Letter to Shelley Midura
CAL. NO. 26244 BY: COUNCILMEMBER MIDURA
An Ordinance to temporarily suspend the requirement for a Conditional Use for accessory parking in an RD-2, Two Family Residential District, for the property located at the corner of South Claiborne Avenue and Dublin Street, only for the purposes of permitting this property to be used for accessory parking for the grocery store and drug store to be constructed on the square bounded by South Claiborne Avenue, South Carrollton Avenue, Dublin Street and Nelson Street; and otherwise to provide with respect thereto.
Passed by City Council 6-0 on October 5th, 2006
Shelley, you were told explicitly and repeatedly that our neighbors and your constituents in NorthWest Carrollton were vehemently opposed to the conversion of any residential properties to commercial. NorthWest Carrollton Board members were in your office on Monday October 2nd indicating that we were opposed to this.
We specifically and directly asked if any items associated with the development on the corner of Claiborne and Carrollton were going to be on the Oct 5th agenda and were told they were not. Please don’t tell me this was a mistake. Given 4 NWCCA board members were in your office on Monday, there was ample opportunity to advise us of your intent.
A neighborhood review board was established in August 2006 to review design of the commercial development on the corner of Claiborne and Carrollton. NorthWest Carrollton had to repeatedly ask for plans for the development to be provided to the review board and to our neighborhood. The board had only one meeting, last Tuesday October 3rd, and this at the insistence of NorthWest Carrollton. One of the concessions that NorthWest Carrollton had indicated it was willing to make was to allow a variance (fewer than required) on the number of parking spaces needed. Claiborne and Carrollton is NOT the corner of Magazine and Arabella. If decisions like the one you made last Thursday were going to be made without even allowing us the ability to respectfully disagree in the public format of a City Council meeting, what was the purpose of this board?
Given the events of this week, I’d like for you to explain to me how we are to trust you to represent us? As I see it we were lied to and intentionally deceived.
Fontainebleau has members who are colleagues of the developers for Roberts and Walgreens and a mid to high socioeconomic standing. NorthWest Carrollton has no such connections with the developers and a lower socioeconomic average status. So I’d also like for you to explain how this is not socioeconomic racism.
Ethical decisions are not always the easiest ones to make. It does not take the existence of a review board to know this. Children know this, which is why they squirm when they know they are doing something wrong.
The members of the NorthWest Carrollton organization deserve an explanation regarding your actions. Please tell me what to say to them on your behalf or I’ll have no choice but to tell them what I think.
Sincerely,
Jenel Hazlett
NorthWest Carrollton
October 9th, 2006 at 12:59 am
The Oct. 5th meeting still isn’t on the city council web site. The upcoming Nov. 1, meeting is the first that I’ve seen on the web site before the meeting. How can anybody on the council claim transparency, when they don’t give prior notice about what’s coming up at meetings?
October 9th, 2006 at 9:51 am
This is a great part of our frustration. If we are to “play by the rules” will someone please show us the gamebook. To have to live with the constant threat of actions and decisions made without our knowing are an added worry.
We are supposed to be working on recovery not some torture which is what it feels like.
Here are some recovery buzz words that mean nothing.
1. open
2.transparent
3.diaspora
4.Public comment
those are just a few that spring to mind
October 13th, 2006 at 6:21 am
She pulled a Jay Batt?!!