West Valley has not won. West Valley as a whole has lost out on a much needed local resource that would have enhanced an unused blight of a space. The plan would also have greatly enhanced property owners with extensive tree plantings to block sight and sound of a soon to be twinned highway.
The town as well has lost out on the much-needed resource that an expensive and expansive engagement of all citizens designated the need and site for in 2012. That further makes a mockery of public engagement in this town. Certainly council exacerbated that trend by again only getting one side of the discussion and failing to consult with far more stakeholders.
The mayor recently lamented to me that administration has trouble getting people out to engagements. It is not rocket science to understand treating the results of engagements in this way repeatedly is exactly why that trouble exists. The mayor promised to become a “community driven council” and instead has again chosen to ignore broad community input and all the voices from one side of a discussion.
A very few irrational citizens feel they have won something but sadly have clouded thought with emotion to such a degree that they don’t even see what they’ve lost.
Shame on the Cochrane Eagle for doing all it could to turn this public discussion into a win/lose from the beginning. I really don’t think bringing Donald Trump attitudes to local news reporting is going to help anyone.
Jim Uffelman
