I have chosen not to sign the “Protect our Parks” petition because it limits park use rather than allows valued community use. Mercer Island parks are here to be used by Islanders and not locked up like a museum. The “Protect our Parks” initiative is better named a “Restrict our Parks” initiative.

People who have been trying to stop MICA and Youth Theatre Northwest from being built at Mercerdale have proposed the initiative.

The privately funded performing arts center will replace the old recycling center, which the promoters of the parks petition somehow consider valuable parkland. The proposed law expressly prohibits a performing arts center as well as our community center and swimming pools.

The collateral damage from their efforts could be huge. In addition to the things their petition expressly prohibits, it leaves in limbo many other amenities we take for granted such as tennis courts, sports bleachers, basketball courts and even the pea patch.

It even raises doubts as to the legal future of the Farmers Market and Summer Celebration. I also am concerned about preserving Music and Shakespeare in the Park.

I support MICA and YTN but even more important, I support the right of all Islanders — children, families, seniors — to use our parks. They are for all of us.

Nancy Hewitt Spaeth

Mercer Island