Friday, December 7, 2007

'TIS THE SEASON FOR SWEARING (WCHL Commentary)

If you didn’t know, this is the season for swearing; five last Monday in Chapel Hill, four last Tuesday in Carrboro, and four Thursday at the School Board meeting. That’s a lot of swearing and it was good swearing resulting from voters going to the polls and doing their civic duty. Some might tell you that your one vote doesn’t really matter; I say it does matter. In the Chapel Hill vote, candidate four and number five were separated by only 60 votes.

Yes, voting matters and I wish more of us participated in selecting those who will work untiringly as they lead our municipal governments and school system. Let’s commend all who ran and all of those who have served for their willingness to work hard to us and make the sacrifices that comes with service. As one council member made clear the other night, their families also serve and sacrifice.

Our communities and schools face all sorts of challenges that will determine our future. We citizens need to participate in the process and let our elected officials know our thoughts and concerns before decisions are made and not just complain after the decisions are made.

Given their commitment to us, it’s the least we can do.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I liked this commentary Fred. I really appreciate it when someone says "thanks"...which happened at the swearing in but doesn't occur all the time. A nice older lady came up to me so sweetly and said she appreciated all I did and I "seemed to ask all the right questions and say the right thing." We don't always hear those nice words and it's always nice to hear them. As Jim Ward said, this job takes a lot of yourself, but also a lot of your family. We certainly don't do it for the pay! Matt C. said it well, too when he said we are all here (council) for the same reason, to make Chapel Hill a better place....but how we go about doing that may show our differences. And I agree with what you said about making thoughts known to the council prior to decisions being made. That's what I am there for...to listen and base my decisions on what people want, what my instincts tell me, and what is reasonable and practical for the Town. I look forward to working with the newly sworn, and as Bill Thorpe has said on a couple of occasions, we're in the home stretch now. The next two years will have amazing challenges for our Town and I look forward to jumping in with the same energy that I had (hopefully) when I started. In a week or two I will have finalized my "midterm report" on what I've done/seen in my last two years, and what I think is coming and what I want to do. That'll be on my website when I can get around to finishing it!

Anonymous said...

Thanks Laurin! It should be an interesting two years. I predict that budgetary pressures will influence a lot of what is or isn't done.

Thanks again for all that you do

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