LETTER TO THE EDITOR | Former mayor casts support for Callison

Published 3:34 pm Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Editor,

Three months ago if you had asked me who I would vote for mayor of Langley I would have said Sharon Emerson in a second. Then I read a letter she wrote to the paper about the current Mayor, Fred, where she didn’t simply disagree with him, she flamed him hard. She questioned not only his judgment, but his intent and integrity.

She has taken this tactic with the whole council. She seems to get angry when her suggestions are not immediately accepted, a little amusing because I don’t recall ever voting for her. She shoots first, then has to apologize for being so wrong. She is patting herself on the back now, for finally wearing a helmet when she rides her bike, like now she is setting an example.

On her Facebook Page she claims to have 100 employees. Are they really employees or contract workers? She also says her bookkeeper went AWOL for months so she fell behind in her payroll taxes. Bad unintentional things happen in small business and city government, but the business owner or mayor must step up and take full responsibility, not blame employees.

Having spent more time in elected office in Langley then anyone alive, I am familiar with these tactics. In a town the size of Langley this is uncalled for, and calls into question Ms. Emerson’s integrity more than anyone’s. She lost my vote that day. To follow that up she placed handbills on “almost all of Langley” saying come to this big meeting and vote against the funicular. There was no vote. There never was going to be a vote. This is the kind of disingenuous crud that people used to throw at me. It’s important to be able to trust our elected leaders; that day, the day of the handbills, she lost my trust.

I am now supporting Tim Callison for mayor. Frankly now that I have spent some time with Tim, his energy, ability to disagree without the top of his head exploding, he listens, cares and for the record has lived in Langley about the same time as Sharon, I would vote for him no matter what. I don’t think Sharon is a bad person, I just don’t think she is ready to be mayor.

NEIL COLBURN

Langley