City traffic engineer Randy Hoskins' job is on the line in the latest budget discussion. I'm not sure if it's personal, as has been alleged, but I have to think something is behind such an odd move. Money alone doesn't seem to me to be enough to dump the position.
Lincoln needs a traffic engineer. Our community is too large not to have one. There are too many roads, too many signals, and too much planning to do to not have somebody guiding that work under one vision. Getting rid of Hoskins' job would be a tremendous mistake.
I'm neutral, however, on the question of whether we ought to, instead, get rid of Randy Hoskins himself. He has done somethings I have liked, and he has done some things I don't agree with. If I were king I would probably have a chat with him to see if he could change a few of his ideas, and if not I would look for somebody else to take over. But for now the (limited) evidence I have shows him to be competent enough. I only bring this up because Karl Fredrickson, Director of Public Works, has made the accusation that Councilman Jon Cook wants to dump Hoskins for personal reasons. Scrapping an entire position just because of a personal spat would be a tremendous error.
But if the move isn't at least partially personal, why would the Council suggest getting rid of such an important position? Why would a city Lincoln's size want to try to operate without a traffic engineer?
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Knowing Cook, it wouldn’t be uncharacteristic for him to do something like this for personal reasons.
I abhor Lincoln’s aversion to islands, and the randomness of some speed limits sometimes makes no sense. Still, I agree that we need to have someone doing this job.
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