The Editor,
One apology has already admirably been given (“City Council mum, staff “relieved” after Fleury leaves”) but many more are owed to both Mathieu Fleury and to this community by the Seaway News and the City of Cornwall.
Masquerading as a news item, that story fell so far short of acceptable standards that it is hard to figure out what to call it. The words “hatchet job” spring to mind.
Quoting an unidentified disgruntled individual unconnected with the City who posted on social media, (wow, that kind of cheap stuff is a news source now?!) the author of the article handed us a made-up number of staffers who supposedly left the employ of the City because of Mr. Fleury. There was no apparent effort to verify details. It turns out to have been false information.
An easy hint that it was false? If that number had been even remotely true, obviously the self-righteous Councillors who have been seen relentlessly and disgracefully attacking the CAO in public sessions would have already raised it openly. In addition, the names of Geoff Clark and Jamie Fawthrop are also thrown into the pot and stirred into the article as though they added anything newsworthy whatsoever. They don’t.
Mathieu Fleury, a bright and talented individual hired to help lead us into the future was fired in a closed session with no public explanation or justification whatsoever. The too clever by half “parted ways” press release from the City fools no one. A dark cloud now hangs over our city.
Instead of hiding behind closed doors, those who committed such a deed which will cost our community dearly in national reputation, should stop lurking behind a dark cloak of secrecy, cowardly hiding behind others and spit out just what they had against this widely respected gentleman. Was he too good for them? Until then, apologies and explanations are indeed very much owed to us all.
Etienne Saint-Aubin, Cornwall
