If Only

If only...local politicians could do this:

Self-Decapitating Slug

Maybe they could grow the heart needed to serve the community. But if the problem is in the head...break out the Morton's.

Gulag DaVille

Foreshadowing is a wonderful thing but only if you pay attention. Currently in view is what Dunwoody Village will look like after city hall has razed it and sold off the bits. They've offered us a picture of the cookie-cutter pablum pushed by their "friends" in the development community:

Prison? Or, just ugly?

Now, you could scoot over to Sandy Springs, the big sister that stokes our jealousies, and see multiple instances of these horrid offenses to the aesthetic sensibilities, or you can just truck on down to Perimeter Square where the shaker's shake. Right there at the corner of Perimeter Center West and Perimeter Center Place you'll see an early, smaller prototype of what city hall has in store to "vitalize" daVille. It should be noted that daVille cannot be re-vitalized because, well, it already is, as it has been for some decades, vital. But developers want to change all that and city hall agrees with some or all of the seven dwarfs' endorsement.

So take a little time to scope out the prototype and then next time you visit daVille imagine everything you see replaced with dozens of these odious monoliths punctuated all too frequently with high-rise apartments. That's what city hall is going to do because that is what developers are telling them to do. The only thing to be haggled over is how much of a tax break the city will throw at their bottom line.

Job One

Reports have surface recently in one of the local rags indicating that the mayorette and some of the other dwarfs are "concerned over pandemic learning loss." 

Wow! There is a lot hidden in there, most of it unadulterated hypocrisy.  How so? Let us explore the ways.

Perhaps the biggest, stinkiest floater is the simple fact that this city by way of mayor, council and developer's authority actively and aggressively work to undermine our schools. They do this by taking properties off the tax rolls, moving all that money directly into the profits of greedy, but well-connected developers. To be very clear, the city is doing this unilaterally, without school board input even though the vast majority of tax diversion is being taken directly from the school system. Just look at your own property tax bill. Yet we have "representation" at city hall that have the chutzpah to express concern about our children and our schools. There is a special place in hell for these kinds of politicians and it seems that social distancing is not an option. 

Then there is the obvious. No elected official at city hall has any responsibility for our children's schools. Nada. Hell, they won't even provide enforcement when schools violate city ordinances and building codes. Why? Is it because there is no money, no power, no prestige in doing the nitty gritty work? Or is it just because they have no interest whatsoever in residents' quality of life? That they are no more likely to support us than they are to rein in an out of control developer's authority, or misplaced government instituted chamber of commerce, or the incompetent leadership at city hall, particularly in the city manager's office and the police department. It is as if posturing about things outside their purview means no one will notice their failure to serve this city's residents. 

Maybe if these political do-nothings showed as much concern about fulfilling the commitments and responsibilities of the offices they hold instead of anything but that, this city wouldn't be the raging dumpster fire they have let it become. 

Plunk Your Magic Twanger Froggy!

It has long been observed that when folks have no clue how something works it is indistinguishable from magic. This is even true of things someone may know how to operate, like a car or a computer or a cellphone. Both the number of things and the number of people that describes is growing faster than the universe is expanding. 

One area of concern is the deep ignorance around money, what it is and how it works. Once upon a time money was needed to buy goods and services. Now credit, accessed on cards, cellphones and computers, has so abstracted money that it is intangible, reduced to an ephemeral concept. Similarly, money as a reward for work or services has not only been reduced to a concept, the bond between work delivered and monetary compensation has been obliterated. Pay, or whatever it should now be called, is an entitlement, a divine right, like cable TV. Nowhere is this more prevalent than in the expanding corps of government employees, and within that cohort none are more bedazzled about all things money than teachers. 

This isn't just about teachers who whine about low pay and demand raises. It is more than an intellectual moat between the concept of work for hire, it is complete, perhaps willful ignorance of what money actually is, how it is created, how it is managed and how it serves the economy and the greater good. Instead, they put their faith in Froggy's magic twanger. 

They demand raises about as often as they exhale with the money plunking down by magic. A couple more plunks on the magic twanger and all DCSD HVAC systems are not only brand spanking new they are upgraded with the latest anti-virus technology. Plunk again and foam-in, foam-out hand wash stations appear as if by magic. For these folk money has always been an abstraction. Their pay is based on endurance, not accomplishment explaining why merit is never even measured. The more they inhale, the more they exhale, the more they expect to be paid. They cannot comprehend a world where a raise is earned because it is not a world they have ever encountered. And they've never worked for an organization that had to compete for customers' money, so it may be excused as trickle-down entitlement. 

But there is no Froggy. There is no magic twanger. And money doesn't just "plunk" into your account and it doesn't matter if that account is held by an individual or an organization. There is really no magic.

Only In Lilburn

Some Lilburn ex-officials have been indicted for various malfeasance related to development and associated business transactions.  Even worse, one of the indicted was allowed to resign. But even though structural similarities exist all daVillians can rest well in the certainty that really bad things only happen in Lilburn. 

Yes, early on we sailed into troubled ethical waters with counsel at the helm. But we're OK because really bad things only happen in Lilburn.

Yes, there was the pipe farm and the "Save Wieland" mandate at city hall, but we're OK because really bad things only happen in Lilburn.

And there are the recurring civil liberties violations, the lawsuits and the Fraternal Order of Dick Pics that is our police department. Just remember, really bad things only happen in Lilburn. 

It may be unsettling to watch the corporate welfare being lavished on wealthy developers or a mayor who shills for them by demanding high rise development in the Village, but let's thank our lucky stars that really bad things only happen in Lilburn.

When you see your city treating residents like almost unnecessary inconveniences showing total disregard for quality of life, just know Things Will Be OK because really bad things only happen in Lilburn. 

When you realize that Dunwoody is intentionally structured and organized to ensure all these things would happen, well, it could be worse, we could have some of the really bad things that only happen in Lilburn.

If the burden of guilt for having voted this city into existence keeps you awake at night you can ease your troubled mind by remembering Lilburn since the really bad things only happen in Lilburn.

Family Values

Some argue that many of society's ills can be traced directly to the erosion, to the point of collapse, of stable, two parent families. You know, like in the before times, before folks held most important that inalienable right to select and rotate pronouns. That may be why we admire swans-they mate for life. 

Turns out it isn't just swans, some cockroaches mate for life. Yes, yes, the giggling cynic is thinking it is because they live such very short lives. But it turns out there is another, more macabre reason: mutual sexual cannibalism. 

There may be much we can learn from the world around us.

They Didn't Ask You

Teachers are an odd species. At least the megaphone mouths who simply will not drop the mic. They're out there proclaiming their limitations: not a licensed therapist; not a baby sitter; notta, notta, notta. But. They're licensed teachers, quick to proclaim their extensive education, preparation, training, oh, and workload. They're demanding respect, hopeful for admiration, for those efforts and accomplishments.

Fair enough.

But it cuts both ways, does it not? Why not then offer up to experts in other domains the same respect demanded for theirs? Why not show that same respect for the experts charged with managing an entire school system and not just a single classroom? Why not acknowledge their specialized education and skills and even the value of their experience? Perhaps even entertain the notion, no matter how briefly, that these experts must recognize and address issues far beyond and more important than what bounces around in teachers' echo chambers. Maybe then you'd understand that experts with these responsibilities should not, and will not, abandon their commitments for the greater good to sate your whims and insecurities, especially given these commitments are outside your area of expertise-you're no more an administrator than you are a licensed therapist. So, by your own logic, why should they ask you?

Maybe if you showed others the respect they have earned you might garner the respect you crave. 

Deer Hunting In Dunwoody

Much to the mayorette's dismay the seven dwarfs cannot ban deer hunting, by bow, in daVille because, again to her chagrin and despite her best efforts, Dunwoody remains suburban, not the neo-faux-urbanity of her dreams. So, if you're a bow-hunter and have the property-owners' permission, please, cull at will. Just try not to injure that pitiable child whose congenital birth defects have left him looking strikingly like a deer. 

But. It turns out that more deer are falling to Buicks than bows with another traffic fatality right near Touch Down's driveway--TD of "Martha My Deer" fame. Maybe this is just the way it should be, or maybe it is the way that the anti-cull-crowd want it. In any event the Buick logo should be foreshadowing enough:

Looks like the average Buick driver has at least three arrows in their quiver.

We Have Met The Enema

We've had the "Save Dunwoody" movement receiving the apathetic reaction of "from what?" and now we know: from "us" depending on how you actually define "us." Bringing this to the forefront is the temporal juxtaposition of the aggressive effort on the part of city hall to rape Dunwoody Village and the comments of the outgoing DHA president who is calling out the bureaucrats and politicians invested in this rape and pillage as having abandoned any commitment to Dunwoody residents in favor of greed: developer greed; business greed; and political greed.

One might dismiss this as a parting shot from an outgoing president and surely the Seven Dwarfs would like to think that is the case. The problem is the president is merely rotating out, remaining on the board. Furthermore, the DHA has taken the action of hiring a lawyer to call the city out on the rape of Dunwoody Village, reminiscent of days of yore when the DHA prevented the development of a mega-Publix across the street from the library. Due to their efforts a community of townhomes and unattached single family homes, a much better complement to Dunwoody, are there now. 

So maybe, just maybe, the DHA has shaken off the role as pipeline to the politicians selling us down the river and has regained their position as the rightful defenders of Dunwoody residents as the loyal opposition to forces of greed that are making DeKalb County look benign. 

Is Netflix A Sin

Or is it just a guilty pleasure? No matter, some local governments in Georgia want to treat it, and tax it, like a sin. Now the Georgia Municipal Association, a shaker and mover behind all things "tax" would tell you it is just another franchise fee which they claim isn't a tax, it is just "rent." As if the god in their heaven endowed them with the unalienable right to rent out other folks property. 

But there are some real problems in this nightmare on main street. First, what the hell happened to all that local control? Was that just the stinking bucket of political manure some thought it was? And why is it that the governments that tax residents seven ways to Sunday have no problem handing out multi-million dollar tax abatements to developers who are already making enormous profits? And keep in mind those same advocates of taxing us for Netflix justify it by saying that Netflix is very profitable. First, clamping down on market success is not a sound intellectual argument, else we'd expect to see taxes on restaurants based on their success. Or how about this: a tax on developers based on how profitable they are. Never. Going. To. Happen.

So what should happen? Well, let's take a page from the antifa/BLM movements, Silence Equals Consent and any elected official who remains silent, who refuses to stand up and speak out against these punitive taxes should be removed from office and replaced with representatives who will make the bureaucratic changes necessary to fulfill the promise of "local control."