The chickens do come home to roost

By Letter to the Editor on January 15, 2021.

Dear Editor:
A politician’s most reliable pals are the universality of an electorates short and forgiving memory.
In the Jan. 12, 2021 Herald front page item “Spearman wants Shandro fired,” our departing mayor cries he’s “very concerned” that prevailing UCP health minister Tyler Shandro “is not listening”, he “is ignoring best practices” and “choosing to impose a system bureaucrats have long desired.” Mayor Spearman talks of “a wall of silence,” “accountability” and “credibility,” all regarding impacts UCP’s plan to scrap local EMS dispatch, will have on the community.
Time to rewind a tape. Recall during the curbside recycling debacle this very mayor didn’t noticeably deal the taxpayer of Lethbridge many, (if any), favours he’s asking of Shandro.
The chickens indeed do come home to roost. The mayor ignored best practices, and much of two crazy expensive studies conducted by American firms — that were to be “best practice” “guiding principles” explaining how RCS should rollout! The mayor also ignored a 2017 Lethbridge Herald poll asking “Éif Lethbridge citizens should be given a chance to vote on the curbside recycling issue”.
A wall went up, with those who would benefit most financially supplying the rebar, leaving 82 per cent looking at a wall on the other side. We felt your pain Mr. Mayor. Through it all the vast majority of those financing the ruse were patient as Mayor Spearman and the then city manager sold the citizenry on the ghastly bottomless costs that would capture under ideal buy-in a residential waste stream shown in a City of Lethbridge Waste and Recycling study to be 25 per cent of the whole, a mere 6.5 per cent of the 25 per cent comprised of recyclable materials. The Lord-overs showed little interest in the costs, the sheer lunacy of much of it, the benefits, nor the impact this polluting obfuscation would have on the community — forever!
Those with longer memories, still battling walls at city hall puzzle at the audacity of an elected official demonstrating remarkable lack of accountability geared to a learning, listening, hearing disability, now asking for the head, the livelihood and career of another with similar impairments.
Alvin W. Shier,
Lethbridge