Last Monday I attended the so-called borough special meeting to seat the interim assembly person until the October election. The headline for the CVN weekly edition should read “Sore Losers Get Even.” The assembly members who erroneously seated Greg Goodman compounded their error by the most blatant exhibit of prejudice that I have ever witnessed. Not only did they not want to seat Karen Hess, but they were so adamant not to seat her one member asked a person out of the public who hadn’t even signed a letter of interest to volunteer. I stated during the meeting that the job of the assembly members was to represent the community to the best of their ability above and beyond their individual desires. Boy, was I living in dream land. Mr. Hoffman, Mr. Vick and Ms. Waterman preferred to break borough code to keep Karen out of the seat. The only thing that I can envision is they believed that more than likely the oceans would rise, the Chilkat Range would sink into the sea and all the buildings in Haines would collapse if Karen was on the assembly for the interim period before the general election. If that meeting doesn’t wake the people of Haines up and get them to get involved then our community is doomed to the will of a few self-serving knotheads!
Gary Hess