Aug 27 2017
Mayor Jeff Wieler Statement on His Resignation
Read the statement by Mayor Jeff Wieler on his resignation by clicking below.
Wieler StatementÂ
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Jeff, your point is well taken that people on both sides of the political aisle can and should do a better job of listening to each other and that this would be a better way to achieve goals that accomplish results reflective of shared values.
But a key ingredient of good listening is compassion and a true desire to understand the needs of the other human beings in the conversation.
While you have explained your facebook postings as simply being re-posts from other sites, the fact is that those re-posts show a total lack of compassion; in fact they venture far into the territory of classic bullying behavior. Name calling, labeling, colorful insults and grouping of individuals into categories are all behaviors that are so destructive of effective communication and community participation that we begin teaching even our youngest children not to engage in them.
Your two plus decades of community service are commendable. However, I can’t help but feel that the missing element at this point in time is care and concern for the individuals who make up the full spectrum of your constituency.
National politics, talk radio, and internet & facebook groups are quite abstract. Getting to know the fellow human beings of Piedmont (PADC is a great place to start) and building some friendships outside the realm of politics is a much more ‘real’ and useful approach for local leadership. While there is no doubt that the national political arena creates absorbing, outrageous and even terrifying ideas to consider – our local community must put that all aside in our day to day lives. Local leadership is at its best when the focus is on the needs, cares and concerns of the individuals who make up our shared community, and through compassionate consideration of these concerns arrive at agreeable solutions to the problems at hand.
I hope you will find a way forward, possibly by remembering why you were drawn to public service in the first place, and hopefully by leaving toxic national politics out of the equation when it comes to local concerns.
Respectfully submitted,
Katie Korotzer
Not good enough. He needs to personally apologize to each and every person is this town whom he has directly and needlessly insulted during his years on the Council. And then he should resign from the Council.
Good riddance.
I think compassion is too high a bar for the councilman -basic civility would be a start. There seems to be a thread through his statement that his comments on NATIONAL affairs were offensive to the liberal sensitivities of Piedmont, completely ignoring the invective and hateful content of his speech.
What is needed now from the councilman is not compassion but contrition and that could best be shown by his stepping down from council. There is a post on Quora (is that Latin for sexist?) attributed to the councilman that makes his FB posts pale in comparison. It’s not a national issue, not a conservative opinion but a denigration of women. If true, The councilman needs to resign.
Sad and unfortunate for everybody.