It is unfortunate that Mr. Banks has lost his position after 17 years as Flamborough's ACO. I am sure he did a great job and was embraced by our community during that time. Unfortunately, Mr. Banks's bid exceeded the winning bid by $115,000. This is a large sum of money -approximately one third of the winning bid by the couple in Ancaster.

Not unlike the bidding process that is awarded to rural postal workers, every now and then a newcomer is added to the fold, as many long-running workers give up their route or find themselves under-bid because they require a certain income. This is the nature of contracts that are controlled by the public purse.

Contracts undergo the bidding process to ensure that we receive the most affordable service. To suggest that we forgo this process to ensure we have someone we (Flamborough) prefer due to our comfort level, I believe is wrong. That is something we would expect Hamilton to do, undermine our fair bid process and award the contract to someone of their preference whether we like it or not.

But Hamilton did not do that. Instead the contract had two interested parties who both submitted what they considered fair bids, and as the system dictates, the lowest bid meeting the criteria won.

I believe that as a community under siege, we should choose our battles wisely. Crowing against the system for acting in a seemingly fair and impartial manner will, without a doubt, cast us as cry babies to the powers that be.

Although I applaud Ms. Lamb's compassion, we must accept good business decisions. We should concentrate all of our efforts on de-amalgamating from our Hamilton overlords, and stop complaining about things that were carried out in Flamborough as they would have been carried out within the city.

Tom Dunning, Valens