Voters, ask your candidates how they will accomplish whatever they promise | Letter

With the election upon us, we are being bombarded with candidates telling us what they will do if we elect them. Several candidates are telling us they will diversify our tax base – a much needed reform.

That’s telling us what they will do. We’ve heard this before and now we’re hearing it again. Nothing has changed. Why? Is it because they don’t know how?

There’s an easy answer. We are not demanding to know how they will do what they promise. If they don’t know how, what’s the point of electing them on what they promise? If they broke it, do they know how to fix it? If so, what are they waiting on? Is that like repeal and replace with no concept of how to achieve that end? What’s the plan? How will you do it?

We have serious water and sewer capacity problems without additional development. The city has a looming budget deficit. All beg the question of how each candidate intends to remedy these problems. (They are problems not issues. Problems require solutions. Issues don’t.) Since all solutions have consequences, how will the candidate mitigate the consequences and what might they be?

If you can’t tell us how, don’t bother telling us what you will do. No critical thinking skills required for citing what. Let’s raise the bar on our candidates. Let’s ignore the sales pitch of what they’ll do and insist they tell us how they will do it and how they will mitigate the negatives.

Sue Mackey

Snoqualmie