What our Readers Are Saying

Letters to the Editor

McDuff Bypass will make traffic worse

I recently picked Peachtree City as my retirement home after looking for the ideal spot for approximately 10 years.

I thought this was the ideal community from the amenities offered, and the general appearance of the way the city was planned and maintained.

One of the things I notice, however, was how poorly engineered and planned was the intersection of Ga. highways 74 and 54. I can see how this grew to be a problem with expansion of the shopping and restaurant facilities, but (I’m guessing about the distance) with only 500-1000 or so feet between McDuff Parkway and the 74/54 intersection, there are five traffic lights. One would expect that this would cause problems, and it truly has.

Now the proposal is to alleviate some congestion with a McDuff by-pass to connect with Hwy. 74 at the location of the communications tower, south of the Kedron Drive light.

It appears the council has given an open door acceptance to an issue that should not even be a topic for discussion.

What can be envisioned is this will only serve to aggravate our existing problems and still create further congestion on the northbound exit from Peachtree City.

Connecting to Hwy. 74 at the location they propose would require a traffic light. In addition, the Target store that will be built in the mall area of Peachtree Parkway will eventually, if not immediately, give us a light at the Georgian Parkway.

Given that some of the traffic will bypass the problem lights at the 54/74 interchange, both systems will now feed northbound traffic on Hwy. 74 with probable impeded flow.

I believe we will end up with continued congestion, but now in several new locations.

These new lights will not only be a problem during peak rush hours, but will continue 24/7 for the rest of us.

If you now look only at the proposed grade level crossing for the railroad track, you further see that this is an accident waiting to happen. There is not enough room between the tracks and Hwy. 74 to keep people from blocking the tracks on a regular basis.

Someone will get killed there eventually. The trains coming through our city do not slow down at that area, and the warning whistle’s will only create further noise problems to an already sensitive location of neighborhoods.

Perhaps a better tie-in would be at the end of Kedron Drive near the Belvedere subdivision?

All of this, however, and for what purpose? To appease a builder with little apparent benefit to Peachtree City.

Common sense tells us this dilemma is more than just plausible. I don’t question the need for improvements to the 54/74 interchange, and we will see what happens when they complete the widening to that approach from the west.

I would hope that the city council, however, takes a better engineered look at this proposal before we end up with another traffic problem we cannot rid ourselves of.

Roger Begin
Peachtree City, Ga.

It’s not government’s job to promote religion

I’d like to quickly voice my displeasure with the article by Louis Sheldon that The Citizen printed. But I’ll start out by agreeing with him, to try proving I’m not biased against him.

I agree that the Supreme Court needs to have some influence taken away by other branches. I most definitely agree that the Supreme Court has for some reason been given far more influence than is pleasant, or even necessary.

However, I must say that it is most unfortunate that the Rev. Sheldon feels the need to combine with his reasonable assertion negative remarks about a positive thing. That is the government becoming completely secular. (It is always interesting that people use the example of the Pledge to prove that the U.S government is based on religious ideals, as the Pledge didn’t include “under God” until the 1950s.)

It is the government’s job to protect you from unprovoked assault. In a bit more abstract sense, it is also the government’s job to provide for a certain amount of justice, or protection from ideological assault in the form of racism or religious discrimination.

It is not the job of the government, most especially on the federal level, to dictate morals, especially with the weak excuse of promoting “tradition.” These things are the responsibility of our families and our myriad churches.

So, essentially, the allowance of influence in any federal branch is debatable, though I agree that it should be minimized. However, the job of any government agency to provide secular, ubiquitous protection from assault, either from itself or from individuals, is paramount.

Jason Crain
Fayetteville, Ga.

How about some traffic help, F’ville?

I don’t have that last nerve left after today, and this is an open letter to the city of Fayetteville. I was driving south on Ga. Highway 85 about 8 p.m. Tuesday just past Grady Avenue where the lane to the right ends and traffic in that lane is supposed to merge.

I was in the left lane when a white Silverado pickup came speeding up on the right side. The lane was ending [so] the driver sped up and came into the side of my van forcing me into oncoming traffic.

I saw the man was about to run off the end of the road, and was going to wreck me and himself. I slammed on the brake to keep him from hitting me or wrecking in the ditch in front of him. He came over in front of me then slammed on his brakes for the next two blocks, harassing me for daring to drive in the proper lane.

I called the city of Fayetteville police [and] they came and talked to me then talked to the driver of the truck. He said he runs that lane every day, but didn’t see me! Said it wasn’t intentional, said he was a doctor at the hospital.

He runs that lane every day [so] he knows where the lane ends. He must know by law [he is supposed to] slow down and yield to traffic.

He almost killed me and drivers in the oncoming traffic lane, then decided to play games with me by harassing me by stopping in front of me to irritate me.

The officer did nothing, issued him no ticket.

Each and every time you come down Hwy. 85 where that lane ends you have a brainless idiot, who every day runs that lane, speeds up and cuts in front of the driver in the correct lane of traffic.

The city must do something before someone is killed by people running an ending lane, simply to get a car ahead of traffic.

It’s sad that this doctor almost wrecked me, and is so stupid that he did not know that had I not slammed on my brakes and moved over, he was within three feet of running off the end of the road and down an embankment, and he would have had his fellow doctors treating him at the hospital of his choice.

It’s also equally amazing that his wife, void of brains, rides in the vehicle with him. I called her a stupid donkey, and were I not already in physical stress, I would have gone to jail for assault.

I fully understand road rage: When someone almost kills you then laughs and then harasses you, it takes the patience of Job to survive.

With the stress I am already in with my sick grandchild, I really needed the good doctor to try to wreck me. Please, city of Fayetteville send an officer to cite these people for failure to yield, and reckless driving.

LeGay Saul
Fayette County, Ga.

Duchess Andrea reports from bridge club

The primary elections with those unimaginative candidates and voter apathy are thankfully over. Everybody in my bridge club was sick of the long-winded recorded telephone messages from desperate candidates and their cronies.

A classic moment in the election came at the Starr’s Mill political forum when Fayette County Commission candidate Sam Chapman’s puppet strings became entangled in the microphone.

Several sheriff’s department deputies were present to untangle the mess and quickly put the candidate back on track to praise the sheriff.

Chapman was defeated by Peter “The Piper” Pfeifer in a surprisingly close race. Agnes, my bridge partner, says, “Sam is cute but not ready for the big time.”

The dirtiest race was for the Eighth Congressional District seat between Dylan Glenn and Lynn Westmoreland.

Controversial Citizen Newspaper Editor Calamity Cal Beverly gave an early endorsement to the kid Dylan Glenn much to the surprise of the bridge club.

Westmoreland quickly discounted the endorsement as the results of a “beef” that goes several years back. Tyrone Tessie commented “that beef is a lot of bull.”

Lo and behold, as soon as Calamity Cal made his move, the whole Washington crowd led by Newt Gingrich and Zig Zag Zell began endorsing the kid and jumping all over Westmoreland like he was a closet Democrat or even worse.

Maybe Newt forgot that a much younger Westmoreland rescued him from a pack of howling, rabid Eastern airline pilots in those sad days. Newt never put much stock in loyalty nor good judgment.

Lynn Westmoreland, who usually exercises good horse sense, deserved such a political scare for “playing footsie” with the Politburo (Peachtree City Council) in setting the stage for 15-year-olds and legally blind citizens to drive golf carts on public roads in the city.

Willene from Woolsey was intrigued by state House Candidate Dan Lakly’s comments about having close ties to Zell Miller.

She called the former governor about Lakly, and Zell had a hard time placing him except to remember that he was one of those “dog-gone” obstructionist Republicans in the legislature. These are the same Republicans that Zell will speak to at the National Convention.

Enough said!

Duchess Andrea of Aberdeen Village

[Editor’s note: Andrea describes herself this way: Duchess Andrea, a certified lunatic, was born in 1904 near Social Circle, Ga., as one of 12 daughters of a bootlegger. She studied at the Normal School near Blakely in Early County, Ga., where she was found to be abnormal. She attended Wesleyan College and the University of Georgia without receiving a single credit. She has written extensively about nothing and has been an uninvited speaker at numerous national conventions. She is active in the bridge club and is a long-time resident of Aberdeen Village.]

Lutheran Church controversy : Traffic will increase

I continue to object to the impending zoning change of the Christ Our Shepherd Lutheran Church property which would allow Walgreens to build a new drug store and additional commercial building (for a tenant yet to be determined) at the corner of Ga. Highway 54 and Peachtree Parkway.

Last Friday, Father David Epps in his regular column, “Church move is the right thing,” indicated his support for the rezoning and stated, “Traffic will decrease, not increase as the result of the sale.” I disagree with Father Epps’ traffic assessment.

Christ Our Shepherd Lutheran Church, on average, has a total of 700 people attend four separate church services every Sunday. If each car carries an average of three worshippers, then on Sunday, the busiest day, the church generates a total of 233 cars.

Other days of the week, their car numbers are significantly less, even when their preschool program, youth activities, Boy Scouts, and community service meetings are included.

The Walgreens annual report for 2003 indicates they have 4,442 stores with 3.6 million paying customers per day. This is an average of 810 paying customers per day per store and is based on stores that on average are smaller than the one proposed for Peachtree City.

Considering a larger store size, I believe it is a conservative estimate that this store would ultimately draw a minimum of a 1,000 customers/cars/day, seven days a week. These numbers do not include traffic generated by prescription drop-offs and customers who do not make a purchase.

On average, the total number of automobiles in Peachtree City would visit this store every month (automobiles in Peachtree City = 30,000 cars divided by 1,000 cars/day = 30 days).

The above calculations do not include cars for the “tenant yet to be determined” at the additional building that will also be built on the property.

What is certain is that the Walgreens sale would have a much larger traffic impact than that of the Lutheran Church. Father Epps’ traffic assessment of a decrease in traffic if the property is sold to Walgreens does not compute (233 church cars Sunday versus Walgreens 1,000 cars/day plus the additional building cars).

Simply said, the huge traffic potential is the reason that the Walgreens offer is “175 percent” of the appraised land value, and traffic will increase.

The initial concept plan for Walgreens also adds a two-way road cut on Hwy. 54 very near the intersection. This means that cars traveling west on Hwy. 54, after going through the Peachtree Parkway green light, would be making a right turn into the Walgreens parking lot. With traffic going through the intersection at 45 mph and above, how many accidents would that cause? This would be a safety travesty.

Also, the impact on traffic on Peachtree Parkway going north and south between McIntosh High and J.C. Booth Middle schools would be significant. The congestion could easily be the tipping point to four-lane Peachtree Parkway North.

This site should not be rezoned. The tearing down of a landmark church for a new drug store and additional commercial building would be detrimental to our planned community.

This proposed zoning change affects all of us in Peachtree City. Anyone who would like preprinted copies of the petition for distribution in their subdivisions or organizations, please contact me at bnigro@redicheck.biz. I intend to present the petitions to the Peachtree City Council prior to their rezoning vote, which at the earliest will be late September.

Bill Nigro
Peachtree City, Ga.

Preservation a priority in PTC

Preservation is an issue for Peachtree City. That is, preservation of quality of life, which should include the architecture within our planned community.

Recently a failed theater, a closed Donato’s Pizza and a fire-damaged Morrison’s Cafeteria were replaced respectively with a restaurant, more retail space and an Eckerd Drug Store. While neither these original nor replacement structures are or will be particularly appealing, we had little influence in their reuse since they all were land-planned and zoned commercial.

Taking a wrecker ball and bulldozers to demolish a signature and beautiful church, lawn and fountain at the crossroads of Peachtree City simply goes too far. It is not just the memories of baptisms, weddings, living mangers each Christmas and fellowship that are lost forever. There would be a significant loss to the community as well.

I challenge you, the reader, to name a more attractive and architecturally desirable public property in all of Peachtree City, or for that matter Fayette County.

Christ Our Shepherd has been on this corner for more than 25 years. For a “nominal” payment they upgraded to this site rather than take the developer’s offer of free land.

It was common for Peachtree City developers to give land for schools, churches, golf cart trails and community use including recreation and public safety. It was this spirit that drove our planned community centered on quality of life.

Preservation usually involves community-wide fund drives. In comparison this is easy. All that is necessary is for the Peachtree City Council to vote no to the proposed zoning change on this property from Office Institutional to Commercial and for the church to accept the community’s decision.

Is a church set up to serve the community or does the community serve the church? Is this fair to Christ Our Shepherd? They do have some real needs and have long been a pillar of the community. They are very good people.

This church might be faulted for not including the community in their original deliberations on whether to seek a zoning change to Commercial or not. However, they are in my opinion a resilient, engaged congregation whose ministry will grow no matter what the decision. They are clearly a church capable of serving all for the common and better good.

Preservation and spirituality should be complementary objectives. A No by city council on changing the zoning to Commercial does not stop Christ Our Shepherd from moving. They want a much bigger property with a softball field for their youth and more. It would, however, almost ensure that the most attractive corner of Peachtree City is preserved.

Otherwise we get the biggest box drug store in town plus a retail business to be named. There are much more suitable sites for both. We are a planned community. Let’s stick to the plan and help preserve our unique quality of life.

B. Ray Helton
Peachtree City, Ga.

Land once had restrictions

In 1975 Garden Cities Corp. sold the three-acre site of the present Lutheran Church in Peachtree City to the Board of American Missions of the Lutheran Church of America.

The selling price of $10,000 per acre carried a long list of restrictive covenants tied to the deed. The very first restrictive covenant reads, “No portion of the property shall be used except for church and church related purposes.”

These restrictions were valid for 20 years. Now the church wants the mayor and city council to rezone the property to Limited Use Commercial so they can sell it to Walgreens. I believe the original intent of the planned community concept should be preserved and the covenants should continue.

Last month the homeowners in the Highlands subdivision received a letter from John Weber, pastor of Christ Our Shepherd Lutheran Church, inviting them to an informational meeting regarding the sale of their church.

At the meeting they informed homeowners of their intent to rezone their property to Limited Use Commercial so they could sell it to Walgreens to build a drug store and to build an unnamed future facility on the site. The invitation was sent to homeowners, members of the Lutheran Church, representatives from Walgreens, Mayor Steve Brown, Peachtree City Council members, the city planner and a representative from Commercial Net Lease Realty (developer).

The Walgreens’ representative, the mayor, council members and city planner never showed up. Members of the church planning committee attended. Pastor John Weber who issued the invitation was not there.

At the meeting church members told how the church looks upon the $3 million-plus offer from Walgreens as a “gift from God.” Homeowners in the area and other Peachtree City residents see it as a safety factor, an eyesore, more congestion and reduction of property values.

Does Peachtree City want another 54/74 intersection? Does Peachtree City need another drug store? Will the property in the vicinity of the drug store be a desirable location for homes? Will the homes in the vicinity of the drug store maintain their value? Can our mayor and council possibly find rezoning the church property a good move for the city?

Most residents of Peachtree City say NO.

Thomas Spath
The Highlands
Peachtree City, Ga.

Veterans air differing views of swift boat controversy : For Kerry

So let me get this right. The guy who put John Kerry in for a Silver Star and gave him glowing fitness reports calling him the “the acknowledged leader in his peer group,” didn’t really mean it.

Then there’s a doctor who says he treated Kerry, although his name is nowhere to be found on Kerry’s medical records, and says Kerry wasn’t wounded like those records show.

Oh, and there’s a guy on another boat who insists Kerry ran away from a fight, came back later and picked up his crewman out of the water when it was safe and no one was firing at him.

And all of these assembled by a guy who has opposed and hated Kerry from the time of his testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee. A guy who gives extensively to Republican causes. A real old-fashioned Nixon-style fascist who allegedly has two Bronze Stars.

Meanwhile, all the men who served under Kerry directly attest to his leadership and bravery in combat. Not all agree with him politically, but all say he was brave, unselfish and aggressive.

Not one has had anything but great respect for his record under fire, although at least one has a great deal of trouble with his testimony to the committee and his anti-war stance (a matter of record).

The most troubling aspect of this sinful smear is not the smear, but the willingness of so many veterans to visit the lie.

Many Bush fans will do, or say, or believe anything because they didn’t like Kerry’s anti-war stance. Most with whom I have spoken have never read Kerry’s testimony to the committee but seem to know all about it. They tell me he testified to witnessing atrocities (not true), that his testimony was all about atrocities committed (not true), that he broke faith with his fellow soldiers by giving this anti-war testimony (subjective, but stupid).

As we’re opening war records, let’s do everybody’s. We can start with the detractor in chief, John O’Neill. He says he got two Bronze Stars, but did he really? And if so did he deserve them?

Perhaps we can find somebody who didn’t serve with Mr. O’Neill who will sign an affidavit saying he has a cousin who knows somebody who did serve with Mr. O’Neill who says he was really a quivering coward who wore women’s underwear at night and cried when he came under fire.

And what about that so-called doctor? He might very well have had a drug problem the entire time he was in Southeast Asia which resulted in these delusions that John Kerry accidentally shot himself. We have no direct proof, but perhaps some of the men who saw him on the plane home thought he was acting “a little funny.”

And what about George Elliott, Kerry’s commander and the guy who wrote his glowing fitness reports, put him in for the Silver Star, the Bronze Star, and three Purple Hearts? Was he lying then? Was he lying when he made his negative assertions? Was he lying when he made the retraction, or when he allegedly retracted his retraction.

He’s called “bloodthirsty” in the book about Kerry’s war experiences. Perhaps there is a basis to the name and maybe we should investigate him for crimes against humanity.

It’s an interesting road we can travel once we depart the dock of common sense and eyewitness accounts. If we have diverse eyewitness accounts, perhaps we should believe those closest to the action. Perhaps we should question those with a grudge to bear. Perhaps we should wonder why we have departed the dock at all, except to make political hay from a brave man’s record.

If this is payback for the Bush National Guard thing, let me draw a personal distinction. I don’t know President Bush, nor did I serve in the TANG, nor did I fly the F-102.

I did however serve with the group of flight commanders that hired so-called “Guard babies” (pilot training candidates) for my unit, and this is what I know.

I would never have hired George Bush for a pilot training slot with his extraordinarily low AFOQT composite score, his complete lack of flying experience, his lack of ever evincing an interest in military flying or contact with the unit.

If he was forced on us by political expediency (higher ups), I would have wondered at his low flying time (less than 100 hours per year) and the fact that he didn’t upgrade to flight lead in that amount of time.

Most importantly, he would not have been allowed to simply “forget” his yearly medical flying exam. He would have been called on the carpet and told to go to the infirmary. Failing that he would have received a FEB where his wings probably would have been revoked (but not his commitment).

Having been granted permission to fulfill his duty elsewhere I would have expected him to do so. In the Guard, we had a “no pay no stay, no green so seen, no dough no show” rule (of thumb). Consequently there would be pay records and there would be attendance logs. Draw your own conclusions.

There is no stopping this train. The lies from Swiftboat.com will continue and as Goebbels noted, they just have to be big enough and repeated enough.

But these men who tell them are men without honor. It is they who have not kept the faith, the worst thing a military man can do.

A local veteran told us in the AJC the fallacy of believing in medals as proving anything, and he is right. Medals often reflect the skill of the writer as much as the valor of the recipient, and he suggests we “listen” to the Swift-lie jerks.

Well, do so if you must, but research both sides. Read the testimony of the men with whom Kerry actually served and bear in mind the source of financing and the distance separating Swift-lie’s “witnesses” from the actual action.

And you veterans out there willing to accept these lies at face value, look to your own soul. Is your belief based on the evidence of men who were not there, or your dislike of the politics of a man who opposed the reasoning, strategy, and politics of a strange, and terrible and often valorous event to which you gave so much.

Tim Parker
Peachtree City, Ga.

Against Kerry

Kerry: New England patriot or Hanoi John?

Watching John Kerry’s acceptance speech on television, I came to the conclusion that it was the most fundamentally dishonest act that I had ever witnessed.

The basic assumption of his speech was that the majority of the American people would not know about his actions after returning early from Vietnam or the fact that he had voted against every defense measure and weapons system that we now depend on in our war against terrorism.

However, the most sickening factor to me was that he cloaked himself in a false mantle of patriotism and love for our flag. This is the same flag that his protesters burned on numerous occasions and that he has voted every time not to protect by an amendment.

I served in a recon platoon and three infantry rifle companies during three tours in Vietnam. We neither committed or observed any of the atrocities that Kerry testified under oath before Congress were the norm among American troops. In 1971, I was wounded for a seventh time.

In 1971, John Kerry was working with Jane Fonda aiding the enemy that we were fighting. The protesters that they led were burning American flags and carrying pictures of Ho Chi Minh and communist flags.

The next year, propaganda posters could be found all over Vietnam’s jungles of Fonda wearing an enemy uniform, manning an antiaircraft weapon in Hanoi, and of Kerry leading a demonstration in Washington and at Valley Forge.

What kind of leader politicks to go home early with three scratches leaving his men behind, and joins Hanoi Jane?

In 1971, Kerry published a book that was pro-Hanoi and whose cover, with the American flag being raised upside down by seven hippies, mocked the flag-raising at Iwo Jima. His book and speeches trashed an entire generation of the United States Armed Forces who fought in Vietnam.

These activities make John Kerry, Jane Fonda and all others like them, traitors in my book. The blood of thousands of America’s finest is on their hands.

The North Vietnamese were encouraged to continue a war that they couldn’t win on the battlefield, but on our home front. A war that was fought according to President Reagan for a noble cause to stop communism and to save South Vietnam was defamed, smeared and ultimately lost.

Lost by the Kerry-types, left-wing liberal politicians, most of the media, and hordes of college protesters, and draft dodgers. The draft dodgers were later given legitimacy and called real heroes by Jimmy Carter.

Now, it breaks my heart to see the same thing starting to happen to our troops in Iraq. The attack against them is being led by many in the media, John Kerry, Ted Kennedy, Tom Daschle, Max Cleland, Wesley Clark, the sewer that most of Hollywood has become with its Michael Moore-types, Al Gore, Jimmy Carter, and others who have politicized our national security.

These extreme liberals are greatly damaging the war against terrorism. They would also have us get permission from a corrupt and predominantly anti-American U.N. before defending our country. To their type, America is always wrong.

One last fact is that real heroes don’t beat their chests proclaiming their service and calling themselves heroes. Yet, the most liberal of our 100 senators by voting record, Hanoi John Kerry, does this daily.

Did you ever hear Bob Dole or John McCain, who both went through far more than most, do such a thing when they were running for president?

Robert Powell
U.S. Army Infantry
Carrollton, Ga.

Lay off the sheriff already

Enough is enough.

The sheriff has been criticized a lot lately by those who either wanted something he controls, or for something of personal reasons.

On behalf of the sheriff, let me say this.

Since moving here I’ve had several reasons to talk to him or his deputies. I found Sheriff Johnson to be very helpful, very informative, very considerate, and just plain good to talk to. His deputies so far have been the same.

I could also tell he is a man you would not want on your case as he is a good sheriff. If I found out different, I would say so.

So let me add this: Thanks, sheriff, for being the person you are.

Thanks for your staff.

Thanks for building a helicopter building that cost taxpayers nothing.

Thanks that it is hardly visible except to those who could not build it their way.

Thanks to you and the city police for your efforts to fight crime.

Thanks that we have a sheriff’s department as it is. Let’s not change it.

Jim Howell
Fayetteville, Ga.