Insult was unprofessional

City of Spokane Director of Business and Development Services Jan Quintrall was quoted in an Aug. 4 Spokesman-Review article as follows: “Most engineers don’t want to be told there’s a budget, and rightfully so. They sit there and they design. So, who’s watching the budget?”

At best, that statement is misleading and woefully generalized. At worst, it is self-serving, patronizing drivel that, in my mind, was purposefully crafted to serve her need to bolster her position in the article.

An old, not-so-tongue-in-cheek definition of an engineer comes to mind: “One who can do for $1 what anyone else can do for $100.”

My career was spent as a professional engineer, the last 21 years of them at the city of Spokane, with the final six as principal engineer heading up the Capital Programs Group. While there, I was personally in charge of a number of high-profile, successful, budget-mindful projects. And I certainly wasn’t the only one.

Quintrall’s fallacious and off-the-wall statement has no business coming from a presumably educated and informed individual, let alone someone high on the organization chart at City Hall.

Richard Raymond

Spokane