Shirking responsibility
We elect our public officials to represent us and guide us to a better future. We elect enough of them to our national, state, county and city offices to make sure that there is an adequate number within the group to posses the educational qualifications, intelligence, experience and expertise to accomplish the mission assigned to them. In most cases we pay them enough to compensate for the work they do. That's the way it has always been in the past.
However, it is now become a common practice for these public officials to shirk their responsibilities and hire an outside consultant to do the planning and take on the duties that these officials were elected to do. These consultants can paint a rosy picture that does not include where the money for all the great ideas is going to come from.
At the end of the day the pipe dream dwindles to nothing because the public officials realize they can't find the funds to accomplish what the consultant has proposed. With this failure, the public officials can avoid the blame because they will say it was the consultant's fault and they had nothing to do with it. At this point, all the taxpayers have to show for their hard earned money is a highly paid consultant laughing his way back to a bank in Chicago, Dallas or New York City.
Jim Parsons
Bella Vista
Editorial on 08/23/2017