When Pat Fiacco attacks

Regina's municipal election campaign doesn't even start until later in 2006, but Pat Fiacco is already going strongly negative against somebody:

Mayor Pat Fiacco had some strong words for those he says are "getting in the damn way" of attempts to improve life in the inner city.

"We know there are things that we can do differently, so we'll do them. But we're not going to stop," the mayor said Saturday at the release of a progress report on the Regina Inner City Community Partnership (RICCP).

"You're either part of the construction team or you're part of the demolition team. This is the construction team. If you want to be part of the demolition team, get the hell out of the way," Fiacco said.

Asked afterwards to whom he was referring, Fiacco would say only: "I think that the individuals know who they are."

Not surprisingly, the Leader-Post finds several quotes roughly agreeing with Fiacco and nothing by way of a contrasting view. But one can draw a hint from this quote:

Fellow board member Morris Eagles, who has lived in north central for 30 years, said community residents need to take ownership of the issues. "They also have to be the ones that act as a catalyst for change. We're the residents here. We're the ones who have to identify what the real issues of the community are," he said.

In other words, the dispute seems to come down to individual residents of the north-central area who don't agree with a renewal plan, and Fiacco's efforts to implement that plan. If that alone were the question, it's hard to argue with need for some change. But there's still the small matter of how to win the approval of the people most affected.

On that count, telling people to "get the hell out of the way" rather than listening to their concerns only serves to make the process unnecessarily adversarial. And even if the rebuilding program is successful, it's hard to see how the area will be much better off for the resentments that are bound to result from Fiacco's explicit desire to impose it against the will of residents.

While Fiacco's image as a plucky boxer may have served him well so far, there's no benefit to picking unnecessary fights. And it won't be long before a lot of people who he's managed to drag into battles with City Hall will get their chance to deliver a knockout blow.