Editor:
One man’s opinion about city planning, system development, and the City Council.
They do what they want, when they want, and with whomever they want.
I’ll start with the most recent affront.
Jamie Melcher, local real estate agent, to the planning Commission. No conflict of interest there. Duplexes in Sweet Home residential areas; money talks.
Check out the Lake Pointe land development above The Point Restaurant. Houses built on the edge of fill dirt. They already replaced pilings on one house because they cracked. Two of the lots were under water a few years back. I know because I live on Riggs Hill.
I called the planners on it and their reply was that the engineers checked it all out and that everything is A-OK. Same story with the duplexes. It’s out of our hands; state statutes mandate what we do. Uh huh.
I used to live on 18th Street. There was a couple of acres behind the houses that bordered Ames Creek. City property, but useless. Ashbrook Park had about 5 acres listed as wetlands. No building allowed.
All of a sudden the wetlands became dry and a dozen houses went up. The little plot of land behind my house all of a sudden was zoned wetlands. How lucky for the Ashbrook developers. I can’t prove any money changed hands, but if it quacks like a duck, looks like a duck, and smells like a duck, it probably is a duck.
But I ain’t one to gossip, so you didn’t hear that from me. I could go on, but you get the point.
To quote a line from a old song, “Money doesn’t talk, it swears; propaganda all is phony.”
John Marano
Sweet Home