TAKING THE COMMENTARY A BIT TOO FAR

Glancing at Betty Parker's political column in Saturday's Fort Myers News-Press, I noticed that Mayor Jim Humphrey's comments at a recent City Council meeting were being slammed for going well "over the line".

In many cases with city and county commissions, nominations for volunteer advisory boards and commissions are handled as part of it's "consent agenda", where a number of generally minor administrative items requiring approval are done so with a single vote.

With the Fort Myers City Council, one of the items on it's "consent agenda" was the appointment of former planning department employee Brian Bigelow to the city planning board. Bigelow is also the gay partner of the commissioner who appointed him, Warren J. Wright, although the two no longer live together.

While in the past commissioner's spouses and family members have been appointed to volunteer panels without objection, Humphrey made note of the relationship in the televised meeting:

"I understand you are in a committed relationship with Mr. Bigelow. If that's so, it surely appears that's a conflict. It would be similar to me appointing my spouse, or another council member appointing his spouse."

While the appointment was rejected as other commission members had other objections to Bigelow's serving, some of those other members felt the mayor had gone too far with his comments.

"I was taken aback by the mayor's comments," Councilwoman Veronica Shoemaker said. "Those kinds of issues should not be an issue. The mayor kind of went overboard on that. There may be other issues with Mr. Bigelow, but that should not be an issue."

"The mayor shouldn't have gone into all that personal stuff," said Councilman Mike Flanders, whose wife was appointed to another advisory board by Mayor Humphrey.

Sounds like Mr. Mayor embarrassed himself in an obvious attempt to humiliate a collegue, and he should apologize.