It is possible for a governmental

entity to turn the corner and move from the first choice towards the second.

Councilman Dan Tennant was our first move.

Gwinnett County is turning

also with the recent election of two new county commissioners, Marcia

Neaton and John Dunn. Both ran campaigns promoting sensible and slow growth

that is in stark contrast with the "build a road and start developing"

position of the past. With the entrance of Neaton and Dunn come four new

planning commission members (the AJC has labeled them "homeowner

activists", Dec. 25, p. C3) that have initiated debate on vital issues

like some of us are doing in Peachtree City. The newly appointed Gwinnett

County "activists" have embraced such issues as overdevelopment

vs. overcrowded schools, stopping automatic variances for developers,

mandatory sidewalks for all developments and sticking to the county's

land use plan.

The two terms of Peachtree

City Mayor Bob Lenox has placed the common good much further on the back

burner than we would have previously thought possible. The mayor has plowed

a lot of ground for certain developers at our expense financially and

with the possible deterioration of our future quality of life. I have

witnessed a movement that goes well beyond individual rights over common

good towards outright selfishness.

In his backpedaling interpretation

of the big box decisions (PTC Update), the mayor makes a feeble attempt

at providing ironclad legal excuse for the city council's decisions on

big box stores. Unfortunately, the mayor left entire sections of the law

and governing process out and opted to narrowly select only the parts

he likes, which resembles more of a dictatorship than a republic. He failed

to mention items like the Supreme Court decisions on "takings law,"

the ability to place restrictions on zoning, etc.

We cannot implement impact

fees on new homes for building new schools because the developer's lobby

in the state General Assembly extracted it from the impact fee law. Such

political ploys leave cities and counties struggling to keep their school

systems from bursting at the seams. This is the style of government that

the mayor appreciates with its support of the special interests at the

expense of the citizenry.

I recall in regard to the water

dispute between Georgia, Florida and Alabama that the mayor publicly stated

that he did not think that we (Georgians) had any obligation to allow

the other states access to the water of rivers flowing from Georgia. Simply

consuming all the water and allowing the riverbeds to dry up in the other

states is far from the common good, especially when you consider that

the water has run through those beds since the beginning of time.

The mayor has found an ally

in the retreat from common good in the Georgia Department of Transportation

(GDOT). The GDOT deputy commissioner, Harold Linnenkohl, wrote a letter

to the editor (The Citizen, Dec. 13) emphasizing GDOT's hands-off approach

towards public safety while passing the buck back to the municipal government.

Mr. Linnenkohl stated, "Peachtree City approved the development of

this project, not the Georgia DOT," and he is almost right. Peachtree

City approved the project in conjunction with the prior GDOT approval.

What exists is an unfortunate

pattern of shifting accountability. On one hand, the city council (Lenox,

Brooks and Fritz) gave us the notion that the Wal-Mart Highway 54 mitigation

must not be a threat to public health and safety because a national traffic

engineering firm (albeit one employed by Wal-Mart) designed it.

To solidify the council's position,

GDOT via Keith Rohling gave a confident approval (later reduced to tentative

in The Citizen interview) to the proposed mitigation plan. Mr. Linnenkohl

wrote, "Our primary concern is that any alterations or tie-ins to

our state highway system be safe, up to standards, and in accordance with

our policies and regulations."

Now please remember that Mr.

Rohling gave his approval even though he admitted in the newspaper interview

that he had never seen a traffic engineering scheme similar to the one

proposed anywhere in Georgia. What criteria did Mr. Rohling use to be

able to give an immediate, firm confirmation that assures our safety to

RAM Development on the same day as the city council meeting?

On the other hand, a GDOT response

via Jim Hullett (Atlanta Office) is that Peachtree City alone is responsible

for insuring the health and safety aspects of the highway mitigation plan

and not GDOT. Mr. Hullett stated that GDOT is merely approving an application

for a commercial development to have "access" to Hwy. 54.

Mr. Hullett went on to explain

to me that GDOT could not legally restrict access to the highways. I replied

that access had been denied to Hwy. 74 for the Katz family and their property

(their access points had been taken away). Mr. Hullett then explained

that sometimes access is withdrawn to insure public safety near intersections.

This takes me back to my original

argument. GDOT does play a role in health and safety and should not be

allowed to approve the implementation of a plan that substantially increases

traffic capacity while at the same time provides significant flow impediments

(a pair of two-lane bridges, an accident-prone intersection, etc.).

I asked Mr. Hullett if the

citizens of Peachtree City were to hire a nationally recognized traffic

engineer and found that a safety hazard exists with the mitigation plan

if GDOT would reconsider their approval. He said, "No." I guess

the deputy commissioner was wrong about his commitment to public safety.

GDOT is now sending a nondescript

form letter to citizens that in no way addresses any of the concerns regarding

safety, capacity and traffic flow. In fact, the official response omits

several key safety factors within the plan.

Another questionable element

in the GDOT approval process is that they threw out an attempt to mitigate

the intersection at Planterra Way to prevent commercial traffic from invading

the Planterra Ridge subdivision during the Home Depot approval.

Now, in the controversial Wal-Mart

plan, the intersections on both sides of Planterra Way (Wynnmeade Parkway

and Huddleston Drive) will be mitigated in the exact same manner that

was rejected previously for Planterra Ridge. No one at GDOT can seem to

explain the rational for these decisions. Perhaps it is "whomever

has the most money wins" or "public safety is just an obscure

theory not worth exploring."

Mr. Linnenkohl stated, "Peachtree

City is a thriving and progressive city. The city leaders recognize this

and have a very thorough and sophisticated zoning process in place as

a means to prevent overdevelopment." His statement is humorous in

that the planning commission denied both the Home Depot and the Wal-Mart,

two city council members voted against the Wal-Mart and a third stated

she did not want it either.

In addition, the city was scrambling

around trying to develop a big box ordinance while handing out exemptions

for it at the same time. Prior to the big boxes, the city was sued into

allowing hundreds of apartments and the Cedarcroft subdivision on Hwy.

54 due to a large loophole in the ordinances. This does not appear me

as thorough or sophisticated.

Last Thursday I went to GDOT-Thomaston

to review some documents related to the Wal-Mart approval (the plan has

still not officially been approved) and spent over three hours in my car

roundtrip. None of the current documents were made available to me. I

was told that I had been shown all of the documents in GDOT's possession.

After driving almost two hours

home, I received a fax stating that the most current documents had not

been turned in on the open records request. Interestingly, Keith Rohling

kept all the current documents on his desk and avoided the records request.

Steve Brown

Peachtree City

[email protected]