Writ Of Mandamus

More on the writ later, but first let's set the stage...

As many of you may know there has been a dinosaur zoo operating in Dunwoody for a few years now. Not live dinosaurs or even fossilized bones but the inflate-a-date variety. Now the city is shutting down the dino-zoo and that is making fur fly over on fece-book with most seeing dino-extinction as a sin against god and humanity. Mostly because their kids liked it. 

This would be a real teaching moment if it weren't taking so long. Some are just now learning that Dunwoody takes an "enforce on complaint" approach to anything they deign to address and with any action subject to their assessment of the complainer, the alleged offender and the alleged violation. This has led some to call for an open records request to identify the dino-hater presumably to go after them, but be honest, isn't guessing more fun? Others are seeking their very own inflate-a-dino to defy "the man." Others cannot fathom how an inflatable is a sign. Some want to "throw the bums out" suggesting write-ins for the unchallenged in the upcoming election. The zoo-keeper confesses to knowing the rules but has been doing this for three years which may not be the best thing to immortalize on the interweb. The mayor is going to "look into it" which is politician-speak for "I'm outta here" as there is much that any city politician would not want the electorate figuring out as they dig into this affair. Let's learn that anyway.

We'll start with the "sign, not-sign" confustication by looking at the actual ordinance, specifically Section 20-34 - Prohibited Signs:

Except as otherwise provided by this chapter, the following signs are prohibited within the city:

(1)Dilapidated signs, including sign structures.

(2)Animated signs, including balloons, streamers, air or gas filled figures, signs that move mechanically as a result of human activity, wherever located.

There you have it, no ignorance, no excuse. Those dinos are prohibited and in violation of city ordinance. You should also know that this ordinance passed unanimously, 7-0, with much self-congratulatory backslapping and support from many if not most of the current politicians. So what exactly is the mayor looking into? An unread ordinance that was voted for? How often does that happen?

Suppose the mayor does look into it. Can the mayor actually do anything? Let's see what the city charter has to say about that, specifically Sec. 3.05. - City council interference with administration:

Except for the purpose of inquiries and investigations under Section 2.08 of this Charter, the city council or its members shall deal with city officers and employees who are subject to the direction or supervision of the city manager solely through the city manager, and neither the city council nor its members shall give orders to any such officer or employee, either publicly or privately.

It is impossible to believe that anyone who voted yes for the Dunwoody referendum ever read this (or ever will) as this prohibition is kryptonite to all those Dunwoody zionists preaching local control. Dunwoody is modeled more after DeKalb Schools with powerless elected officials than after DeKalb county where our elected officials have real staff, real responsibilities and offer the electorate real control. In Dunwoody, voting in new bobble-heads only affects the entertainment value of council meetings. 

The third leg of this stool is the "enforce on complaint" practice. Here we look to Sec. 3.04. - City manager; powers and duties enumerated:

The city manager shall have the power, and it shall be his or her duty to:

(1)See that all laws and ordinances are enforced;

Job one: enforce all laws and ordinances. In what world is that: just sit on the sidelines until someone complains? No one should be complaining because if the city manager were getting the legally mandated job done there would be nothing to complain about. Why? Because if all laws and ordinances had been enforced then this one in particular would have been enforced three years ago. Isn't what the city is doing to us the very definition of dereliction of duty? And since the only thing mayor and council can do is upgrade the city manager, which they are not doing, they too seem to have dropped the ball. And none of this seems to bother any of them.

This brings us to the writ of mandamus, a court order forcing a government to do its job. Maybe it is time to pursue that path as we're living in the municipal equivalent of a failed state where clearly defined responsibilities are being ignored in deference to...who knows what. This city's failure has conditioned folks to believe that ordinances don't matter, which means your vote doesn't matter, because the council vote doesn't matter. Just ignore what you don't like and hope no one important complains. And had the city done its job these dinos would not have been up long enough for folks to come to believe if something is popular or you get away with it long enough then it cannot be illegal even when it is. Is that what we want to teach our children? Because that is exactly what this city is doing.