Segments (1 is intro, 2 is opening statements, 3 - 10 are questions, 11 is the candidate closing statement.) The audio fades on the intro and may skip a few other places but someday I promise I will learn to not cover the microphone with my finger.
Dunwoody Young Parents political forum 1
Dunwoody Young Parents political forum 2
Dunwoody Young Parents political forum 3
Dunwoody Young Parents political forum 4
Dunwoody Young Parents political forum 5
Dunwoody Young Parents political forum 6
Dunwoody Young Parents political forum 7
Dunwoody Young Parents political forum 8
Dunwoody Young Parents political forum 9
Dunwoody Young Parents political forum 10
Dunwoody Young Parents political forum 11
Remember, you only vote for one on November 5th based on where you live.
9 comments:
John,
I appreciate the video since I had to leave mid-Session, thank you.
Dunwoody needs a Fact-o-Meter operator because I heard statements that were wrong, misleading, and simply untrue regarding zoning, especially concerning the high-dollar, high density High Street project in PCID.
Tea Party/SaveDunwoody/CleanSweepers cannot be against Agenda21 and simultaneously for impact fees, for individual rights and against the lawful property rights of another, all in the topic.
Doug Thompson nailed how we can legally and advantageously affect the High Point development - When developers request variances to their approve new plans, we can try negotiating a higher percentage of owner-occupied units into the project.
We can expect a higher quality unit, courtesy of City council drive to implement more stringent, new building codes.
I admire the Clean Sweepers for stepping up to public service, yet the Council doesn't have on-the-job training. One requires mastery of what can and cannot be accomplished, or Dunwoody will get sued by a deep pocket developer - And lose.
Respectfully,
Max
Thanks for that explanation, Max. I wondered who it was behind the scenes advising the Clean Sweep folks. This gets to the very serious question of motivation for these candidates. Are they stalking horses for some sort of attempted payback here? And why would someone recruit people never involved in their community to push this retribution agenda? Maybe this is who one of the candidates, Richiter, was referring to last night when he said he had consulted with volunteer attorneys. If so, one can only question whether any plans that the sweeper candidates espouse is from them or from the former city attorney. Certainly their plans lack merit and will get the City into more expense and problems which us taxpayers would have to pay for. All to meet someone's agenda against the City and its Manager.
Unfortunate we have come to this in our City.
Rob Augustine
Rob, just my opinion here - Based on listening to a Summer's worth of public commentary...
The financial supporters of the Clean Sweepers are documented as key SaveDunwoody folks, that seem coincidentally sympathetic to the Dunwoody Tea Party positions.
I see the Tea Party using this election in Dunwoody, as they are around the US, as a platform to gain position on the political chess board. This is also a documented political strategy, widely reported.
What I find so vexing is that many Tea Party positions are aligned with my own personal beliefs - We have too much government, too large a government, too wasteful a government - But all at the Federal level.
Georgia is graded pretty well in terms of sound fiscal management.
The City has increased cash reserves, paved roads, fixed underground infrastructure, all during the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
These Clean Sweepers are forcing the round peg of scary Federal spending into the square hole of Dunwoody governance. They are alarming many residents with tales of malfeasance, abuse of power, and overspending.
City Council recognizes that citizens need more avenues of communication and responds by announcing Town Halls meetings will occur.
I hope so.
I also hope that people will step back and realize that after only FIVE years, Dunwoody is generally working as promised.
Take it easy folks, some people have REAL problems - Like not being able to walk down the hall...
Certainly not a world view that I want to embrace - these extreme Tea Party folks living their lives with a solipsistic blindness, most aptly described by that astute purveyor of the communal polity, Russell Brand, when he summarized the motives of Margaret Thatcher, that she ruled by deliberately engendering the idea that "there is no such thing as society", that we are all alone on our journey through life, solitary atoms of consciousness.
And though I do believe that it is a waste, such a waste, this inner-life of mine, that one day, I shall close my eyes and everything that I ever thought or felt will vanish and be gone forever, but I then think that is perhaps why life is so very beautiful, it being so temporal, and why those times when I do share witticisms and laughter with another and we laugh heartily, soulfully, that's the celestial harmony, right there baby, and what I shall leave here, and I don't feel so alone that when I do close my eyes, it's not going to go away, least not all of it.
But I'm thinking, as it has become painfully obvious that I cannot win a seat via a write-in campaign, and with my concept of community being that of everyone sitting round a colossal fire-ring, drinking bottles of Guinness, passing fifths of Jameson's, and taking hits off an Aesculapian bong will never be accepted, that the incumbent council members and the man with that fascinatingly great name - Heyward Wescott, that has to have come out of an Anthony Trollope Victorian era novel, are the most community oriented candidates, striving for the general good.
The citizens of Dunwoody would be fools to not reelect them and not newly elect the Wayward one. Or if you want to just consider financial reasoning - spite fences really don't do anything for the property values, at all.
Posting in two parts ------- part 1
I too attended this forum. Listening to the City Council candidates Sunday evening, I must say that I was surprised by the lack of knowledge and lack of prior community involvement of several of the candidates. It is questionable how their ideas would even work for the City at all. Their lack of knowledge arises primarily from the fact that they have not been engaged in any activities, until now, involving the City. I do not understand how an informed electorate could support this group of self-named sweepers.
While these sweeper candidates adhere to a "party line" and are consistent in criticisms, they offer no evidence that they could do a better job or even understand what is going on in the City. To me, being on City Council requires people who have been engaged in various community efforts over some period of time. People who have proven they can work effectively for the future of our City.
More troubling than the lack of engagement in civic activities though is the sweepers amazing ignorance of so many topics. They criticize the fact that the City of Dunwoody, like all other governments in Georgia, has a fee for things like hot water heater installation or water meter installation. Well, every local or county government has this. Why? To be sure that the work is done by a proper installer and that it is inspected for completeness and correctness. To attack these fees, which cover the cost of the inspection, is ludicrous. I can just hear these same people complaining when someone's gas water heater has a gas leak and resulting damage, or the backflow valve on a water line is not installed correctly, thus affecting the water supply. These are important areas that require inspection. The user fees pay for that. All local cities have these. It is silly for the sweepers to attack such small fees as some kind of excessive or improper tax.
Part two of two -----
These incorrect views carry over to bigger issues like zoning and impact fees. These sweepers will have us tied up in litigation over pre-approved zonings that are already on the books from past County decisions, or in their naive idea of unfairly charging impact fees to some, but not all which is required for them to be constitutional and uniform. These sweepers are really a train wreck waiting to happen. And criticizing the City for meticulously evaluating, writing, and adopting a City zoning code that implements new and better zoning standards is also ridiculous. The sweepers offer no alternatives; only their silly criticism.
Then you have these sweepers telling us we haven't listened to people or haven't planned things. Where were these sweepers at all the zoning code rewrite meetings? Right, they were not there. Where were these sweepers at all the planning meetings, the citizen participation efforts, and all the other discussions to develop master plans for the City? Right, they were not there at all. They were off working is their excuse. Well so was everyone else who has found the time to participate in these projects and in helping the City over the years. So the sweepers excuse is no excuse - it's just them dodging.
Finally, I could not help but think that these non-participating and inexperienced sweepers were part of an orchestrated and deliberate plan to wreck our City government. This was evident based on the same language and same stances being urged by these sweepers. They must have a political party they belong to or some organization headed up by someone who is pulling some strings. Apparently from several accounts, our former city attorney is leading this effort. It seems to me this is a very real danger for the City and its future.
The sweepers would be a regression to uninformed and more costly governance. The sweepers are an attack on sound City programs by sweepers who never bothered to be involved in the process at all. The sweepers lead an effort to mislead the citizens by claiming even the most fundamental and widely practiced governmental functions are somehow wrong.
I am confident the voters in this City will see through the sweeper facade and vote for our other candidates who have demonstrated their knowledge of and involvement in these important matters that will greatly affect us citizens.
It is clear to me that our City Council members Shortal and Thompson and the actively involved and dedicated candidate Heyward Wescott all have the experience and knowledge our City needs. They have done well and we should elect them.
Sincerely yours,
Rob Augustine
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Max, Gary Ray Betz, and Rob Augustine all agree that the sweepers are not the best choice for City Council.
Now that is amazing.
Vote on November 5
Here is a link for an Absentee Ballot:
http://web.co.dekalb.ga.us/voter/applicationforms.html
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