Apologies Necessary

There’s no denying Ron Peters was a high-profile RiverPlace “GrassRooter.”  Others, like Bill Cole and Ed Crowley, also took leading roles.  This was a team effort, involving many courageous residents.

However, now that W/S Development has taken its toys across the river, at least two individuals have turned the debate into ugly personal attacks on Peters.

Two weeks ago James W. Rice wrote about him, “Now that RiverPlace is not coming to Hudson, as a man who is in real estate and owns his own company, are you and your company going to go to the Friels and buy the land from them at a sweet fire-sale price so that you and your family can make a killing cutting up that beautiful land into lots so you can build and sell new homes and condos down there while causing our taxes to go up for more schools?  I and a few folks think you are, and have had it in your plans for a while.”

What Rice leaves out is the information upon which he bases his accusation.  Is it something he knows or something he feels?  If he has supporting evidence, he should provide it; if not, he should apologize to Peters.  If Rice stays silent, he’ll have no credibility on any future issue.

The same might be said of Gary Dearborn who wrote, “For the past few weeks, Mr. Ron Peters has tried to force his opinions down our throats as if we do not have the mentality to make up our own minds.”

Think about what Dearborn is doing.  It’s a ludicrous exaggeration having the obvious intent of denigrating Peters.  Dearborn needs to publicly explain what sort of “force” Peters used.  Did he nail our eyeballs to the paper and make us read his letters to the editor?  No.  Did Peters exercise his right to express his opinion?  Yes.  Obviously then, Dearborn isn’t telling us the truth.  He owes Peters an apology for this, and other disparaging comments in his own letter to the editor last week.

Why do I say this?  I don’t know Ron Peters personally.  At some point in the future I may well clash with him over other issues.  That doesn’t matter.

He and all the GrassRooters deserve respect for their efforts.  If we let such unsupported and demeaning personal attacks go unanswered, we discourage other community minded individuals from stepping forward the next time a need arises. 

Joe Konopka - Hudson