OPINION: Piedmont Post Mistreatment of Candidate
Regarding the Piedmont Post‘s coverage of election results: “With friends at the Post, who needs enemies!”
Dear Editors:
Chucking City Council candidate Tim Rood’s photo to the back page of the election coverage and cropping his supporters out is an all time low. I could see it if Tim Rood had the nasty habit of shouting down dissenters with expletives at public meetings, or garbled his sentences so as to render his thoughts incomprehensible, or addressed urgent issues facing our city in empty platitudinous air-balloons; but, no, Tim Rood’s “unworthiness” of getting an even break at the Post seems to stem from his audacity in suggesting that we are facing key financial, development and legal obligations in our city and – worse – offering his comprehensive skill set as a city planner to help manage Piedmont’s resources. Even the dreaded “Taliban dissenters” made it to the center of the paper in Jeff Wieler’s column.
But it’s more than merely dismissing Tim Rood’s candidacy and professional expertise, or denigrating Tim Rood, the father, husband and engaged member of our community, it’s that we, the 2,063 supporters of Tim Rood, have also been banished from the Post’s sight lines. Whether due to benign indifference, or contempt, or some point along this continuum, our beliefs and diverse perspectives concerning the management of our city have also been ridiculed, or held out as laughable – even vilified, as in Councilman Wieler’s articles. Considering that Tim Rood lost the City Council election by 26 votes (Rood – 2063, McBain – 2089), earning 49.68% of the citywide vote, it’s counter-intuitive for our community-minded newspaper to balkanize so many of us as simply being “wrong.” Moreover, it further cleaves our community and vitality. We can be bigger than this. We’re going to have to be, facing our upcoming budget shortfall, lawsuits and municipal projects.
Here’s to heart-felt congratulations to all the candidates and a prosperous new fiscal year.
Sincerely,
Denise Bostrom
Editor’s note: The opinions expressed are those of the author and are not necessarily those of the Piedmont Civic Association.
