Has anyone else noticed how our City Commission has gone into high gear with elections coming up?
Suddenly, all the major issues have become issues they just can’t wait to resolve. Were they not always important issues?
And if it were not so tragic to former City Manager Jim Collard and his family, the fact that he got “thrown under the bus” would almost seem poetic since one of the more recent controversies was whether to allow a bus station at Shawnee Mall.
If Mr. Collard was not going in the right direction --City Commissioners cited a change in direction for their decision to fire him-- why did it take so long? And if the Commission’s decision to “sever” his contract was unanimous, as it was when they voted in public, it makes me wonder why someone on the Commission didn’t bring it up before now.
I just can’t believe that of all seven members of the Commission, not one was willing to support him in public.
I don’t know if Mr. Collard wasn’t doing the job we, the citizens, had hoped he would do because he wasn’t capable or because he was being micro-managed by some of our elected officials. I have my opinion, though, and I’m sure many others do, also.
I wish Jim and his family all the best and I hope all of Shawnee will turn out in the upcoming election and deliver a message that we expect more from our city government than four years of bickering followed by four months of high-speed “catch up.”
Guy Goodine,
Shawnee
