Dear Editor:

Re: Mike McCrady letter – Council showed courage about OCP changes

There is a great difference between political courage (Tommy Douglas promoting universal health care) and political arrogance (present council and Gordon Campbell implementing HST.) Arrogance is the attitude of “we are smarter and know better than the electorate”.

Council had several missed opportunities to show true courage. First council should have taken a step backwards and split the bylaw into one for formalizing the method of changing the OCP, the second to allow the proposed Rattlesnake Mountain development to become urban growth. The bylaw as it stands combines two distinct and unrelated items.

Courage would be to accept that the changes are unpopular with a segment of the community. Whether this segment is a minority or majority, we will not know until a scientific poll, a referendum or an election occurs. There were several valid points raised at the public hearing. A courageous council would have either acknowledged each and every point or repudiated them in a document available to the public. Any input from the public hearing seems to have been selectively ignored by council.

Courage would be for council to prove that unrestricted development and land speculation (contrary to the goals of the OCP) somehow translate into economic prosperity, lower taxes and a better quality of life for Summerlanders. Council has only suggested that bigger is better.

Courage is to represent the majority without trampling the rights of the minority.

Finally, arrogance is a town councillor doodling on his notepad during the public hearing.

Those who Mr. McCrady suggested were unruly, were venting their frustration with the poor quality sound at the first meeting. At the second public meeting the obnoxious rule that the audience could not applaud presentations that they agreed with stifled the quality of the debate, and gave no indication if any position was a popular or unpopular with the attendees. At the ensuing council meeting, the confusion created by the poor construction of the bylaw and the inability of council to explain what was transpiring, caused further anger in the audience. If Mr. McCrady is aware of any threats, he has a duty to inform the RCMP, as threats of any kind are unacceptable in public debate.

Hopefully council will show some courage, and explain to the citizens of Summerland the alleged financing irregularities of last election. If they do not, they can not claim to have the backing of the voters to justify their current arrogant behaviour.

John Dorn

Summerland