Mayor Jay Gillian had a fair point at last week’s Ocean City Council meeting. It is one of his familiar refrains about local government, but it addresses a far bigger picture: can we get the facts before we offer an opinion?
It has always been true that people have a tendency to react based on a snippet of information, whether it is idle gossip or hard news. We don’t need to know the context to act like we know of what we speak.
It has become especially problematic in the digital age because it allows us to spread our (uninformed) opinions quickly and to a wide audience. We offer our two cents when that opinion is worth considerably less.
It doesn’t take much to set us off. It can be something we see on the news or that we hear from a politician or celebrity or professional athlete. Or just someone we tangentially know who puts up a post on social media.
We react. And then there is the reaction to the reaction. And then the reaction to that. It is why comment sections can quickly degenerate and should make us sorry we put fingers to keyboards.
We want to feel relevant so we weigh in quickly when we really should stop and try to learn more.
Gillian’s caution came up last week during a presentation on the 2023 Ocean City budget. Councilman Bobby Barr said the city should look into instituting an occupancy fee as a revenue source. It is a worthwhile suggestion. The city should look into it. And indeed, the city is doing just that.
Chief Finance Officer Frank Donato said the mayor asked him and his team to research the idea and report back.
Just as talk among council members began with questions about the idea, Gillian cut in. He asked everyone to please wait until the administration could gather facts and report what it finds to council. Otherwise, he said, someone could take one little bit of information, get people riled up about it one way or another and boom, council chambers would be packed. And that’s before they know enough to offer an informed opinion.
He isn’t wrong.
Ocean City taxpayers and those who have rentals should want to hear the full story about what the city learns about the potential of an occupancy fee – the pros, the cons, the costs, the benefits, what other communities have experienced. Learning about the facts doesn’t mean it will be instituted.
And when that’s presented, decide on an informed basis whether it is something Ocean City should consider. That will be a good time to weigh in.
That may not be easy. Despite the mayor’s caution, we would wager the opinions started to fly seconds after Councilman Barr made the suggestion.