The Peachtree City race for mayor has four involved entrants plus the incumbent, Steve Brown. I will gladly vote for any one of the other four, but NOT Steve Brown.

Our ongoing experience as the organized opposition to a recent commercial rezoning request for a Walgreens in the heart of Peachtree City strongly reinforces this conclusion.

It is one thing to posture in public; however, Mayor Brown managed to top that by vigorously attacking the city planner in a May 2005 council meeting that turned down this Walgreens commercial rezoning request. It was doubly embarrassing for Christ Our Shepherd Lutheran Church. He degraded the only favorable vote they got in either the City Planning Commission or City Council.

It was a 40-minute tirade in front of a packed chamber and, get this, done well after midnight. To label it as unprofessional, disrespectful and petty would be an understatement. It was simply show time regardless of the late hour and the audience fatigue. He was doing what he frequently does — stir the pot and find fault, real or imagined.

Yes, the Walgreens commercial rezoning that Steve Brown vigorously wanted failed, but a city staff member that dared to disagree with him should not have been attacked and degraded in public.

However, I will give Steve this. He can be very likable in private and either Steve doesn’t give up or simply doesn’t bother to listen. In spite of over 1,600 city signatures on a petition opposing the unneeded, unnecessary commercialization of this corner on Ga. Highway 54 and Peachtree Parkway and losing every other possible vote, he persists.

In fact, he called a subsequent city tri-neighborhood meeting about the Peachtree City Lutheran church property late this summer, but only one person showed up. Yes, no one is nor has been opposed to the Lutheran church selling and moving; it was and remains a commercial rezoning that still does not make sense.

In yet another case of being tone deaf and in Steve’s own written words, “What makes this different than Dalton Carpets (on Ga. Highway 74]? The neighbors are saying good things about the Dalton Carpet building.” That is simply not the tune we heard after interviewing the neighbors and now there is more commercial going in beside Dalton.

The song “A Boy Named Sue” by Johnny Cash ends with a plea of “call me anything but Sue.” I would like to add a refrain. “Give us anybody but STEVE. I will vote for a man named Harold, Dan, Phil or Dar!”

I respectfully suggest your readers consider doing the same. Vote NO both against more commercial rezonings and against a self-grandiose “fellow named Steve,” our incumbent mayor who seems to get us unnecessarily SUED.

Think about it. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have a runoff election between two new candidates for mayor? How refreshing. A debate centered on the future of our fine community, not a referendum on past decisions from the turn of the last century to find fault, find fault and find more fault, again, whether it’s real or imagined.

It is an old tried and true political tune that is hopefully finally out of favor. I am not a candidate, yet I am asking for your vote and specifically for anybody but Steve Brown.

B. Ray Helton
Peachtree City, Ga.

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