Mayor Joan McBride’s recent op-ed piece is illusionary and disingenuously dangerous. Nothing could be further from the truth. Mayor McBride has done more to reduce our quality of life in Kirkland and it hasn’t been graceful. It’s been irresponsible. We have more and longer traffic jams, property taxes that increase at a rate three times faster than our cost-of-living allowance, which takes our money that we need to maintain and improve our quality of life. We are paying more for reduced services. She condones and promotes funding regional expenses rather than funding projects that benefit Kirkland. She exports our money. She has not represented the citizens of Kirkland.

Citizens have worked hard just to be able to live in Kirkland. Her vision of Kirkland doesn’t preserve and improve our quality of life. She would rather create and fund freeloaders at the expense of existing Kirkland’s resources.

There’s no doubt about it. She is sincere. The problem is that she wants Kirkland to look more like Seattle than the suburban community it is now.

It’s good that she’s leaving. I would hate to think that whoever is elected will not prove to be as phony as Mayor McBride.

Robert Style, Kirkland