In the immortal words of philosopher Dave Barry: "I am not making this up".
Metro could lead by example, auditor Suzanne Flynn concluded, but because of disjointed efforts "risks losing credibility in the region, which could undermine its ability to achieve its mission."
Who knew that an auditor's comment could make coffee shoot out of your nose?
Metro's "mission" seems to involve stuffing you into a shoebox and forcing you to spend several hours each day riding transit that doesn't take you where you want to go. Unless, of course, you prefer to ride a bicycle. If there's another component to their "mission", it's a well-kept secret.
Credibility? Metro? Incredible!
What chafed me was to learn that Metro was using our money to buy energy offset credits.
Where is that in the mission?
Posted by: G. Don | February 17, 2009 at 08:39 PM
I'm glad you brought that up! I had a similar set of questions as I was reading that. I'd like to know who they're "buying" these "credits" from, and I'd like to know how much of our cash they're spending on this. That was all news to me, and of course with no answers readily available.
And more to the point, as you note: where, exactly, is this sort of thing in their "mission"? What, in fact, is their "mission"? And who decided what their "mission" is supposed to be?
Assuming that they actually have a defined "mission", who tells them how to accomplish it?
They seem to believe that government of the people, by the people, and for the people is a quaint but outmoded concept.
Posted by: Max | February 17, 2009 at 09:49 PM
I didn't see anything in the article about the mission being "moving people confortably and effortlessly to wherever they want to go" (or even "moving people").
It all seemed to be about being green and not making those icky nasty carbon footprints (I suppose it takes a lot of hired help to sweep up those footprints), and holding down the flaring gas at landfills, and hiring a "sustainability manager" and an "in-house coordinator" (that last sounds like a great job for some politician's nephew), and (I really hope they're making this up) running the Zoo, and using goats to trim the grass (well, at least one sensible idea - unless you disregard the need for hiring a goatherd (or "Environmental Lawn-Regulating System Maintenance Officer".)
Posted by: ZZMike | February 19, 2009 at 05:48 PM