In yet another example of Cudahy’s elected officials behaving badly, Fox6 News is reporting Cudahy alderman Jason Litkowiec sent out an internal email calling Cudahy residents who didn’t follow rules pertaining to curbside pickup of trash “dip-shit dumb dumbs.”
Kahle was working on his garden last week. It is a memorial to his son, Elliot, who passed away six years ago. Kahle ended up with a big pile of old lumber, and he dragged it to the curb for a special, city-wide garbage pickup for special waste.
“Maximum length is four feet. I had two pieces that weren`t, so they didn`t pick up anything,” Kahle said.
Kahle chopped down the pieces of lumber to meet the city’s size requirement and the lumber still wasn’t picked up, so Kahle called his alderman Richard Bartoshevich.
“There were some emails sent out internally at City Hall,” Kahle said.
Bartoshevich says he provided copies of an email fellow Alderman Jason Litkowiec sent in response to the situation.
“Direct it to the dip-(expletive) dumb dumbs who cannot read, comprehend or follow simple instructions,” Kahle said as he read the email for FOX6 News. “The days of coddling those who can`t , don`t or refuse to follow simple instructions are over. We do not have the time and resources to change diapers for whiners and complainers anymore.”
What’s remarkable is that Ald. Litkowiec didn’t bother to offer even a token apology for his disparaging remarks, and one can only wonder if that’s because he thinks so little of the residents he serves that he can’t be bothered to apologize for a complete lack of tact and civility.
Here’s video of Fox6’s report on Ald. Litkowiec’s disparaging remarks.
Elected officials are often surprised when they are elected and find out they’re suddenly the enemy. They tend to run on a platform of ‘I’ll get workers under control, make the city super-efficient and lower your taxes’. Then they get elected and have to deal with human nature in the face of that super-efficiency they’ve touted.
Often they find that the workers they assume are inefficient actually are doing their jobs with the resources they have, and there’s a reason why a garbage truck can’t run out and make an extra pickup even for an innocent mistake, or the snowplows don’t clear out the farthest cul-de-sac in the city first even though residents on that cul-de-sac have to leave early for work.
The alderperson was out of line and will probably be voted out (assuming he wants to continue – that email sounds like some serious elected-official burnout). But it sure would be nice if this morphed from a discussion about a rude alderperson who’s had it to a discussion about what you want (customized service) vs. what you are willing to pay for (efficiency and its attendant restrictions).