Let the Fur Fly

Don't know what Harold Weinbrecht did to piss off Tom Joyner (I'm sure there's some history there), but he took a beauty of a missile in this week's Cary News. Never met Mr. Weinbrecht, but I happen to think he's right in just about everything he said, so I felt compelled to fire back with a letter of my own. Don't know whether it will show up in print, but here it is:

One of the letters in your March 7 issue accused Harold Weinbrecht of trying to create a 'poisonous atmosphere' in Cary with his negative comments concerning our City's leadership. I have never met Mr. Weinbrecht, but would agree with the majority of what he stated in his City of Cary Address rebuttal. It is a bit curious why Mr. Weinbrecht's column drew venom when so many preceding reader comments of a similar nature did not.

A 'poisonous atmosphere' is one which encourages citizen outrcy when their best interests are not well represented, where leaders openly challenge eachother, and where public scrutiny prevails. Kind of reminiscent of the way government was run when our great country was born.

Instead, the 'Good ole boy network' is alive and well in Cary. Developers finance our City council and mayors' campaigns (fact, not opinion), our leaders stand with the developers to support $1B bonds, and we as citizens ultimately pay the price in taxes, traffic and in our education system. This week a number of Cary families received letters assigning their mandatory year-round track assignment -- a bitter pill to swallow for the sake of increasing the tax base.

The Mayor's address painted a rosy picture of how wonderful everything is in Cary and how responsive the City Council has been to the needs of the citizens. I think a little bit of poison might go a long way toward opening people's eyes to how decisions that affect us are being made and who the real beneficiaries are.