Last Friday, the Answer Lady (buffalowatch.blogspot.com) reported that:

…in between court fights to keep Erie County from providing prisoners with “Motel rooms”, Chis Collins took time out to hold the Olmsted Park Conservancy hostage.

Collins is refusing to release $360,000 in funding for the Olmsted system. According to Collins, the City can only have the money if it signs a contract with the conservancy that doesn’t include a living wage.

The Conservancy has already borrowed $200,00 against this funding and will have to layoff all its employees but one (including its fund raising staff).

The “don’t pay them a living wage” verbal emanation of Collins seems to be the definition of a “nastygram.” Or the work of a human devoid of humanity. Oh well, there seems to be a lot of that going around these days, with less and less social feedback that behavior is not socially acceptable. Or that a society composed of just “Have-a-lots” and “Have-nots” and very few “’tweens,” economically speaking, is socially acceptable.

Collins seems to be just plain hostile to anyone who a) does not agree with Collins and b) is not wealthy. Either way, those who facilitated his rise to power (Giambra, Pigeon & Company, etc.) should be ashamed of themselves…except many of these seem to be people with no remorse, no guilt, and a nasty streak of aggressive narcissism themselves. What about those who continue to think such “toughness” is cute? What can be done about such evil (towards the 90+ percent of us not considered to be rich) spreading out from the top of the Rath Building? Is it just a Halloween prank? When can we expect the “Oh, I was just kidding” comment?

Dave Bradley
Buffalo

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