Freedom Flyer 8

Sir: City council spent more time welcoming Mayor Tom Gosnell back from his honeymoon than it spent discussing a 5,000 name petition asking council to consider rolling back its self-awarded pay increase.

In fact, council refused to discuss it at all; the largest petition ever presented to city council in its 128-year history. Alderman Bob Beccarea added further insult to injury when he publicly (CJBK Radio) claimed that he could "easily gather 5,000 petitions (names) to support his pay increase" and asked: " ... has Marc Emery ever been in favor of anything?"

Nevertheless, facts will reveal that Beccarea had no signatures of support either before or after the fact of his excessive self-awarded pay increase and that, despite his boast, he is not bothering to do so. (Thinking back, it is surprising how little evidence of support was actually necessary to justify council's ill-fated plans to spend $100 million in the hosting of a sports event, during its last term.)

However, were Becearea able to produce a petition in favor of a 32-per-cent increase for aldermen, I would most certainly accept his contention that certain support exists for his position. But once again, the fact of the matter is that only one letter in The Free Press has supported the pay increase and that I met only five individuals out of 670 personally canvassed who felt that the increase and the manner in which it was awarded were justifiable.

Beecarea's arrogance, though directed at me, only served to insult the 5,000 Londoners who signed the petition (their petition - not mine), but at least he should be congratulated for vocalizing his contempt. Every other alderman simply sat in silence and refused to even acknowledge the work of 200 London citizens who labored in the community to gather the signatures of 5,000 concerned taxpayers.

Council seems reluctant to accept that 5,000 municipal signatures collected over an arbitrarily limited 35-day period was a spectacular achievement, or that double or triple this number would certainly have been possible had we wished to present our petition in June or July. But what would have been the point?

If council could dismiss 5,000 citizens with the blink of an eye, then surely 10,000 signatures would only merit five or 10 additional seconds of murmuring, while 15,000 signatures might net as much as half a minute of "bafflegab." This would hardly justify having several hundred Londoners spend their evenings to bring a consensus of taxpayer opinion to an unresponsive council.

Though Gosnell made much ado about having an "open-door policy" in a recent issue of London Magazine, he certainly slammed the door shut quickly to the 5,000 Londoners who were simply asking for reconsideration of an obviously excessive pay increase. As part of our own "open-door policy," we would have been interested to hear, in lieu of a pay rollback, council's justification for the amount and manner in which its increase was implemented.

If Gosnell wished to show leadership or to demonstrate his "open-door policy," this could have been his moment. We think we made our point. Gosnell and members of council certainly made theirs.

It seems that more than one honeymoon is over.