Bullying or ...

As frustrating as it was to read Paul Berton’s explanation of what we don’t know and why we don’t know it — an examination of why it took Nicole O’Reilly years to access the damning safety report regarding the Red Hill Valley Parkway from city hall — it forced me to read the Terry Whitehead article with a different point of view.

Whitehead is portrayed as a bully. As an elected representative of the people, Whitehead is speaking on their behalf. It was reported that Whitehead repeatedly implied staff were being evasive during the debate over a potential 30-year deal with Liberty Energy. It described the meeting as “heated” and quoted Whitehead as saying “If staff were straightforward with the answers, then maybe we could deal with this.” Is that bullying or straight talk?

In that interaction, I don’t see an accusation of staff providing false information but rather not enough information. Perhaps the city would like to disclose the minutes of that 2010 “heated” meeting and let the taxpayers and voters decide if he was bullying or holding people accountable on our behalf.

As to Joanne Priel noting “the culture of public service instills stoicism in the face of criticism”: Stoicism can also be interpreted as indifference, which seems to status quo at city hall.

Gail McKeegan, Hamilton