Recent comments by a local resort manager, and the responses they triggered both overlook the issues confronting Brainerd and how we can moved beyond them. The resort manager seems to not care for people who do not have much money. This is ironic as most of his employees are paid wages that classify them as low income. While he correctly points out that Brainerd is a city with a low average income, he does not offer any solutions to fix the problem and just assumes that people with modest incomes have nothing to offer, and are somehow less important. City leaders understandably defend our city, but do not recognize that Brainerd has serious problems that they have been unable to fix. Brainerd has fallen behind due to years of bad leadership and bad decisions. None of the incumbents up for re-election this year deserve to stay in their positions, they have failed the city and it's people. The way forward is not denial, and it is not hatred of the majority of our residents who are working at jobs with modest incomes and doing their best to support their families and improve their community. We need leadership who can do for Brainerd what has been done in other successful, older cities, make a family friendly city that is human scale and pleasant to be in. Our leadership's focus on big, expensive projects, large highways that make our city an unsafe freeway for traffic racing through town needs to stop. We will never be Gull Lake, or Baxter. We can succeed as what we are with the people we have, with new leadership. Keeping the same people in office will guarantee us the same, bad results.
Ed Shaw
Brainerd
