By Letter to the Editor on August 5, 2020.
Re: “Province sends ARCHES audit to LPS,” Herald, July 24.
If $1,600,000 of misappropriated, unaccounted for or money missing from the taxpayers’ piggy bank is not sufficient to investigate as a criminal matter, I don’t know what would be. This scandalous debacle from the beginning is coming to a conclusion and I’m one of the vast majority of taxpayers paying for this city-wide harm-inducing project who are plenty pleased it is.
The LPS investigation must be swift, it must be neutral and it must be conclusive in their findings. I know of not one person who believes a line of feeders at the public trough, unelected ones at that, one of them drawing a salary in the range of the prime minister with others close behind, doesn’t warrant a serious investigation – an “all cards on the table in a public forum” one, too! We want to know what is going on and has gone on!
Having said that, I have a nagging suspicion our police service is not neutral, and will not be swift in their dealings with this serious matter. It’s going to take some time finding expertise in obfuscating techniques to arrive at a publicly palatable excuse for the abuse.
As a side note, I haven’t heard much from the prime tooter of this community-wrecking calamitous mess, Shannon Phillips, NDP MLA for Lethbridge-West. Normally Ms. Phillips is lightning-quick on the trigger, filling the target full of holes related to abuses she’s right on top of. Not much from the chief magistrate either – and that was entirely predictable, too!
Alvin W. Shier
Lethbridge
9
Yes you can almost smell the paper shredders that must be running at full speed and the distancing from any SCS support is now a mega marathon.
Phillips is the person who SHOULD be held accountable for this fiasco. She represented the Downtown and threw each and everyone of the businesses she represents under the Bus. FitzPatrick although gone did her best to ensure London Road area was crushed (her constituency) and was a big advocate of SCS killing our city. But as you say Alvin, lets not forget his supreme omnipotence Spearman who was truly the Blind ,leading the blind on this one. Its got to be an “NDP melding of the NON thinkers” that came up with this one. Each should pay in some way!
Thank you Mr. Shier, for your eagle eye observations. Both Mr. Shier and Mr. Bremner blast with real world experience and wisdom. The LPS investigation must be and be seen to be, one of full disclosure to the public. We are owed ,at the very least that.
A full and complete accounting of the cost to city taxpayers for the record ,would also be nice. We started with about 300 street needle users back 3 years ago. Apparently, that number was pretty steady over the last several years. We lost some and gained some? How much those people contributed to any spread of HIV or Hep C,I don’t know. But it appears as though a full-on comprehensive effort towards those local people, may have seen a more productive result. Did the police ,often first on the scene lack the needed support?
Again I quiver (and probably will for the rest of my live) whenever I hear the words, “We are from the government and we are here to help”. Especially with probably very well meaning but 2 minute experts ,that we had who were actually calling the shots and actively promoting this episode, (above and below the table). It may be alittle foggy now, as to who they were, for some.