Final votes on paving funds slated for Monday at New Albany City Council meeting (News and Tribune).
Kudos to Daniel Suddeath for somehow locating a council member (a) who is capable of communicating rationally about paving, sans the pogram-laden code language and ubiquitous red herring of two-way street conversions, and (b) willing to do so for attribution. Is it just a delirium-induced dream?
No, but it’s the first council coverage in a good while not to be fatally compromised by undue reliance on president Dan Coffey’s self-serving, inaccurate and misleading gibberish.
Instead, Suddeath shocks New Albany by spending a few minutes with Jeff Gahan, and while we’ve freely disagreed at various times with the sixth district representative in the past, he takes a public position here that is heard far too seldom these days:
“I think it’s important the council does not get caught up in micro-managing the decisions on which roads need to be paved.”
That’s a stunner, isn’t it?
Could there be a glimmer, however paltry, that someone on the council holds a balanced view of its relationship with the executive branch?
In the context of recent utterances by Coffey and at-large councilman Kevin Zurschmiede, the latter far too obviously relishing his newly chosen role as GOP agent provocateur, Gahan comes off as positively statesmanlike. It’s been so long since a council mayoral hopeful opted to "stealth" campaign by respecting the office he aspires to occupy rather than denigrating it as the source of all evil, we’ve forgotten what the experience feels like.
Congratulations, CM Gahan … er, I think.
Coffey’s anti-them-people diatribes, complete with harmony vocals by Jethro, will be collated very soon in a matchbox-sized volume we're calling, “Just Say ‘No’ and ‘Fuck You’ to Anyone Living on East Spring Street.” Look for more in my Tribune column later this week, as I ponder the impact of square dancing, monomania and legislative illiteracy on the city's future prospects.
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10 comments:
"er...I think."
Famous last words, RAB.
Let's take a look at the situation and recount what we heard on Thursday evening.
A comprehensive paving plan was prepared last November at a cost of $33,000. Renaissance Design Build, a local engineering firm, surveyed every mile of city streets and every mile of its alleys - That includes arterial streets, collector streets, and local streets.
[An aside: Elm Street, where I (and the fact-challenged young Mr. Bledsoe) reside, which is a collector street, has been forced into becoming an arterial street, despite the fact that it is almost completely composed of residential housing.]
Each street was further classified by its degradation (read: crying need for repaving), on a scale of 6 (most needy) to 1.
All that remains to implement a comprehensive plan is the authority to pay for it out of anticipated revenues. That then would allow the administration to seek bids and let contracts.
The "comprehensive" tag indicates that the city has no intention of paving a street in August, only to see Vectren come along in September and rip the street up.
By the way, the November estimate was $6.25 million - more than we can pay for today, but a rational number which this city can pay over a course of years by borrowing now.
The $2 million proposal is the opposite of comprehensive, and Mr. Gahan knows that.
In some ways, it's akin to having all the streets striped before the milling and paving begins.
I'm not prepared to be as generous as you in reading Mr. Gahan's statement as benign.
Rather, he is trying to deflect blame from the council, in effect saying "We know this is a foolish way to pave streets that have been neglected for at least a decade, and we know it will be seen as a failure. Don't blame me or my fellow council members when that becomes glaringly obvious."
What we heard on Thursday is the distinct possibility that $2 million spent this year will result in such a minuscule amount of paving in 2009 that most residents will see zero paving. The biggest needs may have to be ignored to rejigger the plan. Or, the biggest needs may require massive sums for substructure repairs, leaving little money for milling and paving.
If Mr. Gahan doesn't know that, he should. I suspect he does know all of this and just doesn't care. He knows that the tiny percentage of New Albanians who vote will, with just a nudge, blame the mayor and ignore the intransigence of this council.
This is a man who can't even grasp the concept of one-person, one-vote, so I'm unwilling to ascribe a sudden perspicacity or stroke of rationality to him. Sorry to diverge from the party line, but Mr. Gahan is, in fact, Mr. Coffey's key ally. Without Gahan, Coffey is powerless, and they both know it.
No arguments here. My tonge was ever so slightly in cheek.
Well said, Bookseller. That Gahan would receive any credit at all in this matter, even if tongue in cheek, is evidence of nothing more than how low our standards have dropped.
As I mentioned at their last meeting, the council can spend economic development money on streets so that it actually has a positive impact on economic viability or they can take a scattered, piecemeal approach that amounts to nothing more than subsidizing the lowest common denominator, with lost opportunity costs being much greater than anything they'll accomplish.
Thus far, they've chosen the latter with Gahan's full support.
I consider myself duly escorted to the woodshed, and plead two and a half days of sobriety as the cause of my lowered standards.
Post-holiday rehab always wreaks havoc with my antennae ...
Roger,
C'mon in. I've been living in the woodshed for past couple of weeks. Plenty of room. Got a transistor radio and a new Sears catalog. Even found a 6 pack of Billy Beer in the corner.
Mark
Why is it too much to ask for a plan? It seems like every time a bone is thrown people run like it's actually progress?
Let's go one step further, and actually confirm that where the paving is going to take place, utility work will not be performed two weeks later (occured on both cherry and market streets).
Let's also take care of the streets in the worst condition first.
I feel sorry for any traveler who exits off on state street. The road conditions are terrible, and the forever boarded up Hardees gives the impression you really stopped in a bad end of town.
We're not in any hurry. We've all lived with sub standard road conditions for years. Can't we just slow down and actually be INTELLIGENT about something, or is that just REALLY asking for too much??
Damn, now we will have to split the Billy three ways.
Maybe I can find a bottle of Boones Farm over behind the...
I will note without comment that the Republicans certainly have become suddenly interested in stopping road work.
And, unfortunately, we have a Republican majority on the council.
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