Wouldn’t it be refreshing to have a Fayetteville mayor and City Council that actually represented the citizens of Fayetteville rather than their developer pals and their cronies in Atlanta — the city of failure and $100,000 a year bus drivers?
Let’s look at a few decisions from our mayor and council. Be sure to check off the ones that improved your life and made Fayetteville a better place to live.
• An annexation of the past few years that would have 96 houses built and was recommended for approval by the Fayetteville Planning and Zoning Commission, each member hand-picked by the mayor and council.
Their worksheet indicated that the annexation would affect nothing, not the fire department, not the police department, not the water and sewer department, not EMTs and ambulance service or traffic.
Nothing, with the possible exception of schools, but according to the P&Z Commission, the School Board planned on property being annexed by the city.
It was certainly news to me and I suspect to the School Board as well.
• Then there was the property rezoned from an approved 36 houses to 52 and then [they] gave the developer an award because this was just what Fayetteville needed.
• Then the 12-acre hole that was filled in and rezoned when it should have been grandfathered in to complement the existing subdivision. A large number of people opposed this rezoning to no avail.
Councilman Larry Dell arrogantly stated that it was going to be rezoned to something. I wonder why! What the people thought didn’t concern the mayor or council in the least.
Also it took me three months to get the city to stop the real estate agents from placing illegal signs on public property, some with balloons flying, which were specifically forbidden by city ordinance.
The reward for my vigilance was a terrorist’s letter placed in my mailbox threatening me and my family. The Fayetteville Police Department and the FBI have copies of the letter and I hope someday to watch as these thugs are escorted to a federal prison.
• The Fayetteville zoning policy has been changed three times that I am aware of in the past few years and was recently modified to allow multiple property uses to give developers and building owners even more leeway. It seems that zoning will soon be replaced by an anything-goes policy. Almost there now.
• There were three water and sewer rate increases within, I believe, one year. Someone has to pay for all of the additional hookups to our system.
• Then there was the matter of the truck restrictions on Grady Avenue and Beauregard Boulevard where there were informational signs that stated that no trucks over six wheels were allowed on Grady Avenue or on Beauregard Boulevard.
After a few complaints to the Fayetteville Police Department about trucks violating the city statute, the signs were removed and replaced with ones that stated no through trucks over six wheels. Problem solved. No through trucks means absolutely nothing. Of course you knew that and so did I as well as being known by the mayor and City Council.
• I still seethe over the Pye Lake boondoggle which was given to the city with a $1.25 million repair [bill] that was mandated by the state of Georgia.
Of course it can, with the proviso that a developer would be able to build 12 lake-access homes and the city would repair and maintain the dam and lake forever, including periodic dredging. The dredging would be funded by our stormwater fees.
The question was asked if the taxpayers of Fayetteville would have use of the lake for recreation purposes and the answer was an emphatic no.
For those of you looking for somewhere to focus your anger because of the loss of your homes, devaluation of your homes, loss of jobs or underemployment, look no further than the Fayetteville mayor and City Council.
For retired folks who were counting on the value of their homes at least being stable, their investments not free-falling and savings increasing in value to ensure their retirement years were free of stress look in the same places.
Here in Fayetteville and in thousands of towns and cities across the U.S, the feeding frenzy was in full fury, fueled by rapaciousness and pure unadulterated greed.
Then the balloon burst with a resounding boom that was louder and more destructive than cannon fire. The sound was still reverberating in the U.S. and around the world as we marveled at the fact that our entire economic system was based on smoke and mirrors. Smoke and mirrors that were perpetrated by our own mayor and City Council as well as thousands of government bodies throughout the United States.
How shameful.
How sad.
Edward Lawson
Fayetteville, Ga.
