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Mailbag: No ‘debate’ when it comes to outsourcing

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Re: the Councilman Steve Mensinger/blogger Geoff West debate on outsourcing (“Costa Mesa Outsourcing Debate,” March 29): That’s a debate on outsourcing? I read Mensinger’s well-reasoned piece on outsourcing, and it was full of facts and figures, just as one might expect from someone who is logically calling for a certain course of action. Then, I read the contra piece by West and found no facts. It was just an over-emotional regurgitation of past events. There was no logic. There were no reasoned arguments. It was just silly.

Maybe West shouldn’t be faulted. There really are no facts to support his position, which seems to be just keep the status quo. Then again, West’s overblown and shrill adjectives not only add nothing to the debate on outsourcing; they also add nothing to the discussion of the root issue about what to do about the ocean of red ink we have.

Perhaps you think I’m being too harsh? If so, imagine you are on the City Council. Then go back and take his column apart and see if you can find any facts that would help you make a reasoned decision about how to right the upside down financial ship that is Costa Mesa. Has he given you — as a council person — any facts upon which you can act to fulfill your fiduciary responsibility to the citizens of Costa Mesa?

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All you’ll find are sentences about people standing in the rain and similar things, along with a thinly veiled attempt to ramp up hatred against those who are trying to get Costa Mesa back to where the city is fixing roads and parks and the other things we expect, and not just being an ATM constantly being filled in the back by citizens and emptied in the front by employees. Costa Mesa’s government needs to be right-sized. These are difficult times, and emotional arguments help no one.

M.H. Millard

Costa Mesa

Don’t use employee’s death for gain

It is time for people in Cost Mesa to stop using the tragic death of city employee Huy Pham for political gain. It is time to stop linking the possible loss of a job with throwing one’s life away. If we follow their logic and reason then there should have been millions of deaths nationwide, including my own, as people were forced out of careers and jobs that many had held for decades.

Our community needs solutions and communication, not political theater and character assassination. We all want to work for a better Costa Mesa, but it’s really hard to work together over all the shouting and name calling. Just a reminder, this isn’t a political campaign, it’s our future!

Bob Knapp

Costa Mesa

No extra pay for superintendent

The day after the Newport-Mesa Unified School District board agreed to raise Paul Reed’s pay because he, as deputy superintendent, was filling in for the superintendent, the new superintendent of the Los Angeles School District refused to take a pay increase.

His reason for refusing the increase in pay? Times are tough and we all have to contribute. I wonder if Reed or our board saw any irony in this?

Mike Dunn

Costa Mesa

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