I am writing in response to the op-ed column by Karen Veloria and Doris Tevaseu in the Dec. 7 Times/News. They made some statements that need clarification and qualification.

They are both on the Highline Unincorporated Council, but let’s get some facts straight:

Karen Veloria says that more time is needed to reach the residents of the North Highline area for the study of annexation. She has been a member of the Highline Council since May. If she wants more time to get people to attend the council meetings and be informed, since her election it would appear that she has gotten very few people to these meetings and hearings. How much time does she need ?

Sure, many people would like to stay unincorporated, but, as I understand it, state law says unincorporated areas have to either incorporate or get annexed by the year 2013. So, some action must be accomplished soon, as it will take several years to accomplish any completed action when all parties agree and the vote is taken.

Doris Tevaseu is a member at large of the council because she works in White Center, but she lives in Bellevue. She seems to have a great love for Seattle, but chooses to not live there. Yet, she wants us citizens who live in the Highline Area to become part of Seattle. It upsets me to no end to have someone who does not live in the area, nor partake in the day to day living in an area, to attempt to tell the citizens living there what their best options are.

Sure she works for an organization that works with the ethnic community of North Highline. But, to us citizens living in the area, there is much more at stake than social services.

For the past eight months the Highline Council and King County has been conducting polls and finding information on annexation and if you read their results, there has been a good amount of these people polled and interviewed. But, if the interviewer was not invited in or accepted to every home selected, then whose fault is that?

Also, very few of these so called interested citizens have even went to the trouble to attend the meetings when invited or publicized for their information and benefit. As local homeowners, my wife and I have been attending these public meetings for at least 18 months. All other citizens of the area had access to the same information we have and could have been at these meetings to learn what is happening in our community.

The majority of the Council recommended Burien because with the facts we have, that is the best option out of all the information that we/they have received. Let’s at least get the facts correct.

Bob Price

White Center