Wednesday, August 14, 2002

It appears that each of the incumbent candidates for County Commission or their supporters continue to utilize the tactic of utilizing malicious, generalized misrepresentation, insinuation and innuendo to attack their legitimate opponents by pointing to general, unspecified allegations of misconduct on the part of a board of which they were a part.

Until now, I have chosen not to respond to these malicious and demeaning statements because it has been my position that to do so would be to lower myself to their level and would only serve to further generate unwanted discussion. Certainly the political process and climate in Fayette County has become increasingly distasteful, as some apparently believe that it is far better to personally attack others in order to divert attention from their own deficiencies. I have grown tired of these distortions and intend to seek an appropriate conclusion to this manner as necessary.

Certainly, philosophical and personal disagreements existed, and continue to exist between myself, Mr. Bost, Ms. Wells and Mr. Dunn. It is a given that the public policy-making process lends itself to disagreement and confrontation, but some of us understand that one can disagree without necessarily being confrontational and engaging in personal attacks.

The representative process is designed to stimulate debate and to encourage different points of view on a particular issue. That is why we have parties and factions within parties that approach problems and present and vote on solutions differently everyone simply does not, and will not, agree with a proposed method to implement change.

Whether we like it or not, zoning decisions especially require a balancing act between public and private interests and, typically, considerable emotional tension exists with regard to zoning and land use issues.

During my term of office, whenever decisions were made to grant a rezoning, careful consideration was given to prescribed statutory criteria, staff recommendations, legal considerations, the community's interests and to a balancing of those interests with the petitioner's interests.

In spite of the assertions of some libelous letter writers, favoritism was never a factor in my decisions. You may or may not know that the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled against exclusionary zoning specifically and that Fayette County's zoning ordinance was overturned by state courts during the 1980s.

Those constraints continue to exist today, and in spite of the ongoing political rhetoric, and comments from the no-growth segment of the community, failure to comply with applicable guidelines could eventually undermine years of planning and application of sound land use principles.

The fact that I made decisions that were contrary to the personal opinion of one commissioner who previously resigned from office and one who continues to serve in an incumbent capacity today, and their supporters, certainly should not subject me to their continuing malicious and personal attacks.

Generally, public service offers a sense of accomplishment for achieving benefits for the community that we serve. Clearly, the citizens ultimately judge their satisfaction or lack thereof with the performance of elected officials. We will all disagree from time to time, or frequently, with our elected officials and they are fair game to be second-guessed and criticized.

However, such disagreement does not mean that the individual should be subjected to an ongoing, malicious distortion of the truth nor should an individual be subjected to unfounded accusations of unethical behavior. However, in such cases, remedies do exist and may be applied in those circumstances where such action is warranted.

Perhaps, in closing it should be noted that I was never charged with a violation of any ethics statute or ordinance nor was any complaint relative to the conduct of county business routed to the solicitor or district attorney for review. If I'm not mistaken, some members of the county current commission cannot say that their actions have not been reviewed by the solicitor's office.

Robert H. Sprayberry

Fayetteville

[Sprayberry was elected to the county commission in 1994 and served until the end of 1998. In his four-year term, he served the first two years as vice-chairman and the final two years as chairman. He ran for state office in 1998 and was defeated.]

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