Does anyone else find it strange that Cyndi Plunkett couldn't solve the problems discussed at the city council meeting last year? She didn't even try.

Now she's swing vote on blocking an attempt to change things for the better.

Vote Republican

During the last election, all of the candidates for council voiced concerns about quality of life issues, increased traffic burdens being the favorite point of discussion. As a property manager, I guess that I am particularly sensitive to the needs of existing retail developments like Peachtree Crossings and Braelinn Village.

These core commercial developments were integral to our original Master Plan and the foundation upon which our residential villages were conceived. As community support for our older retail centers continues to erode, these retail properties are beginning to experience the early effects of blight, the current number of vacancies at Braelinn Village being of particular concern.

I think Don Haddix is sincere in trying to address this issue by attempting to limit the supply of excess retail space; however like Cyndi Plunkett, I am not convinced that a moratorium is the most effective mechanism to achieve this goal. Cyndi was right to point out that the moratorium would not affect developments with conceptual plans currently on file.

While I was glad to see that renovations and cosmetic facelifts of existing commercial developments would be exempted from the moratorium (as long as new conceptual plans were not required to be submitted), I concur that moratoriums do have a negative connotation in the business community. Furthermore, there are only a very few (small) vacant commercially zoned parcels remaining in the City so the intended “positive” impact would be negligible at best.

Don and Cyndi seem to agree that some of our zoning ordinances need to be tightened (particularly in the industrial section); however a definitive time line or actionable goal deadline was not established at the meeting. Hopefully that was just an oversight and will not be an item that simply gets swept under the rug.

Limiting supply is not the sole solution. The City needs to take aggressive steps to help promote our existing retail facilities. Unlike other municipalities, our City does not belong to trade organizations like the International Council of Shopping Centers or have a defined Department or Commission specifically setup to fulfill this role. Perhaps the Tourism Association or Development Authority’s scope could be expanded to help satisfy this need.

It’s time to make some lemonade, folks! I hope that our new City Council does not get bogged down in petty arguments over the method and loses sight on actually remedying the problem.

Mark Hollums

As I predicted, Cyndi Plunkett provided the leadership and the swing vote to defeat this stupid moratorium idea.

I told Dingy Don it was wrong and would be defeated.
I told Doug not to second the motion or get involved.
I told you all that Cyndi would prevent another lawsuit.

Only real loser in this is Doug. He signaled his lack of leadership and is on his way to becoming the next Murray Weed. And yes, you dope - a moratorium on growth does send the wrong message to the business community. If you are listening to the wrong people - please stop. You have 4 years to serve the people of the city - all of them.