Survey Fallout

“No one loves the messenger who brings bad news.”

How true that statement is. Now I know how the messenger feels after he has been shot!

For a guy who is as sensitive as I am and who wants to be loved by everyone, this is been a very traumatic week for me.

First, a couple of my readers made some nasty cracks that really had nothing to do with the municipal political survey that I prepared but were personal to me. If that was not bad enough, now this:

• ----- Original Message -----
  From: Gignac, Jo-Anne (Councillor)
  To: windsorcityblog@yahoo.ca
  Sent: Monday, February 02, 2009 3:46 PM
  Subject: Re: Mister Softie's lament
  
  Please remove me from your email list.
  JAG

Then this:

• ----- Original Message -----
  From: Jones, Ron
  To: WindsorCityBlog
  Sent: Monday, February 02, 2009 10:19 PM
  Subject: RE: Busy weekend of border stories
  
  Please remove my contact from your mailing. Thank you. Ron Jones

How polite even as I heard the "bang" go off.

I knew that these two Councillors could not have been the authors of those nasty comments. But their request for deletion from my BLOG e-mail list hurt all the same.

One right after another. After all of this time too on my list. On the same Monday too, Council day. I wondered if this was a subject of an in camera meeting discussion. I had better check the Minutes when they come out. Who is going to be next to go? Could this be a plot to see which Councillors actually read BLOGs so that they can be re-educated?

I did not understand. These people are elected by the Taxpayers of Windsor. I am a Taxpayer. Don’t they want to know what I think about what is going on in this City? I know that I am not always in favour of what they are doing but is that a crime for which I should be so punished?

It especially hurt about Council Gignac since I praised her recently for her foresight on the Cleary transaction about being the only Councillor who voted against it. I guess it is what have you praised me for lately that counts.

Seriously, do Members of Council only want to hear from YES-men and women? Are they afraid of hearing criticism, especially constructive criticism as I set out in my BLOGs?

Perhaps they did not want to be part of a small group. After all, Councillor Hatfield recently said that only 20 or 30 people might read a BLOG.

A Star writer in a BLOG said before that:

• “Ward 1 candidate Coun. Dave Brister is not a fan of blogs.
  
  “I don’t read blogs,” he said recently.”

It was also said about him:

• “Brister said all the criticism directed at council over the last year about secret deals and secret meetings has only been an issue for two or three people in the community — “two or three people out of (a) 200,000 population.”

I wonder if I am classified as one of those two or three people.

I get it, perhaps the Councillors want me to do charitable work instead. The Councillor formerly known as Councillor Budget said to another BLOGGER in town in a not so polite way:

• “Remove my name from your mailing list and find a charity to which you might devote your time.”

I scratched my head trying to think of what I had done wrong. Then it came to me. It had to be the survey. They were upset at the results. I guess they did not want my readers to know what other readers thought about their activities as Councillors.

But why were they taking it out on me? I did not make it up. I did not fill in all the surveys. I did not make all of those comments. All I did was report how my readers voted.

It is not my fault that Councillor Jones has a disapproval rating of over 70% and an approval rating of just over 7%. How can I be responsible if Councillor Gignac’s disapproval rating is almost 40% and her approval rating is under 20%.

They are responsible for what they do on Council, not me. I cannot help it if people think that they are doing a very poor or poor job. Perhaps they are and it should be a wake-up call for them.

I would have thought that the Survey results were like a report card that a Councillor would have received as a student in school. After all, they are used to be treated at Council like Kindergarten students by the Mayor/Principal. They have been scolded enough times by him publicly and did not run out of the Council Chambers crying.

It is just a mid-term report card, not the final one. They have not done better than the last report card. In fact, they did worse. However, they do have time to improve between now and the next municipal election.

Hopefully, at that time Councillor Jones will not be voted as the Worst Councillor on Council. I know that Councillor Gignac must be upset that she did receive a few votes saying that she was doing the worst job. Perhaps she might try and learn from her peers, such as Councillor Dilkens who received no negative votes, probably because he is a proponent of open and transparent Government.

I know that both of the Councillors did not receive a single solitary vote as being the Best Councillor but if they are re-elected perhaps it is due to them doing a better job after seeing their poor results. Do you think that they would write to me and apologize and thank me for helping them do better? Do you think that they would want to be added back onto my e-mail list. Hardly.

Then I wondered if there was a different explanation.

Is Councillor Jones really mad at me, not because of those survey questions, but because I did not list him as a possible mayoral candidate? I might have done so except I did not think he wanted that job.

Look at how much time and expense I saved Councillor Gignac. She might have thought that she had a chance to be Mayor and might have spent some money on a mayoral campaign. She would not have had a chance and would not have been on Council at all if she ran for Mayor and lost. At least now, given the past history of her Ward, if she works diligently, as I know that she can, then she has a good chance to be re-elected as a Councillor.

I thought some more about it and perhaps the explanation is that the Councillors are not suited for the job. They do not have the disposition for it. Perhaps they are not very happy at what they are doing and are taking it out on me. If that is the case, then they should remember what ex-President Truman said:

• “If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.”