Search the ArchivesUser loginGoogle AdsNavigationThings to do calendar
Browse archives
Business Showcase
 Contact InformationThe Citizen Newspapers For Advertising Information Email us your news! For technical difficulties |
FreeSpeech for 02-18-09Tue, 02/17/2009 - 4:36pm
By: The Citizen
pith·y: 1. Precisely meaningful; forceful and brief: a pithy comment. Seems that Free Speech is anything but pithy lately! - - - - - - - - - - - Fayette County tax assessors, I am waiting (but not holding my breath). I have confirmed that my house has gone down in value. And yet my tax assessment still went up! Gotta pay for such boondoggles as the Taj Mahal and these nonstop roads to nowhere. The only thing getting “by-passed” there is a balanced budget. Former Commissioner Van Landingham used to say (believe it or not) that they were doing us a favor by re-assessing every year rather than the required two years because then, “You get two small increases rather than one big increase.” Unbelievable. And now at the federal level our income taxes are going to skyrocket, too. Thanks, Fayette Commission, assessors, School Board and cities for bringing this “generational theft” to our local community. - - - - - - - - - - - PTC Council and city manager, what are you waiting for — money to fall from the sky? Get the budget cuts going, lay off 44 people, reduce everyone’s salary by 13 percent, and get rid of the aquatic center. Are we training Olympic athletes? I think not. Also why is the Planning Department in existence? There is so much commercial and residential property vacant, and we continue to look at adding more units to the already sad situation. Is it time for Harold to look to the developers for campaign contributions? Stop the madness. - - - - - - - - - - - I disagree with the person who wants Doug Sturbaum to return his salary because he always votes with Don Haddix, never asks questions, and provides no input. Anyone who consistently votes against Logsdon, Boone, and Plunkett is worth their weight in gold. - - - - - - - - - - - Harold Logsdon, Cyndi Plunkett and Steve Boone are making one trashy decision after another. The term “sell-out” is appropriate, and my husband, our grown daughter and her husband and I all agree the actions taken on Ga. Highway 54 were totally despicable. And somebody please tell us why the planning people and the council people aren’t using the city’s land plans? Those plans served us well in the past. We have had relations with Judi Rutherford, Annie McMenamin, Steve Brown, Carol Fritz and Caroline Price, all of whom served on the City Council. We can tell you with great certainty they would’ve never approved such a ghastly development. They would’ve booted the developer out the door. - - - - - - - - - - - FCBOE and Fayette County economy: There is a strong connection between the health of the education system in Fayette County and Peachtree City and the economic health of the area. We should well remember that a big part of the draw and attraction for Peachtree City is the quality of the public eduction. To some extent the property values and stability of the area are supported by the reputation of the public education system here. As policy makers review options for how to handle the tight budget conditions, we ask them to pause and consider impact to the quality of education and by extension the effects on the community as a whole. Gutting the education system to meet a one-year, short-term budget goal may look good on paper now, but what will be the middle- to long-term effect on the students, the neighborhoods and the city? Great care must be taken to ensure that the quality of the education provided to our students does not suffer in this difficult time. - - - - - - - - - - - OK, so now the Fayette County School Board wants the teachers that live outside of Fayette County to pay $1,000 for their children to go to a Fayette County school. However, they look the other way when kids from other counties enroll in the Fayette schools illegally. What is wrong with this picture? They could charge those kids instead and have a budget surplus. - - - - - - - - - - - If you are on a septic system in Peachtree City, get ready: the city is quietly (there was a special meeting Feb. 12 that was not even posted on the city website) in the planning stages of hitting each resident currently with a septic system with a $20,000-plus sewer “update,” as they like to call it. I like to call it a city water and sewer revenue maker. The $20,000-to-$32,000 estimate each resident in these neighborhoods would be charged to “update” is just the beginning. Then the city can charge each month for sewer, too, so your water bill will double. If you are on septic and your water bill this month was $49 (mine was), now with sewer and water, my bill would be $98, plus the $20,000-plus fee they will prorate and charge me interest on over the next 20 years. I want each neighborhood that is currently on septic to protect our green septic systems. I keep mine in perfect order, pumping every three to five years, and it only costs me $300 to get it pumped. Septic is a perfect system for our large lots and hilly neighborhoods and more environmentally friendly than the sewer system that will have to have pumping stations that we all know aren’t working around town. Now is not the time to be price-gouging residents over $1,000 extra a year in water bill and sewer update charges. Hippocket Road or Lake Peachtree sewer project is going to be the trial “upgrade” neighborhood, but the link below outlines all of the neighborhoods in PTC that are on septic. I know that the city can only smell the money once they factored in how many homes they can upgrade and charge to install. We all need to work together to stop the planning stages of Lake Peachtree potential sewer project. So in this first phase PTC will convert all of the “green” septic systems in the Hippocket area, then they will move onto the money they can make off of Robinson Road, in Stoneybrook, Smokerise, Maple Shade and Planterra. All of these septic communities need to come together, attend the meetings and make sure from now on there aren’t any more quiet and not announced meetings. The link is peachtree-city.org/index.asp?NID=715. - - - - - - - - - - - Cal, could you please just have a separate blog for each of our local politicians? I am really wondering if some of them have anything else to do since they’re always on The Citizen blogs. I can’t believe that Haddix and Brown just feel like they have to reply to every comment on every PTC action. Do they not have anything better to do? Do they not realize that some of the steady bloggers are agitators and/or devil’s advocates? Just please give them their own section. - - - - - - - - - - - So I’m walking through the Publix parking lot and notice all 10 handicapped spots are taken. The problem is there’s only 20 cars in the whole parking lot. So should we conclude that 50 percent of Georgians are now disabled? I don’t think so. I’d agree that 50 percent are fat and lazy, but not handicapped. - - - - - - - - - - - To the parents of the teenager who drives the black Saturn SL2, tag number APH 8686, you need to have a talk with him. On several occasions, he has not stopped at the stop sign at Lester Road and Ebenezer Church Road. On Feb. 10, I was the unfortunate victim of his failure to stop. Once he realized he pulled in front of a full-size SUV, he held the gas down until he was out of sight — 80-plus mph, I assume. His luck may run out if he continues this behavior. - - - - - - - - - - - My son has been in the Rising Starr and SMHS since the seventh grade. He has played under the current varsity coach for two years. I have sat back and listened to parents of SMHS players in the stands hurl abuse, not only at the coach but at the officials and the players for the other teams. I also went to a meeting where a group of vigilante parents were trying to petition to get the coach fired. These are some of the same parents who are making nasty insults in the stands, yet have the nerve to disparage the coach for what they deem as inappropriate comments. My son loves to play basketball and has never once complained about the coach. I have always taught him to respect all people, coaches, teachers, adults, etc. What the parents are missing is this is just a game. Most of the current kids in the varsity basketball program are NOT the second coming of Kobe Bryant. I have observed intently and found the coach very competent. Simply put, the talent that we are up against is routinely very good. The effort our kids give is always very good. This is a sign that the coach is motivating them. I played college baseball and have coached at various levels. It is normally the parents who act and do things inappropriately and pass these negative vibes on to their kids. I ask my peer parents to please teach your kids to just play the game. In the glass bubble of Peachtree City, we can try to shape the program based upon dislike for the coach. But guess what, folks, when your kids get in the real world and encounter college coaches or enter the work force where they don’t like their boss/supervisor, what then? Get a petition to remove that person, or quit? That’s simply not reality. If there is gross misconduct, that’s one thing, but just because a coach yells does not warrant the kind of actions and articles that are taking place. The next several years will get better and better based upon the talent. Give the guy a break, teach your kids to listen, and be quiet and watch the game. - - - - - - - - - - - $5.00 admission to SMHS boy’s basketball game. $400 for tip-off club dues. Watching the coach ruin another group of kids ... priceless! - - - - - - - - - - - Irradiated food is coming to a table near you. Look for or ask about the radura symbol on the packaging. The food is irradiated to kill E. Coli spread by fecal matter on the meat on your plate. Instead of insuring there is no manure on your steak, the meat industry irradiates it. Enjoy your irradiated, fecal-matter-contaminated beef. It’s what’s for dinner. - - - - - - - - - - - Starting its fifth year, the Fairburn Farmers Market will reopen on May 9, 2009, at the Freight Depot on West Broad Street, Fairburn, Ga. As one of the farmers there, we have noticed continued interest and attendance by folks from Fayetteville at the market. - - - - - - - - - - - ABC News recently reported that $1 spent in tax money returned $1.50 to the economy, whereas $1 in tax cuts only produced a $.75 boost to the economy. Seems to me that if this theory were true, Cuba and North Korea would be leading the world with their standard of living. Speaking of the economy, Nevada Senator Harry Reid inserted billions of dollars into the current stimulus bill for funding of a bullet train from Los Angeles to Las Vegas to aid business in Sin City. Does anyone remember the bridge to nowhere? If this fast train concept was economically feasible, then investors would be willing to raise the money to do it. But do you think the legacy news media will skewer Reid and the Democrats for this waste of taxpayers’ money in the “no earmarks” stimulus bill? - - - - - - - - - - - America! I love this country. It has been very good to me. Where else can a multimillionaire get millions of free money from the poor little hardworking snooks they like to call taxpayers? I love this country! After all, you cannot expect a new CEO to use an office that was fine for his predecessor, can you? Of course not; he needs that $85K Persian rug and $1,400 trash can along with the other office items that total nearly $1 million (for a single office). The money was supposed to be a stimulus. It was — it stimulated his account, and who is more deserving than CEOs who have made just a couple mill this year rather than their usual multimillions? But it’s not like you don’t have a lot of money to spare. You really didn’t want to retire and your kids can get by without college. The world needs ditch-diggers, you know. So pay up. It’s extortion ... I mean, tax time. Who better knows how to spend your money. I have said it before and will say it again: We have the best politicians money can buy! login to post comments
|
AdvertisementsWho's new
Recent Comments
Who's onlineThere are currently 0 users and 50 guests online.
Recent blog posts
New forum topicsActive forum topics
Recent staff blog posts
|
From Our Galleries Random Photos are from:
Featured Columnists
More Columnists |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Copyright 2010 - Fayette Publishing, Inc. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use Policy
Server 4
Click for Latest Gallery Additions
