I wholeheartedly agree with Steve Brown’s letter about how volunteers must fill gaps in Peachtree City leadership. One of the things I most enjoyed in PTC was the Hispanic Heritage Celebration. Months went into preparing this event, and as he stated, it was a wonderful opportunity for our local students to give back to the community. Last year, the Starr’s Mill marching band strolled in officially opening the celebration with a beautiful score from “West Side Story.” In all the years I was involved in the planning, not once did any of our City Council members attend. This year, our dear mayor was totally oblivious to the fact that it had been reduced to nothing. So many people came to ask when it would be taking place this year, and with heaviness of heart I answered that it wasn’t important enough to City Hall for them to make sure it would happen. Our current mayor is not for the people, and does not incite enthusiasm for volunteers to want to roll up their sleeves and give of their time and talent. Peachtree City has taken on a bleak personality, a dark shadow. This was an event which did not cost the city very much. Donations were given for the live entertainment, the food was donated from local restaurants, local supermarkets donated wares, etc. There was volunteer manpower to set up and take things down. How smart was the move to eliminate this grand event? How can we teach our youth to give back to the community or ask people to get involved in things when our so-called leadership sits high and mighty making decisions for us, but does not have the capability to lead by example?

----------------------------------------------------------------

For those of you who bashed the former mayor and council for purchasing three acres of commercial property on Ga. Highway 54 West to prevent yet another retail development from being built, consider this: our current elected officials are actually considering “trading” over six acres of city-owned greenbelt directly across the street from this property to a developer so he can build a wholesale club, Kohl’s and gosh knows what else at one of the city’s entrances. Oh, and get this, one of the primary entrances to this new shopping mecca will be off of Planterra Way.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Santa Logsdon is spreading more Christmas joy by sticking it to the taxpayers (again) for over $900,000 to help his buddies pay their bad debts. This is bad, real bad.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Harold Logsdon is making Bobby Lenox’s legacy look better and better every month. Bobby had a way of playing the king role and helping his little buddies make big bucks off the city. And then along comes Harold, the sneakiest back-room dealer of them all. According to Cal Beverly at The Citizen, the city waited until after 4 p.m. on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving to send the press release on the big payoff of the development authority farce, knowing it wouldn’t land in the newspapers until late the next week, so people wouldn’t have a chance to attend the meeting. Sorry, Harold, you can’t sneak this one under the Thanksgiving rug for no one to see. At least Bobby would have had the mettle, or maybe it was arrogance, to throw the issue out there for the public to choke on it. We are in the worst leadership vacuum at City Hall since Herb Frady was mayor back in the late ‘70s.

----------------------------------------------------------------

I can’t remember a more deplorable year in Peachtree City’s history than the one we are suffering through currently. Logsdon is leaving a black mark on our community. We have been sold to local developers, banks and their ilk for 50 pieces of silver. The lies about cutting taxes, the backdoor deals with the developer to get the TDK road, the useless annexations for Group VI and the use of our hard-earned tax dollars to pay off the development authority’s illegal misbehavior are the highlights of our misguided leadership this year. The Logsdon bunch has the audacity to reduce the compensation we employees receive while moving to double their personal salaries at the same time. The year 2006 will be remembered as the time a bunch of malicious and revolting people used our government against us. We need some virtuous people to run in the next election and take our community back and to restore honesty and ethics.

----------------------------------------------------------------

The City Council in PTC needs to resign. Next, we need to file a civil suit against the development authority members who clearly violated the law.

----------------------------------------------------------------

You have got to laugh at the poor fools in Peachtree City, drowning in their own snobbery. They are getting what they deserve now.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Typical of Peachtree City citizens who don’t want to go to school outside their city limits, but as chronicled in the AJC, will travel to the northside (Lenox Square) to shop rather than staying where their schools are located.

----------------------------------------------------------------

The arrogant person in Highgrove who suggested that his/her community be sent to Minter/Whitewater schools is at the very least uninformed. No such suggestion was made. What was indicated was a “bulls-eye” regarding Highgrove/Whitewater dodging the redistricting bullet. Last year when the elementary school lines were being redrawn, it was only logical that Highgrove/Whitewater would be rezoned to the new Cleveland Elementary School with the anticipated “feeder” pattern to the new Bennett Mills Middle School. It not only would have eased the overcrowding at Peeples, but would have helped populate Bennett’s Mill. One has to wonder what the considerations of the board/committee were for not moving these communities considering the fact that the residents of Highgrove and Whitewater were campaigning to stay at the Starr’s Mills Complex long before any boundary lines were redrawn. And, they filled the FCBOE meeting room on the night of the redistricting announcement. Doesn’t that in itself indicate that they also realized that they were the most logical choice for redistricting? Additionally, the overcrowding at Peeples is NOT attributed to the Wilshire community. Wilshire is geographically logical to attend Peeples. Why bus children to Braelinn from Wilshire with buses crisscrossing from Timberlake, Highgrove and Whitewater? For that matter, Timberlake should go to Braelinn as it is practically right next to that school. Children who can see their schools from their backyards and be transported to school by golf cart should attend that school. Communities that are geographically closer to a new school realistically should go to that school. Wilshire was redistricted four years ago; why should they endure being used as a ping-pong ball? The numbers indicate that if Wilshire was rezoned back to Braelinn, it would be over capacity in a year or two, posing another problem. What the FCBOE should really do is what Marion Keys suggested: Throw it all out and start from scratch; redraw all the school boundary lines using city maps. Allow the neighborhoods within a two-mile radius of a particular school to attend that school; then draw the lines that make the most sense with regard to each subdivision and their proximity to a school while factoring in the number of students in each area. Just because you choose to live in Highgrove does not entitle your children to go to the school of your choice (unless, of course, you want to put them in private school). Your children are entitled to a good education, as is every other child in Peachtree City. And, a good education involves a school that is not overcrowded. Additionally, and most importantly, there are no Peachtree City schools. There are Fayette County schools and a PTC address as opposed to a Fayetteville address has no significance whatsoever in school boundary lines. So, get off your “high” horse and get your facts straight. Highgrove should not be immune to redistricting.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Great blog from reporter Ben Nelms on the EPD. The lousy City Council in Peachtree City wouldn’t even condemn the actions of the PSC plant for fouling our air. All of the other local governments and two congressmen sent strong words of criticism on the matter. A lot of us think it’s kind of funny what’s happening in the great “planned community” now.

----------------------------------------------------------------

How did Peachtree City get in the flight path for the Atlanta Airport? What was the name of the man at the public meeting in College Park that spoke representing the airport? He said when all of the construction was finished, things would get back to normal. Well, all of the work is done and now there is a steady stream of low-flying planes over Peachtree City that wasn’t here before. Go out at night and look at all of the lights in the sky. Just another thing in Peachtree City that is worse than it was before. If you have noticed the noise and don’t like it, speak up.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Who says that gasoline prices aren’t manipulated? Prior to the election, prices went down, down, down and the experts said it was “market forces” at work. Now that the election is over, prices are going up, up, up. Well, maybe it’s just coincidence.

----------------------------------------------------------------

How will your city, school, club,or family celebrate Bill of Rights Day on Dec. 15? Check www.jpfo.org/bord.htm to see if your state or local elected officials have resolved to commemorate BORD, and then make sure they do. BTW, it takes a whole five minutes to read this seminal document out loud.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Franklin Roosevelt said of the trial that tested the mettle of his generation:: “No man can tame a tiger into a kitten by stroking it. There can be no appeasement with ruthlessness. There can be no reasoning with an incendiary bomb.”

----------------------------------------------------------------

Jay Leno for Congress? “According to a new study by National Geographic, 11 percent of Americans between the ages of 18 and 24 could not find the United States on a map of the world. You know the only place where everyone could find the United States on a map? Mexico.”

----------------------------------------------------------------

How would you vote on a ballot question, “Do you approve that children born to illegal aliens become U.S. citizens?” No one will ask you, but please let our glorious leaders know your views on this.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Almost without exception the pro-illegal alien/pro-open borders supporters fall within three categories: 1. Illegal aliens and their families. 2. Profiteers of illegal immigration (employers, banks, landlords, foreign governments, their agents, etc.). 3. Beneficiaries of illegal immigration (organizations that depend on illegal aliens to fill their membership rolls and/or to support public grant money applications, etc.).

----------------------------------------------------------------

Illegal immigration from Mexico and other Latin American countries is a problem, but a lot of questions surrounding it are not being answered. I believe until the U.S. addresses these and other issues, no attempt at controlling it will be effective. First, what can the United States and Latin American governments, along with major corporations, do to improve the economies of the native countries the illegal immigrants are coming from? Most of these immigrants are coming here for financial reasons; they’re not fleeing political persecution. Nor are they seeking to live the American way of life. This is evidenced by the fact that many send money home and don’t assimilate while they’re here. Many also remain only temporarily, leaving after they’ve earned enough to satisfy some economic goal. Second, what is so difficult about leaving their native lands and entering the U.S. that they risk life and limb to do it illegally instead of through legal means? Third, before any immigration critics act with prejudice, or any Hispanics get defensive, remember that all Latin immigrants are not illegal and all illegal immigrants are not Hispanics.

----------------------------------------------------------------

There are about 50,000 Irish illegal aliens and 11 to 20 million from Latin America in the United States of America. But illegal immigration is not about Hispanics; it is about the laws of a sovereign nation. Even though by many magnitudes, Latinos are the major violators of our immigration laws, it is still about the law. And U.S. employers who provide the lure for illegal labor force are as guilty as any illegal alien.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Thumbs down and shame upon those who hire illegal aliens. You are taking work away from our own struggling blue-collar workers and food from their children’s mouths. You can check through a federal data base for valid ID, so there is no excuse except corruption and greed.

----------------------------------------------------------------

President Bush was wrong to invade Iraq. There were already WMD inspectors in Iraq. Instead of making the inspectors leave Iraq, President Bush should have sent to Iraq an “army” of inspectors, a sufficient number to cover the entire country. And even if they were to have stayed 10 years, and found no WMDs, that would have been 10 years of no loss of life. Saddam would have still been in power (presumably). Sure, it’s good that he is out of power, but look what has happened since then. We have lost over 2,800 of our best young men and young women, thousands more seriously wounded, plus the deaths of countless thousands of Iraqis. If we cannot “cut and run,” we should surely force the elected Iraqi officials, and their military forces, to cut the shun. Maybe then we could resume looking for the culprit of 9/11, Osama Bin Laden.

----------------------------------------------------------------

To my young friends: when I ask, “What’s the name of the guy who such and such?” it’s not because I can’t remember, but to keep your memory sharp. You’re welcome, it’s my pleasure (LOL).