Letters to the Eagle Editor: June 7, 2006

Marco: How not to run a city?

Over the past 12 months, many decisions have been made by Council and City Manager. The shenanigans about paying for sewer/water/roads is coming out of this fund or that fund.

Whether or not to raise taxes is up to the discretion of our city manager. The past year has been an education on how not to run a city. Plans were drown up — paid for — with little thought of how the impact would affect residents.

Over the next 10 years, those of us on water/sewer/septic will see and understand but it will be too late unless you make your voices heard. There will be no turning back to the days when retirement costs are affordable.

Think, what will you do if your water/sewer/taxes double? This will happen at the rate we're spending and financing everything today. Perhaps it's time to form the Marco Island Civil Liberties Union. W

e need more control over how our taxes are being spent. In order to have peace, we cannot have disorder. The political action committee formed CARES to educate citizens on fair and equitable solutions to resolve our differences and to keep Marco citizens informed on what is happening with their government.

Our voices will continue to seek truth, justice and fairness for all citizens.

— Frances Enman / Marco Island

Intentional misinformation?

It's reasonable that political issues, such as the Protect Our Paradise initiative to have hired city managers undergo a public vote of confidence every couple of years, will have advocates as well as opponents.

However, in expressing his opposition to Protect Our Paradise's initiative, letter writer Pat Reese has crossed the line of reasonableness. To keep this response within the word-count limit, I must ignore the intentional misinformation and lack of knowledge that Reese's letter betrays.

However, I cannot and WILL not allow this pony-tailed, left-over-from-hippie-Woodstock-era individual cast aspersions on my loyalties to flag and country. He wrote referring to the Protect Our Paradise initiative: "Their leader, Russ Columbo (sic), recently had issues with a flag donated to the city by the Veterans of Foreign Wars."

Reese conveniently ends his reference right there without informing the reader what those issues were. I proudly will: For about three months, I had notified City Hall that the flag flying at Jane Hittler Memorial Park was too small for the flagpole's height and was in a deteriorating condition.

My visiting Desert Storm veteran Marine sergeant son had pointed this out, much to my embarrassment. City Hall promised to correct the situation but never did.

At one point, the flag's halyard failed and our flag was allowed to fly freely at the top of the pole like an ordinary piece of cloth. After some time I managed to retrieve the flag myself and posted a public notice with information on where and how to reclaim it.

Within 24 hours, an apologetic City Hall not only reclaimed the neglected, torn flag but also had it replaced with a new one. That, ladies and gentlemen, is " the rest of the story."

I'm happy and proud to report that, as a result, I received many phone calls appreciative of the incident. There were even complimentary letters to the editor. Sadly enough, this is what Reese attempted to insinuate as having been a very "bad" thing in my past.

His appalling innuendo should reveal something about Reese's American values to the reader. Thanks much for hearing me out.

— Russ Colombo, POP chairman / Marco Island