Letter: City leadership ‘Eyes Wide Shut’

The top three candidates for Richland police chief have been interviewed and rejected. The city manager is now beginning an outside search for new candidates. The first of the three top candidates rejected was Capt. Mike Cobb, a long-term resident of Richland, father of a young man now on the Pasco police force, known to be an a political straight shooter and son of a Vietnam-era veteran with the 101st Army Airborne Division.

I’ll diverge for a moment. Several weeks ago, as I sat in Starbucks, a man of slight build walked in with two bodyguards, one of which was over six feet tall wearing a blue military uniform and beret. The other was dressed in a suit. I didn’t know who this man was, but my friend did and jumps up to shake his hand. It was the U.S. Secretary of Defense and former U.S. Marine Corps Gen. James Mattis, a former resident of Richland. I now could add to my list of meeting great individuals. And, who was in charge of Mattis’s Richland police force resources to provide local security forces? Capt. Mike Cobb. Yes, this selection process is consistent with the past and current Richland city manager’s “leadership”; Eyes Wide Shut.