Alto council members lacking character should turn in resignations over sewage spill
WOODY EDMISTON

In the Dec. 12 issue of your newspaper I read with a certain amount of disappointment that the mayor of Alto had resigned. Although I do not know Mr. Palmer, I find it a great blow for the people of Alto to lose a person who is prone, perhaps convicted to do the right thing.

Maybe calling a state agency was not in the best interest of Alto's elected officials, but that should not have been the issue. Since they are entrusted with the safety of all Texas, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) should have been involved in any sewage spill open to the air or spread across the ground, or leaked into it, untreated.

There are specific rules for cleaning up a spill of that sort. There are no smallcity with-tight-budgets-andinward looking-city-fathers exemptions.

To fail to contact TCEQ would have been un-neighborly at the least, unethical and probably illegal.

What Alto does, affects everyone - especially those downstream. Small city governments fail to recognize their role is to lead their city as it progresses and fits into the larger scheme of things.

The city council's role is not to make sure every day in Alto is a mirror image of the previous day and to make sure outside influences don't upset that delicate balance. That could lead to opportunity or - perish the thought - opportunity.

In the story you mention that the council took notice of, "The illustration . . . that it wasn't illegal to speed if you didn't get caught."

This will come as faint reassurance to the spouses of the members of the council who bought in to this drivel. My spouse would be open to a lot more discussion of her late night activities if I knew she embraced the notion that guilt requires apprehension in-flagrante.

If one thinks he must be caught to be guilty, it opens up options for any number of freewheeling activities. It is no wonder the council thought it unnecessary to notify persons in authority over them - they weren't planning on getting caught. Bart Simpson seems to have infiltrated the council. Might I suggest you collect the minutes of the meeting and publish them shortly before the next election. It will give the voters an idea of who will do the right thing and who will follow the law, regardless who is looking.

The idea that one must get caught to be guilty, is not just applicable to only TCEQ matters; what next, tax collection, municipal court fees, the police? If it isn't illegal to speed if you don't get caught, then the local police can stop anyone they want and they will be guilty- according to this bunch.

Everyone in the meeting who thought that idea was a good one, should retire to whatever place he seeks forgiveness and pray earnestly for deliverance. That should be done immediately after submitting their resignations on the grounds they do not have enough character development to lead others. They've been caught.

Writer's Miranda Warning: Anything you say, can and probably will be used in the book I'm currently writing.

Woody Edmiston is the author of Why Parents Should Fear MySpace.