The Trib’s 1st SB endorsement – “we don’t like the other guy”

The Trib’s endorsement of Ann Wasson was inevitable. Still, it is striking that the first six paragraphs of the endorsement were all devoted to trashing Marcia Stromgren. Perhaps that’s because at this point the Trib’s editors are only interested in having the election vindicate their pro-construction pro-Red Plan editorial position. All the incumbents face angry voters and as we have learned from the last twenty years negative campaigns are the most effective. They mostly want the challengers to lose because their victory would be a repudiation of the Trib’s Don’t Ask Don’t Tell Red Plan policy.

The beef against Marcia is that she wouldn’t talk to the Trib. As I’ve told other pro-voter rights candidates they should have talked to the Trib even though its mind is already made up.

I strongly disagree with today’s endorsement of the Trib. I’d say that Ann Wasson has treated the public in much the same way that Marcia Stromgren treated the Trib. She ignored them.

As a School Board member Ann Wasson stopped listening to anyone with a different point of view on the Red Plan long before it was approved. She signed an undated contract that the rest of the Board never even looked at. That is a breach of school board duty by the entire board that still boggles my mind.

Today’s proposed traffic routing changes for Ordean by Kent Worley is just one of many examples. His proposal simply reveals a critical flaw in a plan that begged for consideration if not compromise. At no point did Ann Wasson offer either. Rather, she said of Mr. Worley last May in a column submitted under her name to the Trib that:

Kent was part of Let Duluth Vote and that he helped design Plan B. Both claims are incorrect. A great many people have talked with me about their dissatisfaction with the Red Plan but never participated in Let Duluth Vote activities. Kent was simply one of these folks.

Ann also said that Kent was against progress. This is the usual claim of folks who have heavily invested in bulldozers. From the beginning Kent simply offered improvements on the Ordean site since he was certain the School Board would never consider any other location. His prediction was spot on. His major concern has always been student safety followed by the recognition that the Ordean site was inadequate for parking or building expansion.

And finally Ann said that Mr. Worley’s evaluation of the site was inaccurate and flawed. It was an accusation better left to a professional than a homemaker. Mr. Worley has a graduate degree in Land Planning and Landscape Architecture from the University of Michigan, as well as 40 years’ experience in Duluth. Search the site for other posts related to Mr. Worley.

For over two years Kent offered his expertise in land planning, traffic management, open space development and recreational land use to the School Board. Its doubtful that Ms. Wasson read a single thing he submitted such was her confidence in the powers she deferred to.

Perhaps the Trib is so eager to reelect Ann because, like the Trib, she has made it her habit to ask few serious questions about her $400 million dollar baby.

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