We should deal in facts, not fiction “Blame me!” pleads Ms. Mary Schmidt in her attention-seeking online post, “Blame me!” With pleasure.

Ms. Schmidt seeks credit for the recent resignation of a highly-trained, competent and effective city employee — not an accomplishment worthy of praise.

Her malicious harassment may be a contributing factor, but she has continually failed to provide any evidence to support her questionable allegations. She demanded the city council investigate her unsubstantiated allegations, even though it is not authorized or qualified to do so. I would think that someone of Ms. Schmidt’s years would know that.

An ethical person wold take their evidence to the proper law enforcement agency. Instead, she files a complaint with the International City/County Management Association, a private professional organization with no authority or ability to investigate. The only authority the ICMA has is to revoke the membership of any member found to have violated their code of conduct.

Ms. Schmidt is also to blame for spreading baseless rumors from anonymous sources (her favorite kind) such as she did at a city council meeting earlier this year, claiming that Great Plains-Ellsworth employees weren’t going to be recalled after holiday shut-down per her “anonymous” source at Great Plains Corp. I contacted Ms. Amy Shoemaker, human resources director at Great Plains-Salina (it is best to get the facts from the horse’s mouth and not the other end), who confirmed that Ellsworth employees would return to work by Jan. 6. She said she does not know who Mary Schmidt is, but she does not speak for Great Plains.

I also blame Ms. Schmidt for being willfully uninformed, as she is unable to differentiate between a rear end vacating a chair and an official vacating their elected office.

Ms. Schmidt claims to have a vast array of knowledge on many topics, however, her words show it is merely half vast.

Michael Walsh Ellsworth