By DAVE HAMRICK
Editor-at-large

When Fulton County built its new government administration building back in the late '80s, observers quickly began using the name “Taj Mahal.”

It's a huge, many-storied building with a great, airy atrium, lots of marble and mahogany, and a $250,000 ornamental staircase that serves no function whatsoever, except perhaps as a piece of exercise equipment.

That building is one of the main reasons, I feel certain, that Fulton County Commission Chairman Michael Lomax was ousted and replaced with conservative Mitch Skandalakis. I lived in Fulton at the time, and my taxes tripled in three years while county workers surrounded themselves with luxury.

On the other hand, there is something to be said for large, beautiful, richly appointed government buildings. They send a message that the people represented by the government in question are successful, well educated and sophisticated.

Should government buildings be solid? Should they be built to last for generations? Should they convey to visitors that the people whose taxes are on display are not afraid to make a statement?

Well, let's not get too carried away. The jail/courthouse complex planned by Fayette County is on a much smaller scale than Fulton's. We're just talking 60 or 70 million dollars. We're just talking three stories for the courthouse, and a couple of single story pods tacked onto the jail.

That's it for now. Ultimately, a county administrative office is envisioned... probably two or three stories itself, maybe an additional 30 or 40 million bucks.

Of course, nobody's seen any architectural details yet. We don't know for sure whether we're talking Taj Mahal or Walden Pond.

But those who watch over Fayetteville are concerned, because they have been working hard to create a downtown that is a combination of “Leave it to Beaver” and “It's a Wonderful Life.”

I've been present when city officials have sent folks packing when they wanted to put three- or four-story buildings anywhere near downtown.

Now here comes the county government wanting to do the same thing and they can't do diddly about it.

Their concern is understandable, and if county leaders decide they must continue with the current plan, I fervently hope they will sharpen their pencils and work with the architects to scale the thing down as much as possible, to make it fit in, to smooth off the hard edges and let landscaping, rather than brick and mortar, be its most defining feature.

County commissioners have been criticized for not letting the public in on their planning early on in the process, and frankly they probably should have had a public hearing or two before they picked a design for the complex and settled on the size and scope of the project. A little more thinking outside the box couldn't have hurt.

But I honestly think that at this point, they have considered the situation carefully and truly feel that the plan they've arrived at is the best one for the county.

But Jan. 6, they'll have a public hearing, and I believe they'll do their best to set aside the work they've put in (and the money they've spent) and honestly evaluate whether they're being presented with good arguments for backing off and taking another look.

As I said in last week's column, they won't be swayed by emotional arguments. If enlarging the county jail creates more danger, reduces property values or will have a significant impact on traffic, that's going to have to be shown with hard facts, not emotional attacks.

But the tougher question to pose to the commissioners, in my opinion, is not whether their plan is an evil one that will ruin Fayetteville. It's whether there might be a better plan for Fayetteville and all of Fayette.

Would the county be just as well served by putting a jail annex out in the country somewhere? The point is well taken that the danger of escape is increased by having to transport prisoners to court, but the plan is to put nonviolent inmates in the new pods, isn't it? Is it really all that important to put shoplifters and check bouncers downtown?

Some residents have even suggested an old-fashioned work camp approach, in which nonviolent inmates could farm their own food and work for their keep. That's exactly what was done in Fayette County before the current jail was built.

Could the 60-odd acres of county property, so carefully assembled, be sold for a nifty profit and used for a master-planned private project in keeping with Fayetteville's dream for downtown... then could the money from the sale be used to buy property slightly farther from downtown that is more suited to a heavy institutional/governmental complex?

I don't have the answers to those questions, but I think they're worthy of serious consideration. And with the future of downtown Fayetteville at stake, slow deliberation is in order.

We'll all get a more detailed idea of how the county leaders envision the project at the hearing Jan. 6.

Let's hope that some sort of consensus can be arrived at (though there will always be some who oppose the final outcome, no matter what). In many ways, this project will define the future of Fayette's county seat, and I would hate to see such a momentous decision made without widespread support.

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