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Dear Editor:
This is a warning to Carmel residents who, like me, have questions for city officials.
In a letter to this newspaper dated Jan. 6, I had asked why $318 million disappeared from Carmel’s debt posting with the state’s Department of Local Government Finance.
A city council member replied that he’d like to answer my questions in a face-to-face meeting. He set up a meeting for last Friday afternoon.
When I arrived, I found him, the city controller, a representative of the Carmel Redevelopment Commission and a second city councilor leaving a prior meeting. They motioned me into a conference room.
Then, my host set up a tripod and camera to record things, asking if I minded.
I didn’t mind since the innocent have nothing to hide.
My question was answered in five minutes and the balance of the two-hour-long meeting was spent questioning my choice of words, facts and metaphors in which I write.
My conclusion is that this new, 21st Century way of handling constituent questions has great promise for the utopians we elect to office, and to their appointees.
It just doesn’t do much for the “trust in government” account.
Bill Shaffer
Carmel