Dear Larry,

I know that right now, you’re intent on hiring your friend Rick Carlisle as the next coach of the Pacers. I can understand that. If I had any jobs to give away, I’d probably want to give them to my friends as well.

When Indianapolis Police Department officers approached Jason Snider in the early morning hours of May, the 24-year-old from the southwest side of Indianapolis had several things working against him. First of all, his eyes and nose were filled with disabling chemical spray. Snider and a female friend had just exited Tiki Bob’s nightclub, only to walk right into the scene of a fight being broken up by IPD officers. Although neither Snider nor his friend was involved in the altercation, some of the spray used by the police to subdue the fight inadvertently drifted their way.

Since NUVO’s first article on the topic (“Troubled Water: Six Questions About the Indianapolis Water Company Deal,” June 4) and in light of growing opposition to the privatized management of the city waterworks, USFilter and the Dept. of Waterworks have circled the wagons. But their reactions to criticism have led to more questions. Here are another six:

As director of cultural tourism for the City of Indianapolis, Marty Peters is point person for Mayor Bart Peterson’s Cultural Development Initiative. When Peterson unveiled his Initiative in July 2001, he went further to acknowledge the importance of the city’s arts and cultural resources to public policy than any mayor before him. He also unleashed a flood of pent-up expectations among the city’s arts and cultural leaders.

If you’re a parent — if you’re not, just pretend — imagine sending your child off to school, backpack strapped on, lunch box in hand, ready for a day of growth and learning. Now imagine your sweet-faced son or daughter running home that afternoon, full of stories about the day’s events. When you ask what the class learned that day, you are told, in history, they learned about World War II but heard nothing of the Holocaust.

Over two hundred years ago, Adam Smith wrote about the “invisible hand” which guides free markets to stability. In the 21st century, that capitalist pat on the butt seems to have brought more equality for lesbian and gay Lilly employees.

For Jenni Walter, Friday night starts with a phone call.

“I ask my friend for 50, sometimes 75. I meet him on a street near my house. And I’m ready to go,” she said.

Twenty-year-old Walter gets her fix — a handful of OxyContin pills — once a week on Fridays. But she gets high every day. Walter would try to get the pills on Monday instead, to stave off the temptation to overuse on the weekend. But money doesn’t come in from her part-time job until the end of the week. And by that time, her supply is dangerously low.

It’s the dog days of August, when the weather is as sticky as peoples’ tempers are short. Those who haven’t yet taken their summer vacations count the days until Labor Day and sweat it out.

For more than a year and a half now, over 600 people — some as young as 13 years old — have been held at the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The detainees have been denied access to lawyers, their families, or any advisement of charges that may be filed against them. President Bush says that any trials will be held by military tribunals, perhaps in secret. Officials are considering building an execution chamber right on the base.

“It’s a wonderful plan,” declared Brian Payne, President of the Central Indiana Community Foundation and a member of the city’s Cultural Development Commission, at the unveiling of the new master plan for public art last week at the Eiteljorg Museum. “This is all do-able as far as I’m concerned.”