A field trip worth taking

By Staff
March 21, 2004
Ward 5 Councilman Bobby Smith is perfectly within his rights as a duly elected member of the city's governing body to ask questions and seek answers on public projects.
On Tuesday, when he asked Mayor John Robert Smith for an update on the city's much-delayed proposal to re-pave city streets, Councilman Smith got, instead of an answer, a typical Mayor Smith finger-wagging lecture. The mayor based his bristling response on things apparently said in a secret council session, a discussion from which the public was excluded and thus cannot have knowledge.
It seems that the mayor and council members are feeling the heat on street paving. After all, the city borrowed $6 million more than seven months ago and has yet to lay an inch of asphalt. Meanwhile, streets continue to deteriorate, even as the city pays interest on the borrowed money at a rate three times greater than what is being earned.
And, the city is buying asphalt for Lauderdale County crews who, in a cooperative agreement, are re-paving some streets within city limits.
Go figure.
We hope residents, voters and people who work in this city continue to turn the heat up until re-paving crews hit the streets. We hope individual city councilmen continue to speak their minds because, in a democracy, there must be many voices, not just one.
The expression of such direct, public frustration seems to be the only way to draw Mayor Smith's attention away from the media games he is so fond of playing. On the subject of street paving, many people don't think his pithy posturing is funny anymore.