Yesterday, I wrote about an obvious lack of diligence from members of Whitewater’s Police and Fire Commission. Their meetings are an exercise in lack of preparation, sloppiness, and plodding along unenthusiastically. (See, Lack of Diligence, Front and Center.)
Someone asked me, in reply to that post, if I thought that Whitewater’s commissioners, on the PFC or elsewhere, were all to be expected to be like Henry Kissinger. The question was about Kissinger’s obvious intellect and erudition, not his foreign-policy approach. (Honestly, the last thing Whitewater needs is commissioners exercising Kissinger-like machinations.)
It’s a false choice – a fallacy of the excluded middle – to assume that we’ve only the two alternatives of lazy commissioners or Henry Kissinger.
Of course not – we have no need to pine for Dr. Kissinger (assuming anyone would be likely to do so).
Whitewater is filled with thousands of smart and diligent residents as capable as any in all America.
Some commissions enjoy such members now, and the city is better for it.
All it takes is their willingness to work hard seriously and thoroughly at their volunteer jobs. A pencil, paper, some reading, some notes: that’s what we need and deserve.
When officials fill committees with their entitled-but-light-working buddies, pals, friends, and cronies, they worsen our present condition and discourage sincere people from playing a future role.
All the while, those same officials will bemoan a lack of greater participation. Their complaints are disingenuous. For decades, Whitewater has under-performed while politicians and bureaucrats have packed principal committees with their pals, and this decades-long habit is the cause of our lack of diligence now.
We’ve very many in this city – right, center, left, libertarian – who would treat their responsibilities with more care and seriousness, and offer better ideas, than some of those commissioners one sees now on the city’s leading boards and committees.
We can do this ourselves; Dr. Kissinger’s services are, fortunately, unnecessary.