Letter: Lack of humility costing Sudbury taxpayers hundreds of millions

There is no mystery as to why many voters don't bother to vote The campaign for city council positions didn't take long to devolve into personal attacks instead of questioning the substance of claims by those competing for the positions. What a pity that our society has sunk to this level so rapidly. There is no mystery as to why many voters don't bother to vote and, more importantly, why many who are well-qualified for the positions don't wish to associate themselves with the political world of today. The recent election campaigning with a flurry of municipal spending may look pretty, but beauty, being a natural tool of nature to provide seeds for renewal, fades quickly when it is false, unsustainable and fails to produce those seeds for renewal. Common sense of the common people knows and understands the façade that is being created for election purposes: to reinstate those who wish to continue feeding at the trough of public funding. By not voting, feeding at the trough will only continue to grow. The perceived insincerity of those competing comes from years of unfulfilled promises made solely to get elected. Political reputations — whether due to ignorance of economics, ignorance of how to fulfill their promises, or lacking the ethics to follow through on promises that were not commitments — have become socially unacceptable. The perception exists that the rewards must be good. For a job that is essentially full-time employment in which high performance is expected, the pay scale is not attractive, and voter perceptions conclude the rewards must be greater than the pay scale would indicate. To gain additional rewards, there is also a perceived notion, whether true or not, that municipal politics are corrupt. Voters question who is financing the rewards, how the rewards are being secretly facilitated, and to whom. Perception is reality in the mind of the perceiver. Equally, or perhaps even more importantly, in an elected representative is humility. Lack of humility by their engineers cost a Japanese energy company more than US$200 billion when their Fukushima generating station was hit by a tsunami in 2011. The size of the tsunami was predicted by markers from previous tsunamis in the area, but the engineers were confident that the height of the seawall was adequate regardless of the markers. They lacked the humility to admit their calculations could be wrong. Sadly, those calculations were catastrophically wrong. If only the engineers had been humble enough to admit their error. Greater Sudbury council is now in the process of constructing downtown projects. They lack sufficient humility to admit those projects have been erroneously justified, and they are not humble enough to admit their decision on hot in-place recycling of road surfaces was wrong. Lack of humility is costing Greater Sudbury taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars. Add humility to knowledge, commitment and sufficient ethics to honour those commitments as attributes to look for in your choice to be your representative on council. Yes, there are some running in almost every ward. Thomas Price Whitefish Postmedia is committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion. Please keep comments relevant and respectful. Comments may take up to an hour to appear on the site. You will receive an email if there is a reply to your comment, an update to a thread you follow or if a user you follow comments. Visit our Community Guidelines for more information.