ROTHENBURGER – Charge for overnight parking downtown? What’s next?
Not all ideas amount to anything, but without them nothing ever gets done
THERE ARE HOPEFUL SIGNS from City council chambers.
Rookies are sometimes afflicted by a bad case of cat’s got their tongue. After campaigning on the basis of knowing all the answers, they discover they know nothing at all, and shrink into the shadows, speechless.
This new group, though, doesn’t seem intimidated by the glare of the spotlight. They’re willing to ask questions, and even to offer opinions and ideas.
Of course, as soon as you open your mouth, you start to find out what it’s like to be a politician.
Take Bill Sarai, for example. He suggests the City charge people for parking overnight downtown.
I know. The parking issue — where experienced politicians fear to tread. Some of the social media reaction was that he must be some kind of dolt for suggesting such a thing. “Stupid,” said one. Haven’t the taxpayers been abused enough? And to think we voted him in. Etc. etc.
Mel Rothenburger is a former mayor of Kamloops, former school board chair, former editor of The Kamloops Daily News, and a current director on the Thompson-Nicola Regional District board. He was awarded the Jack Webster Foundation’s lifetime achievement award in 2011. His editorials are published Monday through Thursdays, and Saturdays on CFJC Today, CFJC Midday and CFJC Evening News. Contact him at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.
Supposedly even daytime parking is barely a money-maker. But beside all of that, the parking meters the city chose to install a few years back still suck…in a big way!