bowl, he thinks we just need to encourage that growth to move to other parts of the state. So, no steps to scrub the existing gunk, or to improve fuel efficiencies, just “spread out” and spew your dirt where the air is clean? Thanks, Moe. I mean, Greg.

Bill Anderson, South Salt Lake

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