Odds and ends:

Now the Georgia

attorney general is wagging his finger at the Fayetteville City Council.

Seems the annexing

champs of Fayette County apparently tried to sidestep state law against

creating unincorporated islands during an annexation of two parcels of

land into the city.

They did it

parcel connecting the now-surrounded "peninsula" to other unincorporated

county land. That's each about the width of one lane of a two-lane road.

Fayetteville's

strip experts have honed down the state's "100 percent" annexation

requirement of a one-owner parcel to a more-chewable "97 percent."

The state's highest legal official agrees with the county commission:

"No, no, boys, you went too far this time."

The county

wants Fayetteville to de-annex the land, located next to the Pavilion

mega-shopping center.

I suggest naming

the slender stalks connecting the island to the rest of the county land

as "Steele strips," in honor of Mayor Ken Steele, who protested

in these pages recently that Fayetteville usually annexes only to protect

our shared natural water resources.

It seems the

"Steele strips" were a little too narrow to fool the attorney

general, but maybe they aren't so wide as to threaten our ground water

resources in that area.

Speaking of

island, look at the map on our front page. The "Steele strip"

board wants to annex that southern island into Fayetteville and unleash

its Southside Master Plan, much to the horror of residents of south Fayetteville

and environs. Public outcry forced the Master Annexers into backtracking

and appointing a task force to create some political cover for their traffic-busting

master plans.

But the map

begs the question: How did such an island come about in the first place?

Why did Fayetteville annex everything around that parcel in the first

place, knowing master planners that they are that they were creating an

unincorporated island in the middle of city land?

Hello, is there

anybody at home in the master planning department? By the way, look at

the shape of Fayetteville on any map. That's master planning? It looks

like a cancerous octopus.

The AG hath

spoken in another interesting issue, this time pointedly against the Fayette

County Commission and its practice of taking votes in so-called "executive"

or closed sessions. Here at The Citizen, we call those events what they

are: secret meetings.

Despite years

of court rulings directing local governments to err on the side of openness

inside of secrecy, local elected officials continue to try to sidestep

into the darkness and conduct business behind closed doors.

Acting on the

prompting of Tyrone Councilman Ronnie Cannon, Tyrone Town Attorney Brad

Sears asked the AG's advice: Can we vote on real estate or legal matters

in secret?

Senior Assistant

Attorney General Kathryn L. Allen wrote back: "This office continues

to believe that votes on matters that may be discussed in executive session

should be held in the open portion of the meeting, except where there

is a specific statutory exception for the votes [emphasis mine]."

She goes on:

"The absence of a specific provision in the real estate or attorney

advice exception does not mean that those votes may be held in secret."

Cannon took

the county commission to task last summer for repeatedly voting in secret

session, in most cases not even revealing the subject matter of the votes

nor who voted for or against.

I agree with

Cannon and the assistant AG: The county commission is wrong. It's following

flawed legal advice that is going to cost the taxpayers a chunk of money

when the secret voting finally gets a court test.

Do the right

thing, county commissioners. Throw the doors open wide on all your votes.

What do you have to hide? Let the sunshine in.

We lost our

recent case against the county and the cities on opening up court-ordered

secret tax-negotiation sessions. Ms. Allen was in the opposite corner

from us, in opposition.

This time she

and we are in the same corner, and any court challenge is likely to be

embarrassing for the commissioners.