Context is key
Continuing our respectful disagreement, I think Kelly Girtz is off in his defense of his support of roundabouts.
Girtz sought to explain why he backed the roundabout at Barnett Shoals Road rather than heed to the wishes of the majority of his eastside constituents ...
If elected leaders simply bowed to the wishes of the public in making decisions, as the Banner-Herald editorial recommends, we would neglect the vast pool of knowledge that is available outside of most folks' realm of experience. A challenge of public office is when good decisions must be made over objections of unfamiliarity.
I don't necessarily disagree, however I also think it is important to keep the decision-making process in context with the circumstances you face. This isn't a discussion about, say, civil rights, but rather a rather specific traffic issue that will impact the lives of the residents on the eastside and those who travel into the county to do business.
If anything, this is exactly the kind of thing you should defer to public sentiment on. This is something which they will have to live with every single day, and it's something where their opinion and their input is essential.
Girtz sought to explain why he backed the roundabout at Barnett Shoals Road rather than heed to the wishes of the majority of his eastside constituents ...
If elected leaders simply bowed to the wishes of the public in making decisions, as the Banner-Herald editorial recommends, we would neglect the vast pool of knowledge that is available outside of most folks' realm of experience. A challenge of public office is when good decisions must be made over objections of unfamiliarity.
I don't necessarily disagree, however I also think it is important to keep the decision-making process in context with the circumstances you face. This isn't a discussion about, say, civil rights, but rather a rather specific traffic issue that will impact the lives of the residents on the eastside and those who travel into the county to do business.
If anything, this is exactly the kind of thing you should defer to public sentiment on. This is something which they will have to live with every single day, and it's something where their opinion and their input is essential.
posted by Jmac at 1:04 PM
21 Comments:
I really like Kelly but I have to agree with you jmac, he's laboring to essentially say "yes dumb people I hear you. You just don't know what you're talking about and I do."
My friends who have driven in towns that use roundabouts have told me that such are the reason that every car in Boston has dents in it. To quote one “it’s playing chicken with three other cars”. I have little experience with roundabouts but have heard enough from those who do to be at least a little skeptical.
However, I think this issue is bigger than just roundabouts. Kelly seems to be an unwitting participant in a vision for Clarke County that has yet to be fully articulated to the rest of us.
A roundabout will essentially be a bottleneck that discourages travel across the near county line. It will keep travelers from wanting to take that route, frustrate and possibly endanger those who do and ultimately steer travelers, commerce and development elsewhere. Defy the wants of eastsiders for a roundabout is about more than slowing traffic. It’s about halting progress on that corridor. In the past, this county has used sewer lines, water, fire stations, development rights and regulations to stop growth in Athens.
This unspoken policy is at the heart of why the county pays lip service to economic development and why, ultimately, the only solution to poverty such a policy provides is to use a lack of good jobs, affordable housing and opportunity to drive the poor out of our town. And it’s happening right now.
It is time for commissioners who believe in an Athens for all Athenian to stand up and speak out. They should go out and get the better jobs we need. They should support inclusive policies and stop dividing group against group. They should consider themselves more as pubic servants than elected officials.
An Athens for all Athenians huh?
Feels like I’ve heard that somewhere before
Hard to imagine anything more arrogant and condescending that Girtz's comments.
And that's saying something, here in Tenure Town.
I really like Kelly but I have to agree with you jmac, he's laboring to essentially say "yes dumb people I hear you. You just don't know what you're talking about and I do."
But... doesn't this need to be said sometimes? Must I point out that the reason we have a republican system of government rather than a purely democratic one is in part because the people are sometimes stupid? I'm not saying I think the roundabout is a good idea or a bad one. I'm just saying that Kelly seems to have done his homework, and most of his constituents probably relied on anecdotal evidence. The chances of research being right over vague impressions being so are pretty good.
Excellent point. But Kelly and many of our commissioners ran for office on the concept of participatory government. I don't think it is right to make some issues fall to the whim of the masses but allow others to get a ruling from the rulers in the inconsistent and haphazard manner in which it does. Our leaders have a pretty terrible knack for micro-managing the things they care about (land use) and ignore the things that have less luster (Floating Homestead Tax Exemption for seniors). We call a neighborhood out in the streets to take up placards and make the planning director come back early from vacation when we need to shut down a developer based on mostly anecdotal evidence. Then, of course, we file that under supposed popular outcry. But now the populous has spoken and they are ignored. Does their opinion only count when it agrees with those in control. I know top down leadership is necessary at times but perhaps the candidates should have run on the platform of “I’ll listen to you unless I think you're a dipshit."
And that platform can't be that bad. It's managed to get a few people reelected.
I also think listening in earnest to the people who will be most profoundly affected is part of the homework.
Indulge me in this beef about Girtz. I agree with him a lot of the time, most times. I've noticed though that Kelly likes to come in at the last minute and "save the day" on these kinds of issues. He did the same thing with alcohol ordinance. Why not voice your concerns all the way along in the process in a deliberate way? Seems he is more interested in getting his name in the spotlight than the process or the end result. And he does have an annoying condescending air about him. That did come through in this column.
Three different commenters, and I find disagreements with all three! Kudos to my loyal readers. This is why I love you.
Jeff ...
I think you're attempting to read way too much into this one particular vote, which is why I stressed the context of the particular issue rather than make this some massive struggle. I like the concept of roundabouts, but I don't think they're the most feasible solution to traffic issues in this instance (along with the fact that most folks desire the T-shaped intersection).
To suggest that Girtz or some of the commissioners have this agenda to stifle growth and development in this community is off-base, and it's particularly misleading to use this item to push that theory. Girtz has made it very clear he views this as a traffic-calming mechanism rather than growth inhibitor.
Related to that, to suggest that traffic calming mechanisms along our community's borders will deter travel to and from Athens-Clarke County is kinda silly (if anything the traffic that results from the traditional T-shaped intersections would do more to deter travel than a roundabout, which is why Girtz argued for the latter). Athens-Clarke County is the economic hub of Northeast Georgia and folks need to do business here.
But now the populous has spoken and they are ignored.
But, um, they weren't. Girtz was merely voicing his rationale for supporting the roundabouts. The other eastside commissioners (Andy Herod and Doug Lowry) voted for the T-shaped intersection, along with four other commissioners.
An Athens for all Athenians huh?
Feels like I’ve heard that somewhere before.
Well, sure. But, then again, witty cliches that aren't grounded in reality don't make up for a lack of substantive policy or comprehensive understanding of local issues. I think the last election kinda showed that.
Anonymous ...
I don't think Girtz was being arrogant. I honestly don't. I don't agree with him on this matter, but I think Hillary's point is valid.
Hillary ...
That said, one could infer from your comment that public input should have little bearing on the issues at hand, particularly local ones. Far from it actually.
He's not like that in person. He is a very likeable guy and I really do think Athens is lucky to have him.
All that said, I will not support the top down leadership that this M and C so often use. People still complain about the good old boy club and how they ruled with impuinty. It's people like Gwen and Heidi and various pop stars that told us we should and can stand up to the good old boy club.
And it worked for a while. Here's the problem. Now they're the good old boy and girl club. If you don't live in "the neighborhoods", if you're not part of the special in-group, if you don't chart time and space by the first show at the chaple then, well......to put it nicely.... you're fuct.
Commissioners not having an agenda to stifle growth? You’re kidding, right? Is not the whole debate over extending sewer lines because they do not want to encourage growth?
And as far as reading into one vote too much, I’m looking at patterns which include things like sewer lines, a land use policy which depends on the arbitrary use of variances and traffic congesting measures. Sure, take it apart and you can come up with a rational for anything. Put it together and our plan to make this community economically inclusive is, to use your words, silly.
“Girtz was merely voicing his rationale for supporting the roundabouts”. Yeah. Girtz was chiding the paper for telling him he should heed the will of the people who will use this intersection rather than charge off his own way. Sure, the T-intersections prevailed. That’s despite Kelly’s efforts. I still agree with the paper.
And if the idea of including all citizens of this town in opportunity and prosperity is, for you, just a witty cliché not grounded in reality, then you and I really see this town in different ways. But a few years from now, when seniors are still waiting for their tax relief while your mayor is distracted by partner benefits and buffer zones, this small voice about giving all people the benefits of Athens will grow into a roar. You might want some Ketchup for your words about giving the poor access to the oft cited Athens quality of life before you take on the Carl.
Your reference to the last election was cute. If it proved anything it proved that more people are dissatisfied with the current mode of thinking than are and that rich, white Nimby democrats are more able to skip yogalates and get to the polls for a runoff than poor janitors who work for 6 bucks an hour. I think it’s important to qualify your other comments because when you say “the issues” you mean your issues. When you say “policies” you mean the policies you want.
Before you make that long anticipated run for a seat, why don’t you sit down and talk with the local representative of our labor department and tell him about your breadth of understanding of economic development. Why don’t you call up the head of the housing authority board and tell him your great plans for affordable housing. Why don’t you get together with someone who grew up poor and black and in Broad Acres and tell how you know exactly how it is and how you know how to solve it. An Athens for all Athenians is exactly about that. It’s not about the greenbelt or a smoking ban or rental registration or giving even more to those who already have so much. It’s not about leading from the top. It’s about leading from within.
Then again you could find a few special interest groups and perhaps a band and promise them you’ll do whatever they want. You could have a friend try to paint your opponent as a republican or a nazi. You could blanket over issues like poverty and economic development and tax relief for seniors and instead take up a noble cause like artistically designed bus shelters.
I’ve even got your slogan ready.
Jmac. Our Commissioner.
Hey, y’all –
I appreciate everyone’s comments, and enjoy the chance for some dialogue. It is a treat of this commission gig to kick around some ideas and get (and provide) some information.
There are a couple’a of points that I’ll address. The first thing I’ll mention is that in making a decision, residents’ needs and opinions matter a bunch. There have been cases when rezonings that come before the commission might have been acceptable on the surface, but deep concerns of neighbors encouraged me to vote against approval. In the case of engineering decisions like the intersection under discussion, there are lots of factors to consider: residents’ opinions (both of the immediate periphery and the corridor), engineering possibilities, cost, safety, and precedent for the future. In this case, safety and future precedent trumped majority opinion in my decision-making. For others on the commission, opinion weighed more heavily in their equation.
Jeff is right; this is about more than just roundabouts. It is about an opportunity to get in front of the curve rather than live behind it – the curve of safety, of calming speeds, of making neighborhoods as livable as possible (notably, neighborhoods that are not on the hipster list that Jeff often references). As many dents as some friends may have mentioned, they have not likely mentioned shopping for gravestones, since the fatality reduction when moving to roundabouts from signals is in the 90% range. It’s also good thinking to consider decisions with economic development concerns in mind, and in this case the effect would be to make the real estate in the area more attractive because you don’t have to worry about the haulin’ ass in your back yard being as severe.
Anonymous @ 5:29 mentioned an apparent “last minute save” tendency. Lemme tell ya – on both this and alcohol, I mentioned the same concerns to fellow commissioners and residents for months. Months. That involves lots of phone calls, emails, conversations in hallways and on street corners. It isn’t real sexy, and generally doesn’t make it to newsprint. By the time you come to the public meeting, see the headline, or read the blog a boatload of work has happened. The unpublished back story is the nature of the beast.
Okay, let me shut up and provide some links:
This is a Federal Highway Administration site – check out the two-pager for a quick overview of roundabouts.
(http://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/intersections/col_roundabouts.htm)
Presentations and papers from a Transportation Research Board conference on roundabouts two years ago are all available for those of you with even more time on your hands.
(http://www.teachamerica.com/roundabouts/ra_conference.htm)
Thanks for the thoughts; see you soon.
Kelly
That said, one could infer from your comment that public input should have little bearing on the issues at hand, particularly local ones. Far from it actually.
McGinty, that is utter nonsense. Public "input" is different from the public determining the outcome. I'm sure that Kelly didn't shut his ears to all public comment and hum so he couldn't hear any of it. The point is that the desires of the public are only one factor he considered, rather than the sole one.
Hence the 'infer' aspect of my comment.
Well, why say it at all, then?
BTW, you have a small goodie from the Clinton Liberry that is residing with me right now.
"Why don’t you get together with someone who grew up poor and black and in Broad Acres and tell how you know exactly how it is and how you know how to solve it. An Athens for all Athenians is exactly about that. It’s not about the greenbelt or a smoking ban or rental registration or giving even more to those who already have so much. It’s not about leading from the top. It’s about leading from within."
One of the first things you should learn about Broadacres is that it, along w/the AHA, is filled w/residents who are 75% disabled!
Yes, that's right, 75%, according to the PPA, are on SSI, elderly, or on medicare or medicaid. NOT the systemic victims of our lousy wages, lack of benefits, transportation, or access to education, but disabled, physically or mentally ill, or elderly, and unABLE to work.
So the AHA is using the 25% of their folks who are honestly members of the born poor, stayin poor, never seen an apartment outside the system poor, never been to a museum poor, won't graduate from highschool poor, to collect grant moneys and provide mortgages to the few who work their way thru athens tech to become home health care workers, and become "mortgable", eventually, to collect federal and HUD funding, which keeps their 1250 apartments running.
They pay their huge staff great salaries, with benefits, and restrict/limit access to resources that are available to poor citizens who don't live in the projects. ( residents who need help month to month are subjected to humiliatiing and condescending screenings, and then left w/no referrals for help w/either medicine or food, which are limited to three times a year for residents).
I believe that these restrictions, enforced and administered by their "resident services department" were developed so that the percentage of AHA residents accessing those resources meant for the poorest of the poor is reduced.
Evidently the churches and groups like the Ark were tired of the high percentages of these folks who were gaining these funds, so they made the AHA screen and deny those folks food boxes, medicine subsidies, much less a way OUT OF THERE, because they want to keep the disabled as hostages paying the freight for the luxurious offices, tavel subsidies and salaries of their staff.
All in the name of helping the 25% of the intergenerational poor, who they do really find resources for. Without that income from the disabled, the AHA would have no money against which to draw down federal funding!
The AHA relies on the disabled to actually pay 30% of their gross income, calculated annually via reviews conducted annually, to pay their costs/matching funds.
But they provide NO benefits to those people, even deny access to the food bank, and condescending advice about the 18$ a month they could get from food stamps, and actually tell them that if they managed their just over 600$ they live on stretch to cover meds that are not covered on either medicare/medicaid they wouldn't need access to the orgs who could really help them.
This 600$ doesn't provide any money to own and maintain a vehicle, much less insure it. It also doesn't provide any alternatives for those Americans to get out of the projects and into independant living situations, where they won't be robbed, have guns pulled on them, be offered drugs ala the "what'll you have" varsity, when they're not being hit up for the drugs the other residents see coming in in kroger/cvs bags. Or cigarettes, which are demanded, with phrases like "you got a cigarette" rather than "may I have a cigarette" or "what chu cookin today" as ways to demand food from these disabled folks.
But that money, which keeps the AHA running, and drawing down federal funds, is used instead to pay travel expenses for Board members like Charlie ("I'm not sure what I stand for and am not a republican") Maddox, and his whole family to various conferences all over the country.
Instead of providing options for the unmortgable disabled, they pay a huge staff extremely well.
Show me another property/rental management company that needs a huge building, numerous staff, etc., all to manage only 1250 units. Rick Parker travels the country, pretending to dig up resources that will serve his residents. But he's NOT serving the majority of his residents, again, 75% of whom have battled the system to gain their ridiculously low incomes and settle for that just so they can see doctors, and have some help w/their medical costs.
Instead he highlights the few success stories among the intergenerational poor who become mortgable, via education and low wage jobs (many of them in the dining halls and janitorial jobs at UGA, all on a temporary basis, which denies them medical benefits, or decent, liveable wages).
I don't know if anyone here has been following the horrors over in Atlanta, where those same disabled folks are being offered vouchers to rent substandard housing in properties already being forclosed on.
And did you know that the AHA doesn't provide recycling? Here we have a captive populace, who, instead of leaving their alumininum cans in clean kroger sacks hanging on the outside of the dumpsters, so that the diggers don't have to climb into the dumpsters to collect their cans, could be educated about our land-full, and all the other containers, etc., which could be recycled.
And residents of Broadacres and "the Rock" and "Pauldoe" know that they are living in these valuable properties on borrowed time, since it is only a matter of time before the AHA comes up w/an excuse to sell these substandard apartments to a developer,for demolition. This increases the likelihood that those citizens who need the system most will soon face the same issues that Atlanta's residents of public housing are facing today.
All so those like Charlie Maddox can take trips w/his family, fully paid for by the disabled people for whom they do nothing, absolutely NOTHING. They have even cut off the utility subsidies gradually, and when the power goes out, don't have account numbers to use to question how often the meters are read. We have to trust the AHA to get us back up and plugged in, and I wish readers here would try, just once, to get thru to the emergency services in their maintenance dept. on the weekend.
There's a lot of lore out there about how residents of public housing sit around all day drinking or drugging, watching cable tv, talking on their cell phones, running shot houses out of their apartments, and co-habiting w/lifelong partners illegaly. That's becuase the antiquated rules of the AHA force these functional, ambitious and hopeful folks to live in sin. Otherwise, the income the other partner brings in would price the rent right out of any reasonable persons budget. Why would anyone pay "market value" for apartments that are uninsulated, most that don't have central air, filled w/mold, and come w/the fringe benefits of the thugs who prey on the most vulnerable of the residents daily.
The whole public housing issue needs to be addressed by meeting the needs of those who are reliable rent payers, but who will never be mortgable due to the low income they are forced to accept, in order to receive the medical care they need to survive.
Those are the folks that really keep public housing going, and as a reward for their reliable rents, NEVER get a chance to get out of there, unless they have family that can get it together to help them.
So yes, learn about the AHA, the citizens who live there, and who without help on election day would never be able to hobble over to their nearest polling places. The abysmal turnouts in those neighborhoods are not because the people don't care, or don't know which candidates are full of scat, but who literally can't walk to or afford to ride a bus over to vote.
Until they do vote though, there will be absurd corruption w/in the AHA, and I'm willing to bet that those, the truly most vulnerable folks, will be hit hardest by the inevitable removal of the projects, and due to huge cuts in the section 8 voucher program, will never have a decent, safe place to live.
I am one of the lucky few, who, due to lupus and RA and numerous other auto immune diseases, which include attacks on organs like pancreatitis, pneumonia, kidney troubles, fought my way into an apartment in Broadacres, and only had to be there for five years.
But I'm only out of there because some of my family members have left resources that are now available to me, and who are well enough educated to put together a trust for the resources I'm eligible for, like help w/uncovered meds, a car I can't own, but do drive, my computer, cell phone (metro pcs, I have no land line) and continuind educational opportunities.
I am the exception to the rule, though. Most of the disabled people who's votes I facilitate every two years, will never get out of that corrupt system. Never.
People give Commissioner Maxwell ten tons of flack about making everything a race issue. I happen to know him very well, and I can tell you he knows it's a class issue, not racial. And he's well aware of how the Housing Authority operates, having spent time in Broadacres himeself as a child.
Did you know, for example, that Michael Thurmond's brother (who I hope is still living) lives in Broadacres? Yes, our State Commissioner of Labor, who has ample resources to help his brother, has instead left him over in BA, for years and years and years, his brother is disabled and elderly, but must have one of those disabilities that aren't immediately visible, so has had a hard time convincing his own brother that he really is ill, and deserves a decent safe place in which to spend the last years of his life.
I have run across that prejudice too, the only time you see me out is when I feel well enought to get up and out, and so people who see me when I am out think I'm faking and unreliable. I have learned to say I'll try to get to events, because I cannot predict what will be going on with me physically when the actual event is being held.
That's why certain sceptical and hostile members of my family had to pass away before I could get the help I needed to get out of there.
So talk all you want about how the PPA and one athens initiatives are committed to getting the actual poor into the problem solving process. It's bullpuckie, and we who advocate for ourselves and our neighbors know that. We're poor, not stupid.
We need the local HED and AHA to create our own voucher program, here locally. But they are too busy scratching each other's backs, giving each other awards for gentrifying the neighborhoods that result in forcing the poor back out into the hinterlands, where they have NO access to the resources which should be available to those who truly need them.
And don't give me that neighborhood notification crap, either. Most residents of public housing can't afford phones, or tv, never mind computers or email accounts. So they are left out of those loops, unable to organize to protect their neighborhoods from gentrification and commercial and (here we go!) the relocation of racist elitist fraternities into their neighborhoods.
I don't pretend to have all the answers to this, and I know there are a very few honestly dedicated workers over there, who really do advocate for the residents.
It's a shame that I can't sign my own name to this, it would ruin my credibility as a voting rights activist, because as even a former resident of Broadacres, a stigma hangs over my head as a bum, a con-artist, a druggie or member of the intergenerational poor.
Until the M and C stop gentrifying the poor out of these areas, (hey, what a way to reduce the poverty stats for our county, eh?) and provide snail mail notifications to those individuals who want to protect what little affordable housing still exists in Athens, all the PPA and One Athens efforts will come to naught.
But I bet all the social service workers will still be making small yet decent salaries w/benefits. The current system of social services only benefits the people working in them, not the people who really need them, with very few exceptions, mostly small groups like the Interfaith Hospitality Network.
That's what we see, as poor folks in Athens, and until we hear a candidate who really gets this, we'll keep supporting those who at least put these issues out there for us to get behind.
I'm an environmentalist, support the greenways and bike paths that connect east athens w/the multimodal transportation center, but NOT to the detriment of the needs of the poor, like clean running water, fire protection, transportation that actually gets them to and from jobs and childcare, and access to healthcare and education.
Kelly, you represent these third world areas too, and I'd like to hear more from you on how to deal w/these issues, including the guts to challenge the AHA on it's real viability as advocates for the people they house.
anonymous, that's fucked up. It seems as though what you're advocating is not only finding some way to encourage the people living in AHA to vote, but also to find some way to get them out of there through larger community assistance. How can people help this, if not by putting direct pressure on AHA themselves?
Let’s take this point by point.
1) “Yes, that's right, 75%, according to the PPA, are on SSI, elderly, or on Medicare or Medicaid.”
So you are saying that is why we should not support changes in lousy wages, lack of benefits, transportation, or access to education. There are plenty of elderly who don’t live in subsidized housing. It’s because they had jobs and healthcare and retirement plans. What exactly are you arguing?
2) “They pay their huge staff great salaries, with benefits, and restrict/limit access to resources that are available to poor citizens who don't live in the projects.”
Yeah. That’s plain bullshit. There are plenty of resources available. I admit that awareness of such resources is lower than it should be, but there is a social service to do everything but wipe asses in this town. If anything, we have too much duplication in services.
3) “Residents who need help month to month are subjected to humiliating and condescending screenings.”
You’re right. Even those in a placement have screenings looming over their head and I have at least heard of these screenings being used for intimidation and coercion. It needs to be corrected.
4) “…left w/no referrals for help w/either medicine or food, which are limited to three times a year for residents”
Again you’re right. What can/ should we do?
5) The AHA relies on the disabled to actually pay 30% of their gross income, calculated annually via reviews conducted annually, to pay their costs/matching funds.
You’re assuming two things and they are both wrong. First, you saying these people who are disabled are not intergenerational poor which is again, bullshit. People with resources and means don’t move to the projects after they become disabled. Poor people who are disabled do. Second, you’re denying a correlative between poverty, poor jobs and disability which is also bullshit. Poor education, poor nutrition and little access to healthcare all lead to increasing instances of disability. Give someone a job with a good salary and healthcare and you’ll see intergroup disability claims go down. I don’t think people like being on disability but it beats most of the jobs offered to them. And please don’t claim that everyone on disability really needs it. That straight up bullshit without a chaser.
6) “their just over 600$ they live on”
Wrong. SSI. WICK and TANF are all based on scale. Some people actually make enough on their SSI alone to make car payments and weekly payments on a flat screen. So after the housing subside, the disabled which you cite still can collect money from several other sources plus receive Medicaid/ Medicare, WICK, TANF, SSI, and other forms of public assistance. Here’s the catch. You have to attend meeting with your case worker. You must be sober. You must take care of your children. Follow the rules and the system, while not perfect, is helpful. Break the rules and you’ll get smacked and then all you can do is complain about how unfair it is.
7)
“Charlie ("I'm not sure what I stand for and am not a republican") Maddox….
Rick Parker travels the country, pretending to dig up resources that will serve his residents. But he's NOT serving the majority of his residents…”
You do a great job slinging shit for somebody with no answers. Charlie is for giving people the type of jobs that will make an impact on poverty. What the hell do you stand for except you?
8) “Instead he highlights the few success stories among the intergenerational poor who become mortgable, via education and low wage jobs (many of them in the dining halls and janitorial jobs at UGA, all on a temporary basis, which denies them medical benefits, or decent, livable wages).”
Well damn them for being successful and being encouraged by it. And while I’m sitting here arguing for better jobs, you say that the residents in public housing won’t be helped by better jobs because they are disabled but now you’re taking a shit on the available jobs. Again, what the hell are you arguing? Do you want Rick to be fired and you put in charge of the housing authority. Are you still mad at Charlie because he balked at your racist scheme to corner the toilet paper market?
9)” I don't know if anyone here has been following the horrors over in Atlanta, where those same disabled folks are being offered vouchers to rent substandard housing in properties already being foreclosed on.”
Well they better not come to Athens because according to you Rick Parker will analy accost them with a dremel tools and Charlie will grind them up and feed them to his children. Treating the issues of poverty is not easy. That’s why I’m advocating for treating the sources of poverty like available jobs, income and benefits. That’s my suggestion. What exactly is yours?
10) “And did you know that the AHA doesn't provide recycling? Here we have a captive populace, who, instead of leaving their aluminum cans in clean Kroger sacks hanging on the outside of the dumpsters, so that the diggers don't have to climb into the dumpsters to collect their cans, could be educated about our land-full, and all the other containers, etc., which could be recycled.”
So go educate them. I’m sure AHA and the city will appreciate your effort. I would certainly appreciate it. While you’re at it, tell the city to expand the range of plastics it accepts. I like yogurt and hate to throw away the containers because ACC can’t recycle them. If anyone knows where I could take them, speak up.
11) “And residents of Broad acres and "the Rock" and "Pauldoe" know that they are living in these valuable properties on borrowed time,”
You don’t know how right you are. That’s why AHA has been quietly moving residents into neighborhoods that don’t have iron fences. A lot of pubic housing is on borrowed time. This is going to be a shit storm, grab your jacket.
12) “All so those like Charlie Maddox can take trips w/his family, fully paid for by the disabled people for whom they do nothing, absolutely NOTHING.”
Wow. I really do know where to start with this one. With Charlie as chairman, the AHA he increase fiscal strength of the org, successfully lobbied against several attacks in housing subsidies, helped transition residents into actual neighborhoods and moved more students out of low income into dorms housing thereby increasing availability.
So what did you do today, hater?
13) So how does this:
“That's because the antiquated rules of the AHA force these functional, ambitious and hopeful folks to live in sin.”
Cause this:
“Housing sit around all day drinking or drugging, watching cable tv, talking on their cell phones, running shot houses out of their apartments, and co-habiting w/lifelong partners illegally.”
Public housing is some of the safest property in Athens when crime statistics are considered. And, I think you know that the potential cost incurred in legitimizing a child, required criminal background checks and extracurricular activities keep more boyfriends from putting their name on the lease than anything else. If anything, having another able bodied worker in the family should result in a heightened ability to pay rent. Why would you move in with your girlfriend and children and not get a job to contribute. Exactly.
14) But I'm only out of there because some of my family members have left resources that are now available to me, and who are well enough educated to put together a trust for the resources I'm eligible for, like help w/uncovered meds, a car I can't own, but do drive, my computer, cell phone (metro pcs, I have no land line) and continued educational opportunities.
Congratulations. Many people are in public housing because they don’t have the family resources that you apparently do. There are plenty on a waiting list. Luckily for you, they were further down the list and AHA saw your needs as requiring the type of mercy and assistance that you received. Maybe you can wave to them as you drive by.
I hope you enjoyed your stay.
15) “People who see me when I am out think I'm faking and unreliable. I have learned to say I'll try to get to events, because I cannot predict what will be going on with me physically when the actual event is being held.
That's why certain skeptical and hostile members of my family had to pass away before I could get the help I needed to get out of there.”
Well you obviously have typing skills. People hire for those.
16) But I bet all the social service workers will still be making small yet decent salaries w/benefits. The current system of social services only benefits the people working in them, not the people who really need them, with very few exceptions, mostly small groups like the Interfaith Hospitality Network.”
Why don’t you haul your ass down to the hood and take a good look at all those white girls in shitty cars carrying clip boards. Those are the people who get paid shit to raise poor kids and keep their parents from killing them. Most of them have more education than you can pronounce and still they take the truly worse job in social services because they believe that the children don’t deserve to horrid situations that junkies, drunks, child rapists and windbag activists create. Only benefits the people working in them? You’re a joke.
The truth is you are not the future of this town. We do not need to try to continue to fatten those whose only desire is to suckle at the nipple of public assistance while shitting on those who can actually make a difference. Through your entire argument, you offer no answers and instead want to shit on all those who tried to help you.
But the poor children of this town have done nothing to deserve their lot. They deserve opportunities in the form of jobs and education. They need influences better than our anon poster who will tell them that achievement is better than entitlement.
Again, our town needs a plan to bring better jobs for everyone. It is something this town deserves. It is something we desperately need.
Kelly, excellent point and thanks for the links. I think the paper had a valid point in heeding the voice of citizens and I don't fully by the argument for roundabouts but I appreciate your explanations.
Do you think you could move to my district and help us get our grocery store back. Its now a call center and storage facility and our commisioners don't really give a shit?
Go Tides!
js
It seems to me that anonymous is more bothered by the corruption to the extent that it shapes how anonymous perceives the situation. That's not to say anonymous is wrong, but it's to say that calling anonymous a hater or a shitter or whatever is not really going to be all that helpful in the end. It probably won't be all that helpful to make character judgments of Maddox, either, but is it factually true that Maddox takes trips to far-off places on behalf of AHA to help secure their funding or somesuch? I know, all too well do I know, that when you're in a position of frank dependency on a management that takes trips to far-off places, under the presumption that this is all really for the benefit of the managed, it comes across as the immoderation associated with feudal lords. Now, Jeff, you did agree with anonymous that, to your knowledge, there have been occasions where the policies or practices of AHA were abused. Even if such abuses were small in number, the effect can be devastating to people who have no other option but to trust those who are in a position to abuse them. And there are all those little, mundane, day-to-day interactions or snubs that color how we deal with one another, and they add up to a miserable experience for those on the receiving end of bureacratic protocol.
Perhaps you have some experience with the anonymous poster, as I don't get the toilet paper reference in this context, but it seems to me that what you both want is the same. Namely, to see people suffer less. Why, then, do we have to hash out who cares for others the most, or who cares for others successfully?
Some are gifted to be feet, others hands, and still others hearts, livers, spleens, thighs. Don't destroy the body over who has the right truth of the matter.
This issues that anon refers to with regards to searches and harassment are real.
I won't bored you with the toilet paper story with the exeption of telling you is damn funny and slightly embarassing.
I'm not going to duplicate the fine post from Snowden Tataski rebutting the crapola from anonymous@12:31, but I would like to address a few of the more egregiously wrong points.
One of the first things you should learn about Broadacres is that it, along w/the AHA, is filled w/residents who are 75% disabled!
Yes, that's right, 75%, according to the PPA, are on SSI, elderly, or on medicare or medicaid. NOT the systemic victims of our lousy wages, lack of benefits, transportation, or access to education, but disabled, physically or mentally ill, or elderly, and unABLE to work
I haven't seen the statistic quoted from the PPA, but as presented it is seriously wrong. First being elderly is not synonymous with being "disabled". There are many residents of Denny Towers for example who could and do work.To categorically include them in a broad definition of "disabled" is insulting and misinformed.
Likewise, there are many residents (and people outside AHA) whose children receive medicaid for certain enumerated conditions. The persons whose children are entitled to medicaid may include those well up on the "middle class" scale. Again, if in fact PPA uses receipt by the household of medicaid as an indicator of diability by the leaseholder, then it is misguided.
Likewise, eligibility for medicare is absolutely not an indicator of disability. There are legions of robust medicare recipients, gainfully employed, at all economic levels of our society
So I'm willing to concede that PPA may have determined that 75% of the AHA population participates in one of these programs, but I strongly doubt that PPA equated such participation as being synonymous with being disabled.
Also it should be noted that eligibility by an adult for SSI is directly related to one's work experience and education. That's why there are a lot more HS dropouts getting SSI than college graduates.
They pay their huge staff great salaries, with benefits, and restrict/limit access to resources that are available to poor citizens who don't live in the projects.
Most of their salaries and wages are below the market.
But they provide NO benefits to those people, other than providing a warm, safe place to live, with prepaid utilities.
What other landlord provides more than that?
Most residents of public housing can't afford phones, or tv, never mind computers or email accounts.
That scores about a 10 on the BS scale. I've been going into public housing for over 30 years, and I've never gone into a unit that didn't have a TV. There may be some, but I'm willing to bet that overall the ownership rate is 95%. Likewise, I'll be that on a unit basis, since the advent of cell phones, phone ownership is over 100%.
To state that "most" don't own these items is just absurd. In fact, system wide, I'm not sure that "most" don't own a computer of some sort, or a least have access to one at work or school. In any event a large number of my contacts there have e-mail accounts.
The abysmal turnouts in those neighborhoods are not because the people don't care, or don't know which candidates are full of scat, but who literally can't walk to or afford to ride a bus over to vote.
So why don't you educate them about absentee ballots. For every whine, there is a solution.
It's a shame that I can't sign my own name to this, it would ruin my credibility as a voting rights activist, because as even a former resident of Broadacres, a stigma hangs over my head as a bum, a con-artist, a druggie or member of the intergenerational poor.
Like there's any regular reader of this blog who doesn't now who you are maddyclare.....
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