Tyrone’s New Council One Year Later

Now that the new council has one year under their belt (they started holding secrete meetings in November and offering jobs to their hand selected applicants before January, yes there is proof of it, the mayor wrote letters) lets look at the “improvement” the voters got:

Old council – fiscally responsible, left office with over 2 million dollars in the bank for unexpected expenses.
New council – “We’re broke”

Old council – Tax rate remained the same (2.9 mils)
New council – Reduced tax rate 0.011 mils ($7.48 on a $170,000 home)

Old council – Hired a town manager that told everyone how great Tyrone was
New council – Hired a town manager that tells everyone how many months, weeks, days and hours she has left on her contract before she is out of there.

Old council – Hired code enforcement officer and enforced codes equally
New council – Fired code enforcement officer; “codes, what codes?”

Old council – Had a plan to redevelop downtown Tyrone
New council – No plan for downtown Tyrone, keep it just the way it is (dying).

Old council – Bought 40 acres and built baseball and soccer fields (Handley Park)
New council – Painted picnic shelter at Shamrock Park (third time in 4 years)

Old council – Mandated overall appearance of Tyrone to be uniformly positive (grass cut, trash picked up, signs not allowed on 74)
New council – If it is not Shamrock Park who cares.

Old council – Set policy, hired qualified personnel and let the employees do their job
New council – Sets policy of the day and changes it frequently; hires friends and supporters (qualifications not required there is always OJT) and micromanage the old employees

Old council – Enact impact fees to put the costs of new development on the developer
New council – Eliminated impact fees to put all the costs of serving new development on the taxpayers (and who said that this group wasn’t developer friendly)

Old council – Kept costs low by using existing employees to the town’s work.
New council – Why use existing employees to do the work when we can hire our consultant friends to do everything (money is no concern, they have 2 million left over from the old council see #1 above)

Old council – Worked to implement the vision for the future of Tyrone as described in the comprehensive plan
New council – No vision for the future of Tyrone.

Old council – Providing police protection, recreational opportunities and library services to the citizens were the priorities.
New council – The purpose of the police is to raise revenue, as far as all other services, if they don’t make money cut or eliminate them.

Tally – new council 1; old council 11. Be happy just don’t spend your $7.48 all in one place.

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Let’s be honest about Tyrone
Submitted by Margot on Fri, 12/05/2008 - 12:59pm.

Let’s deal with facts and not biased opinions.

0 - Old Council- Left the taxpayers with a bloated budget
1 - New Council- Tried to reduce expenditures of old council
0 - Old- Hired a town mgr & clerk that were despised by majority of citizens as evidenced by a petition to get rid of them.
2 - New- Did in fact fire the mgr & clerk & few objected.
Tie - Old- Code enforcer was town manager who did everything he could to run off businesses.
Tie - New- Can’t have a code enforcer because no one knows what the real code is. The courts were given two certified conflicting ordinances.
Tie - Old- Passed ordinances that took away property rights to run off Businesses for downtown redevelopment.
Tie - New- Promised citizens to correct the bad zoning ordinance then reneged on promise.
Tie - Old- Baseball/Soccer fields became a drain on revenue
Tie - New- No known improvement yet.
Tie - Old- Sign ordinance impractical for businesses
Tie - New- No improvement yet.
0 - Old- No oversight of Town management
½ New- Did hire a consultant who uncovered records mess, but lawyers shut consultant up.
Tie - Old- Secret government
Tie - New- Secret government
Tie - Old-Imposed impact fees but didn’t apply fees to required projects.
Tie - New- Didn’t know what to do about it so they eliminated impact fees.
Tie - Old- Misrepresented results of comprehensive development plan vote.
Tie - New- Are trying to correct comprehensive plan, but are working off the Wrong and incomplete zoning ordinance.
Tie - Old- Allowed Town manager and Clerk to pay themselves public funds. Contrary to payment plan.
Tie - New- Tried to sweep misappropriation of public funds under rug, causing A criminal investigation by District Attorney.
0 - Old- Priority of new library left taxpayers with $600,000 plus bill.
0 - New- Library bill was not reflected in budget?
Tie - Old- Zoned 90 yr old disabled lady out of her property rights.
Tie - New- No empathy or changes to help disabled lady.
Tie - Old- Numerous lawsuits filed against Town.
Tie - New- Unconcerned about these lawsuits.
Tie - Old- Hired lawyers to work against citizens
Tie - New- Same

Tally: New Council - 3 ½ , Old Council - 0, No improvement Minus 12.

Conclusion: A few changes, lot of work to do, little hope. Town needs new leaders with ethics, honesty, and sincere, unbiased desire to help all citizens and eliminate secrecy.

Opinion: The New Council did start on a very positive road by firing the Town Manager & Clerk. But when all the records improprieties were uncovered, the lawyers frightened them about possible lawsuits and the citizens were sacrificed.

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Good Points Tjam
The 5-0's picture
Submitted by The 5-0 on Fri, 12/05/2008 - 9:14am.

Unfortunately, there are plenty of Barry and Valerie haters on this forum who'll ignore your facts and fight you tooth and nail.

**Sits back to await the inevitable flame war**


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