I am blessed that my children are grown and that I have the time available to get active in local government.
We have got a real mess on our hands at the county level right now. It’s obvious to anyone who attends the meetings that the majority voting block made up of Chairman Herb Frady, Commissioner Lee Hearn and Commissioner Robert Horgan simply isn’t representing the citizens of our county.
Watching the citizens get steamrolled at the meetings motivated me to throw my hat in the ring to run against Herb Frady.
I have done my best to let our local citizens know what is going on in their county government. I appreciate the fact it’s difficult for some of our senior citizens to attend the evening meetings and a lot of our working parents have a lot on their plates keeping a family going.
As a service to all, I try to video tape all important county meetings and place them on www.youtube.com.
I taped the Board of Commissioners recent retreat and here are the four links:
1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUl5tcjGHvI
2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPGhbvAfCVI
3. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLSFLxUaWl0 and
4. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ht_hYtL33_A
Keep in mind that Frady, Hearn and Horgan do not want you to see what is going on in local government. In fact, on at least two occasions, Chairman Frady tried to prevent Commissioner Steve Brown from presenting his agenda items.
One of the reasons I am running against Chairman Frady is the lack of openness. I am in favor of letting everyone have their say. Every citizen of Fayette County has the right to speak out about any topic they wish, period, and they deserve an answer.
One thing you will see in the youtube.com links is we are in for another year of deficit budgeting. Commissioner Brown gave a very honest appraisal by saying Frady, Hearn and Horgan are bailing water, but they refuse to repair the hole in the ship. If your revenue doesn’t meet your expenditures, you must identify and fix the problem(s).
I don’t agree with deficit budgeting, so you will have a choice when voting. As you guessed, Frady wants to pave more gravel roads in the next fiscal year even though many of the people living on those roads don’t want it.
Chairman Frady and Robert Horgan continued to stress that they want to complete the Road to Nowhere (West Fayetteville Bypass). No one wants this road and the cost is extreme, but Frady pushes on wanting to go to the next phase III.
I totally oppose continuing on to the next phase of the West Fayetteville Bypass, so you will have a choice come election time. We have wasted tens of millions of dollars which could have helped resolve the deficit budgeting crisis.
Frady tried to explain there was not enough SPLOST money to build the East Fayetteville Bypass, so he wants to build the next phase of the useless West Fayetteville Bypass.
This is just not true. From the beginning there was ample funding to cover the number one priority project East Fayetteville Bypass. Truth be told, the East Fayetteville Bypass was the ONLY road project that Tyrone, Fayetteville, Peachtree City and the county agreed on.
It was no surprise at all that Frady was excited about developing the land around the West Fayetteville Bypass. We all knew that is why the road is getting built in the first place. That is all we need with adding more traffic in the center of the county with more dense development.
You have a choice once again in the election because I will not support any type of residential development that does not consist of rural zoning standards.
I hope you will watch the county retreat on www.youtube.com and please mark the July 31 election on your calendars because you now have someone to vote for who will not maintain the damaging status quo. Thank you in advance for your support!
David Barlow
Fayette Board of Commissioners Candidate
Tyrone, Ga.
