Councilman Harrison should resign immediately
City leader shows he represents only his own interests
Kevin Cummings
When Plano City Councilman Tom Harrison was elected, his charge was to represent all residents of this quickly growing suburb. However, his actions over the past week shows that he is incapable of fulfilling that promise.
At a time when social fabrics of the country appear to be unraveling by the hands of divisiveness tearing at the seams, in myriad different directions; leaders in office, rather than representing the residents who elected them, reflect back on us like a cruel caricature of our fears and ambitions. And, unless this is the portrait we wish to show to the world - one in which we cower in fear of change, of things different than us - we should move to recall Harrison before this facade becomes permanent. (Especially since Harrison refused on Sunday to make the right and honourable decision.)
For the last few years, Plano has been struggling to find its identity between its overly-polished past and the new reality of socio-economic change. Starting in 2014, city leaders began gathering resident input on its Plano Tomorrow plan, an update to the city’s aging comprehensive plan which is used to guide future growth and development. During this process, a dichotomy grew and fault lines appeared in the foundation of what residents and community leaders thought the city’s future should be built upon. Two main groups emerged: Those who thought change and diversity should be embraced and those who thought it should be fortressed against.
Those in the latter camp saw proposals to make the city dynamic and more open to residents of different walks of life - millennials, renters, refugees - by expanding Plano’s stock of infill projects and mixed-use developments as an attack on their idea of Plano. However, like the false memories of childhood, the shimmer of that glossy veneer begins to fade upon closer look: fugitive Collin County ex-Confederates killing federal officers after the Civil War, the heroin epidemic of the 90s, even up to the roiling tension over the city’s passage of the Equal Rights Ordinance in this decade.
Not to mention that this type of reactionary thinking (in the case of Plano Tomorrow) would relegate the city to the slow death of suburban malls, its roots in the fear of change, of things different than oneself threatens to restrict future growth. Companies like Liberty Mutual, Toyota and potentially Amazon, not accustomed to the deep red of Texas have consistently praised moves by the city to make inclusive to all.
However, it is not the infrastructure, strip malls or shiny high-rises that make a city. It is the people who call the place “home,” no matter if they live in a single-family house or in a rented one. And it is this last piece that Harrison has betrayed irreparably. It is for this reason he must resign, so that the rest of the city can continue into the 21st Century.
Nearly all Plano City Council members are elected “at-large,” meaning they are elected to represent the entire city. When Harrison shared the Facebook link last week, asking President Trump to ban Islam in public schools, he showed clearly that he cannot uphold this most basic duties.
How can Harrison propose that he can carry out his duties as “someone who was elected to do a job for everyone in Plano,” in a city where nearly half of the population does not share his skin color, in a city where nearly a quarter of the population comes from another country, in a city where only about 30 percent of those who identify as religious are members of a Christian faith? The Plano of today doesn’t look like it did when Harrison first moved here. And as it continues to change, becoming less white, less Christian, becoming a more accurate reflection of the country as a whole, do we really want leaders who seem more concerned with echoing substance-less soundbites from Washington than dealing with issues that actually affect the constituents they are clearly disconnected from.
More troubling are reports that this was in no way an isolated incident. Actions such as repeatedly taking to social media to denigrate others religions, political beliefs and to spread untruthful, revisionist history speak louder than words. So it may take more than a vague assurance that you are not a bigot to drown out the vileness that screams from behind your keyboard.
Harrison should resign immediately. At best, his voice carries no authority when he speaks on the council because it is clear he only speaks for half of residents. At worst, there is a large and growing population in the city that cannot expect fairness, empathy, understanding, or even the most basic hope in a democracy, that their voice will be represented from a leader elected to make decisions on their behalf.
Hopefully, as the city moves forward it will be with new leadership that reflects the population and accurately addresses the nuance of their voices. Harrison, and those of his ilk, can stay behind, held back by the shadows of fear and change.