Dear Editor,
Wright not right, and we should have seen this coming.
One must wonder if the residents of Bearspaw would like a “do over” when it comes to how they voted in the last municipal election. Given the performance of the current councillor, Samanntha Wright, we must surely shake our heads at the latest development – and at the same time, we must acknowledge that, given her track record, this was entirely predictable.
Wright is facing a legal investigation which could see her kicked off council for voting on a matter in which she is alleged to have had a pecuniary interest. I’m sure others will get into the details of that matter, so let’s just address the obvious.
Wright was not elected to represent all Bearspaw residents or Rocky View County (RVC) residents at large. She is merely a pawn for the “anti-everythings” who recruited her and backed her election campaign. This is a sad state of the world today, and we see it on a national stage where oil-and-gas protestors and competing interests fund electable people who will carry their flag once elected.
For Wright, this was easy to see coming.
Until very recently, she was listed as the president of Rocky View Forward. Rocky View Forward is well known for its anti-Rocky-View advocacy, having spoken against countless common-sense business proposals and developments. In fact, you must wonder if these people are actually supported by the municipality of Calgary, as they would seemingly rather have Calgary bureaucrats control our communities than our own elected representatives. How absurd.
And this group is rumoured to be behind the bizarre deluge of FOIP (Freedom of Information and Privacy) requests submitted to RVC. Imagine, a sitting councillor has ties to a group that has allegedly been FOIP’ing the email accounts of fellow councillors. Talk about creating a toxic work environment. And we know this was no small affair, as County administration was forced to hire more staff to accommodate the litany of requests.
Wright was also described as a key member of Rocky View Gravel Watch, whose mandate appears to be no gravel extraction, nowhere, never. And while we should certainly place tougher restrictions on gravel operations in residential areas, it seems counterproductive to ban gravel extraction in rural RVC only to import it for paving roads and helping with construction in rural RVC.
And perhaps the most telling fact that Wright had a bias in the issue she’s now being investigated for that her husband spoke against the proposal at the public hearing. That’s right – the very hearing that Wright claims to have had an open mind at, her husband was pleading for council to vote against.
There’s a reason that councillors are required to recuse themselves from such conflicting issues, but given Wright's clear agenda, her actions were entirely predictable.
Taylor Waters
Division 5
