Can We Quote You On That?

The AJC quoted our Top Cop as saying:

"As law enforcement officers, we are and should be held to the highest standards of conduct whether on or off duty. We will conduct a thorough investigation of this incident and the actions of our officers."

Wow. Lot to unpack there. Does the Top Cop's "highest standards" include running a porn operation? Police shootings of members of gen-pop, including fatalities? Civil rights violations? Enforce DWB but no patrolling of school zones, again with the fatality connection? Those are symptomatic of a very perverted view of "highest standards."

The clear signal of furtherance of the disaster is "we will conduct a thorough investigation." Danger Will Robinson! Will this be like the whitewash coverup of the porno ring? Perhaps there is a higher, nobler authority. The Georgia State Patrol was called to the scene and perhaps, just maybe, this is a good time to involve the GBI. Now you might be thinking that a statewide organization might be keeping track of errant officers.  Maybe you're thinking of POST? Because they tend to let a lot of very serious incidents fall through the cracks and off the record.

It is hard to tally up the full cost of this systemic incompetence, but it starts with the salaries of the city manager and top cop, both of whom should be fired. With cause. Then there are the legal fees being paid to defend this incompetence, often a losing cause resulting in further payouts. One must really wonder what it takes for the mayor and council to take the actions necessary to clean up this mess.

Schoolhouse Brats

Parents know how enervating it can be to stay on top of children's propensity to misbehavior. Sometimes you're just too drained to intervene. But this leads to the same end as encouraging the bad behavior and at that point the only option is the nuclear option. Drastic, even harsh, action is required.

And so it is with public schools. The edu-industry has been running feral for some time, quite a while longer than the general population knew. They've been feeling their oats, pushing indoctrination while abandoning and weaponizing semantic machinations in their own defense. Parents have had enough.

Parents may be patsies but they're not (all) stupid. They know their school boards are ineffective at best, sometimes harmful other times even worse. When they're on their good behavior they are restricted to approving contracts that bureaucrats set before them, hiring a superintendent with a contract the board did not write and setting policy, whatever that is. And it just so happens these three are insufficient to discipline our out-of-control public education systems. 

Previously Quiet Moms have found a good stick to beat the lovely lady: money. By way of elected official who wield real power, manifest in money flowing from the state coffers to public school bureaucrats, parents have found a way to demonstrate to these wayward brats who is actually in charge. In charge of their children's education, in charge of their moral upbringing and in charge of the schoolhouse. The edu-industry hates this and "open" letters signed by superintendents have ensued. They are right to be alarmed as this is an existential threat. And a very real one. Might be time for them to behave and for many of them to begone.

House Of Cards Collapses

One of the faux neo-cities just went Humpty-Dumpty causing real damage in the fall. And just who was hurt? Well, it wouldn't be the residents as they suffered self-inflicted irreparable damage when they put this jinga game out there for others to play. Badly. With startling transparency the AJC reports that Stonecrest established a developers' authority coincident with installing a rather powerless mayor. Elation all around, but especially for the developers who looked to score a cool three-quarters of a billion dollars. But wheeler-dealers have resigned and important documentation is nowhere to be found. It appears the deal is crashing down leaving developers to weep in their '59 Dom Perignon.

While this is strangely amusing, structural weaknesses and financial calamity is not the real issue. At least not the one facing Buckhead, East Cobb and whatever will become of GreenCliff. Their dilemma is how to ignore the tune of the pied pipers leading them to a similar fate, handing all the gold to developers, increasing their taxes and forfeiting any meaningful vote at the ballot box while handing their lives over to bureaucrats who will serve any interest but theirs.

Unlike Stonecrest (and Dunwoody) these folks have a chance to avert disaster.

Is Anyone REALLY Surprised?

The AJC is oozing faux-surprise at the fact that the group organizing the push for Buckhead citihood is operating behind the opaque cover of blackout curtains. After all the non-profits behind the push for Dunwoody did exactly the same thing. And more. They established "task forces" that wrote reports never made available prior to the vote. Open? Transparent? Not in the least. In retrospect these committees were the incestuous love child between PR and diversion, getting folks pumped up into thinking they were insiders (they weren't) and keeping them from realizing what was really going to happen (they didn't). After the deed was done and they realized they had been hoodwinked there were some healthy servings of buyers' remorse at the Dunwoody City Buffet. 

The prospects are even worse for Buckhead as they are abandoning a structurally better government for one that will, by design, disenfranchise the very residents that will vote for its creation. To pull this off the organizing group requires 100% opacity. No one, absolutely no one can actually see what is happening prior to the vote. No reports will be made public. IRS filings will be available no sooner than 23 months from acquiring non-profit status. This is actually legal, sad, but legal. Not subject to any other accountability there will be no open records or FOIA requests, something that also annoys the AJC. 

But the real disaster is that the city charter will NOT be available prior to the vote and the vote will not be for that charter. It will be to form the city prior to penning the charter. After the vote residents may be surprise to learn that the council and mayor are mere bystanders to a city that will be run by a city manager. Yes, they will hire that manager but after that original sin the manager is in full control. The manager will build out a staff, and if Dunwoody is an indication it will spread faster than a California wildfire. The manager will craft contracts, including their own, with generous golden parachutes and impediments to firing or milder disciplinary action. And should mayor or council try anything, disciplinary or operational, the Georgia Municipal Association will step in. Sound familiar? Like the powerless school board members we elect who are also as worthless as teats on a boar. Remember when SACS stepped in on the Superintendent's behalf resulting in the governor firing half the board? 

The folks setting up these cities know exactly what they are doing, who they are disenfranchising and who they are serving. And they will keep the voters in the dark because the current city government (Atlanta's) has a strong mayor and council. Currently, many residents may be disheartened by what they perceive as woefully inadequate services but they actually can elect people who actually can make changes. If they approve a city of Buckhead they will lose that forever and will be at the mercy of career bureaucrats and the powerful, monied interests they will serve.

So Why Do You Care?

Preemptive legislation is nothing new and we've seen it here in daVille with the recent ordinance outlawing party houses. Not that such a problem exists and even if it did given the city's reluctance to enforce any ordinance, especially quality of life ordinances, it would not and will not make a difference. Perhaps a diversion. Perhaps just political theater. 

It is happening at the state level as well with the proposed bill that would ban promulgation of divisive indoctrination in our schools. Really this should be as simple as requiring that all students read at grade level before any agenda driven programs are introduced. But both sides are engaging in semantic gymnastics. The leftist superintendent who signed an open letter against the bill they characterize as banning CRT. Yet they claim they are not teaching CRT and in fact there are no courses with CRT in the title or even the course description. But this IS a deceit and they know it. After all if they are NOT teaching CRT why do they care if there is a law banning it? They're not going to teach it anyway or are they?

The fact is that the tenets, the principles and the fundamental building blocks of CRT are driving curricula and the teaching of racial division. And this is happening in school systems across this state where an embarrassing number of students cannot read at grade level, lack skill in basic arithmetic and where over 16% don't continue to graduation.

Is there any doubt that public education needs a power-down reset?

What Will It Take?

We already know the Dunwoody PD has no intention of ever enforcing the no-truck zones. How so? Because the "Top Cop" sent an email to a concerned resident stating exactly that. 

Now "Top Cop" is in a pissing contest with DeKalb Schools over traffic cams in school zones. Why? Because "Top Cop" ain't gonna provide traffic enforcement in school zones any more than he's gonna enforce anything outside of Perimeter Center. Apparently they really are mall cops.  

DeKalb schools are pushing back and can you really blame them given the DPD's history of producing and distributing porn? One might wonder if they're expanding into child porn and since they're not allowed in the school zone for enforcement remote cameras are pretty much required. 

It gets worse.

In trying to justify these cameras, the "Top Cop" farted this out in the first pew:

Police said that data collected by all four departments shows thousands of speeding violations around school areas, some even resulting in fatal accidents.

Pretty hard to believe, isn't it? Staring at traffic violations frequent enough and severe enough that we're seeing FATALITIES and yet REFUSING TO PATROL warrants some investigation, which when given the chance the AJC avoided preferring to continue as the city's PR department. It does beg a lot of questions. What does it take to get our "Top Cop" off his ass? How do we get our laws enforced? If this city is going to rely on automation (ASE - automated speed enforcement) why do we even have cops? Or if they're only going to patrol Perimeter Mall do they really need SUVs? And what about ASE cams over there? Why not? And what will it take to get a change in city and PD leadership and get someone who can and will do the job?

Teaching From Aruba

Teachers are notoriously risk averse and this quality almost every move. In many places teachers belong to unions which are often at odds with the public they allege to serve and who definitely make payroll. In Chicago this toxic combination has the schools shutdown due to an ongoing pissing contest between the teachers' union and the mayor, both reliably left leaning. It seems the teachers want to work from some vacation hotspot whilst the mayor wants asses in classes.

Why the disconnect from what in other times would be two sides of the same coin?

Parents. Apparently these otherwise docile folk are quite riled up and while they cannot fire teachers (no one can) they can fire the mayor. And if they don't get the educational services they feel their children deserve they can, and will, find themselves a new mayor. A mayor that will take the bull by the horns and corral an out-of-control union. And what will that look like? Well, it won't be "teaching from the beach."

Look Closely Now

What Are YOU Looking At?

If you're a long time resident, like those who pre-date even a draft city charter, then you may remember when Dunwoody had a chamber of commerce and you just might think they're back. That's because this 4-color glossy ($$$) that showed up in your mailbox is exactly the kind of pricey pamphlet a CoC would put out. But it isn't. It is actually YOUR tax dollars being re-distributed to successful businesses. And why is that? Back in the day when DeKalb bashing was the local sport it was called "Friends and Family." 

It was bad then. It is even worse now.