I thought the council did well in considering the importance of the issue and balancing the need to pay for the project. While no one wants to have to pay $12 million for a repair that could have possibly been avoided (thank you, prior negligent city officials), the waterfront and park are the city's pride and joy, used by thousands of residents constantly.

Councilman Lenz also took great pains to have explained to the public that issuing this bond doesn't mean that we are automatically $12 million in debt. By issuing the bond, we can start the process of getting contractor bids and investigating additional sources of funding to help offset the cost of the project. Without issuing the bond, neither of these steps could be taken, without which nothing can be accomplished.

As far as Mason's comment about being "premature", what's the point in waiting for the whole field to fall into the river first? Yes it is important to be fiscally responsible, but to delay would drive up the cost of the repairs. The Maser engineer made it painfully clear that situations like this (the untreated wood pylons being eaten away by the "ship worms") will decay rapidly. If we don't move soon, we'd be looking at a $40 million dollar project to replace the field instead of repair it.