Thursday, April 19, 2012

Weatherford: "Statements such as Mr. Schellenberger’s are divisive and not constructive."

He's a Republican, right? Hell, if all us city folks would just be good and REPUBLICAN, we wouldn't have to use a youth shelter at all.

Shucks.

City, county should be one big family (letter to the editor of the News and Tribune)

I wanted to express my overwhelming concern at one of the statements that I heard at the Floyd County Council meeting on April 10. During the discussion on the ordinance for the New Albany-Floyd County Parks Department, elected county council member John Schellenberger stated that “city kids” were the majority in the Youth Shelter that was recently purchased and being remodeled by Floyd County.

I have lived within the city limits of New Albany since June 2009, and as far as I know I have been a resident of Floyd County the exact same amount of time. I consider myself a part of both, as I am sure that most of the population of the city of New Albany does.

In reply to Mr. Schellenberger’s statement, children are children. There should be no distinction between “city kids” and children that live outside of the city limits. The Youth Shelter may have a large percentage of children that live within the city limits, but 100 percent of those children live within Floyd County.

There was much discussion about the tension between the city council of New Albany and the county council at the same county council meeting. I have attended many city council meetings, and there is not a time that I remember that such a huge amount of time was spent on discussing the tension between the councils, not even the 911 merger.

It pleases me very much that the two councils were able to vote on the New Albany-Floyd County Parks Department. This is a step forward for our community and it is going to take time and learning on both councils for the merger to be effective.

Statements such as Mr. Schellenberger’s are divisive and not constructive. I hope that the councils can continue this trend when it comes to future mergers and work on building a better community that is 100 percent Floyd County, Indiana, and the city of New Albany.

— Amy Weatherford, New Albany

1 comment:

Amy said...

Thank you for reposting!