HEARD IN RADIO LAND
8-3-09
We thought once Mayor Evans and the new City Council were in office that we would not have to attend Council meetings and that we could get the information we needed via radio; however, after Tuesday's meeting, we realize that we will have to be at future council meetings. Our observation is that the City Council is pretty much a "rubber stamp" council for whatever Mayor Evans presents and that the Mayor appears to be a subber stamp to present anything the Perkins left over department heads give him to present to the Council. Interestingly, only Councilman Williamson, who probably supported Mayor Evans more than most anyone in the city, appears appears to be the only member of the Council who will question or vote against something Mayor Evans presents.
For example, Tuesday night, the Perkins Personnel Director Valerie Jones had the Mayor present a $12,000 request to have a Fire Engineer Exam prepared. As usual, Jones had only one proposal, which was from her long time friend Dianne Clark of Decisions, Inc. The problem with this is that the Mayor had just pointed out that the city revenues were down at least $200,000 from the same period last year and Williamson pointed out that sales tax revenues are down $300,000 from the last year and THERE IS NO VACANCY IN THE FIRE ENGINEER POSITION AT THE PRESENT TIME! With the fiscal year ending in 60 days, why not wait until the new fiscal year to spend $12,000??? Only Williamson voted against this expenditure.
Another Perkins appointee, Community Development Director Charlotte Griffith had the Mayor present a proposal to close the landfill on Jeff Davis Ave by October 1. Everyone on the Council, we believe, thought that was the manditory closing date and had been told that by Ms. Griffith. On Tuesday, the Council found out that the permit for the Jeff Davis landfill only went through July and was recently extended by ADEM for three more months.
A third Perkins appointee, Daryl Moore of Code Enforcement, came under heavy fire from the council because of the GRASS IN THE CITY BEING ALLOWED TO GROW INTO JUNGLE STATUS. The city has a procedure to cut grass on vacant lots and yards of derelict home owners WHICH TAKES 6-8 WEEKS TO BE PUT INTO EFFECT. By then, Councilmembers are being bombarded with complaints from neighbors who do not know why it takes so long to get rat and snake producing yards cut. The whole procedure is now on the Times-Journal website and the Mayor said it would be put on the city's website. Citizens have a right to be irate about neck high grass growing in their neighborhoods and not being cut, but it really is not the council members fault (once they turn the request into the Mayor's office for Code Enforcement).
We are distressed that the City is getting trashier and trashier. REMEMBER: ONLY TRASH LITTERS...and we are getting an increasing amount of trash ALL OVER SELMA.
We were astonished that a police dispatcher and apparently some of Selma's finest believe that the Police Department can give a NOISE PERMIT to permit bands and loud noise in the open air of a neighborhood until all hours of the night. IT IS PAST TIME THAT THE POLICE TAKE NOISE COMPLAINTS SERIOUSLY AND START ISSUING CITATIONS AND CLOSING DOWN LOUD NOISE GATHERINGS! Enough is enough. We will be at the next Council Meeting!!
