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Clearly you are not a Nelson fan. That's fine, it's your right. But has he ever been a fireman? A policeman or a paramedic? Not to my knowledge. So he does what a good manager does and hires what he believes to be qualified professionals to manage these things, and acts on their recommendations. Generally when the police and fire come to budget meetings with requests, they get them. This is not a cop out. This is not shifting blame. To do otherwise would be to be micromanaging, and sticking your nose into things you really know nothing about. These people are his, and our, trusted advisors. If these people are not qualified or are doing a poor job, that's on the mayor. Since this young mans tragic death I have seen media go after Mayor Nelson almost exclusively. This is nonsensical. I've served in the military, worked in construction, and been in a great many potentially hazardous work situations. Who was Austin Duran's supervisor? Who tasked him with working on this machinery? Who was responsible for ensuring he was trained in this? And if he wasn't trained, very respectfully, how much accountability does he have for putting himself in that situation where he is working on dangerous equipment he does not know enough about? There is a level of personal accountability there. As I've said, I've worked in these types of situations, and when you don't know, you take a step back and find someone who does. That's not just work place safety, that's common sense (I know, a very dangerous, almost foreign term these days).I don't know the names of any of the people I just asked about, but blame goes right to the top? The non-EMS Mayor? Sounds kind of foolish to me. As for the two firefighters that quit/retired, there can be a host of reasons for that. Finally, I will say there are people on the counsel right now making superfluous noise. Mr. Nesta and Mr. Becker are playing politics, and not helping anything. They are throwing rocks at the mayor, instead of asking questions like I have outlined above. Again, poor politics attempting to lay blame instead of seek truth.