Amount paid to consultant to formulate school boundaries: $45,000. Number of hours put in by volunteer committee: Countless. Two maps devised by committee which had logical school boundaries and feeder patters, and had all elementary schools under capacity: Priceless. Map BA which Sam Sweat came up with, disregarding recommendations by consultant and parent committee and leaving Highgrove and Whitewater at Peeples which puts the student population at 672, one student under capacity, with 100 projected students coming from New Haven and new subdivision next to schools: Stupid!

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BOE: Close East Fayette, move the majority of kids to Spring Hill, and transfer Lakemont and Lakeside to Minter? Are you crazy? Spring Hill will become a Title 1 school and you’ll lose state funding for closing East Fayette. Part of the reason Spring Hill is such a terrific school is because of the PTO. The families of Lakemont and Lakeside have a large presence at Spring Hill and many of them donate their time and talents to the school. If these subdivisions are transferred, Spring Hill will suffer. Large sums of money were invested in East Fayette recently to upgrade the kitchen and other areas. Take the money you would waste on another over-priced consultant and put it back into East Fayette to fix the water system that some complain about. If you insist on still closing it, consider this: Move some students from Hood Avenue-Fayetteville Intermediate to the new Tillman Road school. Then move an equal number of East Fayette students to Hood Avenue-Fayetteville Intermediate, Spring Hill, Minter, and Inman. Spring Hill will not get hit with so many students and Lakemont and Lakeside can stay at Spring Hill.

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Wow. Sounds like you have the “facts” on Fayette County’s public educational system. While it is not perfect, it’s pretty darn good (excuse my Southern) compared to the rest of the state, or as you compared it, to the nation. Especially since this county hardly receives any of the Title I funding given to surrounding counties. Oh, just visit the surrounding counties with hundreds of thousands of dollars poured into their funding (for technology) and witness what our students could be experiencing if we had community and parent support. Are you familiar with what Title I funding is? “Public” schools do what they are designed to do — serve the public of Fayette County. Despite what many in this area believe, this county is very diverse, and the schools, by federal and state law, must serve ALL students. Compare it to the federal/state government who also serve all. Yes, many tax dollars are wasted and not all citizens are served equally. However, given the government limitations, Fayette County does all it can to provide high-quality education to its students. Perhaps it would be more productive if it had the support rather than the criticism of its residents. Here’s an idea: Let’s start a Citizen blog in support of our schools rather than against them. Has anyone ever considered that? I would venture to guess that our children, teachers and board members would benefit from the community’s trust and support more than the benign criticisms and complaints it is used to. What have YOU done lately to support your local school (other than “Free Speech”)? Oh, I forgot. You are planning on funding your child’s private school education. Yikes! I’ll save it for another “Free Speech” about how those who have been in private schools fare when they have entered Fayette’s pubic schools.

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You better pull up your boots and tighten your belts FCBOE. You think you’ve got problems now with [folks] from Clayton County breaking the law and crossing our borders and coming into our Fayette County schools, you just wait until Clayton County loses its accreditation for a second time. Maybe we can rent some border patrol officers to guard our borders with Clayton County to prevent this from happening. Here’s another thought: Be careful whom you hire from the Clayton County Education System – their track record is not too promising.

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I’ve had it up to here with political correctness, particularly at Christmas. When someone wishes me, “Happy Holidays,” I respond, “And a Merry Christmas to you, too.” If they’re offended by my reply, tough. Also, beginning this year I am boycotting stores that display a “Happy Holidays” sign rather than “Merry Christmas” in the front window. And before I do, I go inside and tell the owner exactly why I won’t be shopping there. Just call it my own little protest against political correctness.

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One thing is perfectly clear from the state House race: It’s more about personality and money than the issues.

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Hooray, another lawyer was elected to the state legislature! Bob Lenox, the Richard Nixon of Fayette County politics, got his man. Cheers!

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Dear Mr. Steve Brown, please! Please! Get a job and leave us alone. We are tired of your rantings. There isn’t a crook behind every tree and bush. The electorate is much smarter than you give us credit for. Just look at the election results.

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I like the idea of city-wide trash collection IF it helps the environment and gets the entire city to recycle. Many cities have single trash collector contracts with trash and recycling where you have one can for trash and one for recyclable. You just follow the rules and throw everything into one can (it gets sorted later anyways why not make it easy for everyone in the community to recycle). This way it gets the whole city to help the environment. Please find us a way to get the whole community involved and help keep PTC going green. Community gardens at each park and 100-percent recycling in our town is what I want to see in the future.