Is anyone else alarmed by the apparent normalizing of “padded” resumes as an accepted practice for landing a job with the city? It seems almost surreal that the Mayor and council members are leveraging their “elected official” status to publicly shame the Leader for exposing a serious breach of professional ethics and HR policy guidelines. As a consequence of a hiring process based more on favoritism than factual credentials, we, the taxpayers, have become responsible for footing an overtly inflated salary with a rich benefits package for a city manager whose actual experience falls well short of the necessary and qualified level rationalizing a salary almost as much as the governor of Washington.

The city budget continues to reveal hefty shortfalls, our streets are in ever worse shape, our sewer system is failing right before our eyes, and our critically vulnerable water supply infrastructure  - precariously patched together after a major water leak released over a half million gallons of water per day for a week at the peak of dry season - remains a serious concern. Regardless, the city manager enjoys internal accolades for seemingly little that has solved any of these problems not to mention broad immunity from serious allegations.

In Mauro’s short time as city manager we’ve seen diminishing overall transparency, manipulated public survey results, obstruction of public information, defamatory statements which have now exposed the city to a federal lawsuit, and the hiring of architectural consultants who failed to include basic geo-technical considerations effectively resulting in a half million-dollar expenditure for a multi-million dollar pool design that went nowhere and taxpayers couldn’t afford anyway.

In addition, he plays a major role in an agenda that aims to annex community assets for market rate housing developments on our legacy lands, effectively destroying the last remnant of Kai Tai Prairie while making our golf course useless, losing it’s PGA rating and its desirability for destination tournaments and sports recreation.

Taxpayers should ask themselves who will be benefiting from that move? Certainly not those that need affordable housing.

If that weren’t enough, the loss of valuable employees due to “John’s temper” has created significant holes in our city employee structure and, yes, we will be the ones footing the bill to vet and salary candidates for those vacant positions - let’s hope for accurate resumes.

Is this the conduct of an “experienced” city manager? Do these kinds of results merit his corpulent salary?

As for Faber and select past and present elected officials, I fail to see a demonstration of unbiased professionalism in the face of these factual allegations. The silent treatment given to a formal complaint calling out these glaring issues smacks of petulance and lack of experienced leadership. The return volley of whiny gas-lighting only draws more attention to the fact that our elected officials don’t prioritize taxpayer interests or value professional integrity.

Collectively, it should be clear that the methods employed by Mauro and backed by city officials are draining precious dollars and resources leaving the taxpayers more exposed every day this masquerade goes on.

Musa Jaman

Port Townsend