Editor:
Over the past few years I have had occasions to get to know Lew Gaiter, our incumbent Larimer County Commissioner.
I cannot endorse him for re-election for a variety of reasons.
Lew simply doesn’t stand for anything. Aside from the positions he publicly takes, he has no follow through or personal resolve to do the job he was elected to do.
I learned this the hard way. Our business was entitled to certain Colorado Enterprise Zone benefits. Other similar retail stores were awarded these entitlements designed to help new businesses starting up in Larimer County. When approaching Commissioner Gaiter I was led down the path believing Gaiter had my interests in hand. After over a year it was clear he had no intention whatsoever to help fulfill the promise of the Enterprise Zone or his repeated commitment to me and my business.
Our businesses generated hundreds of thousands of tax dollars for the County and employed a dozen or more people. The combined tax obligations to Larimer County resulted in about 20 percent of our overhead and exceeded my own annual income by three times. After 6 years we finally closed the business as a matter of financial practicality.
For the same reason, I suggest we close Lew Gaiter’s tenure as our representative in Larimer County.
I strongly recommend voting for Eric Sutherland since he has already proven he will follow through on promises.
Doug Andersen
Wellington
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I cannot endorse Lew Gaiter because I have not seen accountability to citizens.
Commissioners are the local oversight board for county human services. They hire the director and approve budgets. They refuse to fix the ineffective federal and state-mandated LOCAL grievance process for parents involved in child welfare cases. There is no recourse to address caseworker misconduct. They would rather state that it doesn’t occur.
Commissioners no longer air public comments from citizens during weekly BOCC admin meetings.
Commissioners did nothing while Weld County land-grabbed Rose Brinks’ land for their water supply.
Lew Gaiter was appointed to the state Child Fatality Review Commission, along with Ginny Riley, local county human services director. Besides the obvious conflict of interest, Lew Gaiter cannot tell me why the 2010 death of a child involve with LCDHS was never investigated. This commission will not hold anyone accountable for harm to children in state custody. Yet parents are destroyed by the child welfare system for much less.
I’d like to thank Eric Sutherland for his much-needed political activism.
He also adheres to the belief that government exists to serve the people. Our current elected officials have it backwards, while “protecting county assets and interests”, they’ve neglected to represent or even empathize individual citizens.