Letters to the Editor for Nov. 4, 2009

No one’s in control all the time

To the editor:

Life does not guarantee you the right to have the last word. Public life does not guarantee you the right to a public forum to have the last word. If you lie, people will lose trust in you. If it takes too much time to sort the truth from the untruth in what you say, people will conclude you are wasting their time. If you still behave like a third-grader when you are an adult, you will have difficulty in life. If you choose to fight, you will spend your time fighting. If you fight with your boss one too many times, you will probably lose your job. Even if you believe you are correct and others are wrong, you have only one vote. If you try to impose your beliefs on others regardless, you will have difficulty in life. You cannot prove you are right about issues of behavior, trust, or leadership. If you must be in control all the time, do not make your home in a democracy.

Clair Button

Baker City

Council’s rift, Part Two

To the editor:

This is the second of a two-part letter regarding the termination of Steve Brocato as city manager and the process, or lack thereof, to address specific issues of his performance which ultimately led a majority of the City Council to vote in favor of his dismissal from his position in June of this year. The rationale given by the majority of the Council was dissatisfaction with performance-based issues on the part of Mr. Brocato even though he had received a performance evaluation two weeks prior, the overall results of which were contrary to what was declared at the City Council meeting in question.

It would seem reasonable, practical, logical and fair that an employee whose performance was “not measuring up” to a satisfactory level of expectation be provided with a clear and definitive written explanation of any deficiency or deficiencies identified in the employee’s performance goals and objectives (an extension of the employee’s position description); what needed to occur in order to achieve a satisfactory level of performance and a suitable time frame in which the performance in those identified areas needed to improve before other remedy may be sought to address the problem.

It seems this approach would have addressed some, if not all, of the issues I have been reading about in the Brocato case and would have put the Council on better footing in the future should something similar occur.

It might serve the Council’s interest in the future to consult on such matters as these, as a whole, with a third party in executive/special session to clarify all the issues before advancing the matter to another level or forum, as well as provide an approach that would surely withstand the scrutiny of a prudent person as being reasonable, practical, logical and fair and hopefully avoid an “ain’t it a shame” situation from occurring again.

Such a process would certainly serve in the best interest of all concerned in that it would keep the city’s business on firm ground and keep the public’s eye firmly fixed in support of it.

Dan Johnson

Baker City

Editor’s note: This is the second of a two-part letter Mr. Johnson submitted. He divided the letter in two because the full version exceeded the Herald’s 350-word limit. The first part was published in the Oct. 19 issue.

Criticism of city staff unfair

To the editor:

After reading the latest diatribe from Mr. Wilder, a response is in order. In his ridiculous tirade, he rails against our excellent city staff while making many outright fabricated accusations.

First, City Manager Brocato only proposed upper staff salaries while he negotiated a 5-year agreements with all our city’s unions that included only a cost of living clause. The Budget Board along with the City Council discussed, vetted and approved the final amounts. During the discussion, the Baker City Herald ran stories along with full page spreadsheet of proposed salary changes.

The obvious intemperate tone impeaching all our public employees by Mr. Wilder attests to his pious hurtful words. We have an excellent, hard working and honorable city staff. They are worth the wages paid. We are blessed with a top-notch, highly skilled management team that saves our city thousands of dollars through their expert decisions, grant writing abilities and creative thinking.

Attacking our City employees’ integrity, motives and honor without justification is wrong.

Jeff Petry

Mayor, 2007-08

Baker City

Obama trying to fix Bush’s mistake

To the editor:

There are a lot of ideas about how to fix the broken health care system, but there is no doubt the nation faces a genuine crisis in health care costs. No plan to cut the federal budget deficit will work without addressing the crisis. If nothing is done, federal spending alone on health care will be 20 percent of our entire economy by 2050 and state governments will be similarly affected.

President Obama deserves great credit for tackling this crisis. He is being fiscally responsible while addressing a strong moral responsibility: the current system which denies health care to many working people and bankrupts those who are unfortunate enough to get sick is morally wrong.

Health insurance premiums doubled during the Bush years, and nothing was done. History will record this issue as one of the biggest failures of the Bush administration. Republicans who are now griping about the President’s plan (more precisely, his broad outline of needed reforms) had their chance to fix the problem their way when they controlled the White House and Congress, and they failed to do anything. The crisis cannot wait another four years or eight years, and both parties have to get together and come up with something now, for our country’s sake.

The public insurance option, in the bills moving through Congress, is a small part of the package, with an estimated 5 percent of health insurance customers enrolling in the new plan. There is no reason to oppose it unless you want higher federal deficits, more money flowing into insurance company coffers, and less freedom for consumers to choose.

If someone is required by law to buy insurance, why not give him the choice of a lower-cost insurance option where his premium does not go to fund armies of lobbyists, hefty dividends to shareholders, and a $10 million salary for the CEO?

Craig Martell

Baker City