Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page.

Page 4A The Braselton News Wednesday, December 19, 2007 Opinion “Difference of opinion leads to enquiry, and enquiry to truth. ” -Thomas Jefferson Braseltoons by John Sheppard 11 Joseph, you said they were wise men?" letter Says JCCHS being ignored by board our views Hindsight: Murphy wasn’t so bad, after all THE DEATH this week of former Georgia Speaker of the House Tom Murphy closes the door on one of the most remarkable, and controversial, men to hold power in the state. For over a quarter century, Murphy held sway over the state like grumpy grandpa. Chomping on his cigar, “Mr. Speaker” would growl like a bear, sometimes even when he agreed to a proposal. Murphy was an “old school” Democrat politician, a scion of rural Georgia at a time when rural poli tics dominated the state. He didn’t always adapt to change, but he did do more for the booming At lanta area than many recognized at the time. Politically, Murphy could be tough. But few would call him unfair. Even if he disagreed with a propos al, he would generally listen to both sides of the idea. And if he was sometimes petty in his politics — what politician isn’t — he mostly kept those per sonal feuds from overshadowing the larger issues in the state. In hindsight, “Mr. Speaker” may not have been as bad as many thought at the time. Compared to his successor, Republican Rep. Glenn Richardson, Murphy would even be considered something of a saint. Two weeks ago, Richardson gave a talk in nearby Commerce about his proposal to abolish property taxes in the state in favor of higher and broader sales taxes. But Richardson’s ideas were lost be hind his (posterior) in an arrogant display of vanity and his rude comments toward a room full of local business leaders. Perhaps Speaker Richardson believes he’s be ing “tough” just like his predecessor. But he’s not tough; he’s just an insecure bully who doesn’t listen to opposing views and whose political agenda is driven by polls and political aspirations. Mr. Murphy never lowered himself to that level. He wasn’t vain and didn’t give much attention to polls. And he didn’t use his position as speaker as a political springboard to seek higher office. Tough, but fair. That will be Mr. Murphy’s legacy. But unless he changes, it won’t be the kind of legacy left by the vain and arrogant Rep. Richard son. The Braselton News A Publication of The Jackson Herald & Mainstreet Newspapers, Inc. Mike Buffington Editor & Co-Publisher Scott Buffington Co-Publisher & Advertising Manager Angela Gary Managing Editor Kerri Testement News Editor Jeremy Ginn Advertising Web Site: braseltonnews.com Classified Advertising classifieds@mainstreetnews.com PO Box 908, Jefferson, Ga. 30549 General Phone: 706-367-5233 letter Please help look for dog Dear Editor: On Dec. 16, our neighbor and good friends were presented with a tragedy of life-changing proportions! They were in a car accident on Hwy. 332 near the Hwy. 124 intersection. The mother of our good friend, Tonya, was killed in the accident and their pet bulldog, “Penny,” was ejected from the vehicle. Tonya is eight months pregnant with their next little girl and has a three-year-old daughter. Her husband has been looking for Penny for two days to no avail. Please keep a look out for this poor dog, who may be injured, lost and confused. She has no identifying tags and is very shy. She’s a bulldog, kind of a puppy and is light in color. Several of our neighbors have been out looking for her to give this family some solace in this difficult time. We all love this family in our close neighborhood of 60 people. Contact any of the people listed below for any information you may have, or think might be relevant. Tina or Skip Heaslip 678-469-4253 or 706-654- 4661; Liz or John Elegret 678-462-2303; Terri or Eric Johnson 770-823-7566; Sandy or John Baker 706- 654-5959; Tami or Mark Mancini 706-654-5493. Sincerely, Tina Heaslip Hoschton Dear Editor: I felt compelled to write after attending the Panthers versus Eagles basketball games a few weeks ago at East Jackson Comprehensive High School and then again this past Saturday night at Jackson County Comprehensive High School. I do not have children in the school sys tem, but I have friends who have children that attend both schools due to the ridicu lous attendance zones created by the board of education. The first games that I watched were at East Jackson. I must agree that the school is beautiful, as it should be, with the mil lions of dollars that went to fund that school and the tax dollars that the entire (no mat ter which side you live on) county will be paying for many years to come. As I looked around the new gym with ample seating, heated and cooled, and the obnoxious presence of four sheriff’s depu ties, their principal, all of her staff, and the board chairman hovering over the visi tor’s side only, I realized how unwelcome JCCHS parents, faculty and students were that night. It was very oppressive. Ironical ly, the only serious trouble that night was caused by East Jackson students. One was hauled away by police and then there was an angry display by two East Jackson female students that had to be broken up by their faculty. This past Saturday night, I sat in the familiar old gym at JCCHS. For the record, there is no a/c or heat and during the hard rain that we finally got that night, there were leaks all over the gym from the roof. The puddles were first noticed when a JV basketball player slid into the water and the young man could have been injured. The rest of the night, JCCHS staff had to keep placing towels over the leaks on the sidelines and those on the court had to be wiped up every couple of minutes. I also saw the new JCCHS principal walk a majority of the student section out to change shirts as apparently both schools had told students not to wear any shirts that were derogatory or inappropriate to the game. However, East Jackson students, par ents and some of their faculty were allowed to wear shirts that were meant to be nega tive and directed at the head varsity boys’ basketball coach. Why? He stood up for his players and his school, just like the head football coach has done. As a causal observer, the support is long, long overdue. Rumor has it, these fine men and true Panther supporters were scolded for their devotion to JCCHS. (Shame on you, Dr. MacGhee and Mr. Lancaster.) Need I remind you that the Panthers were treated badly the moment Coach Caputo announced he was moving to East Jackson? After his announcement to the football players, he dismissed the Panthers and held a team meeting for his “new Eagles” and chanted Blue Pride that day and many, many more times while recruiting in the hallways until the end of school. Faculty that was moving at the end of the year already wore Eagle pride cloth ing and name badges and posted Eagle pride items on their bulletin boards (school counselor’s office) and in the Panther hall ways. Panthers had no football coach, a man that was new to the role of athletic director and no principal. For the record, JCCHS and its long list of needs has been ignored by the super intendent and the school board. How long are they going to make the students and faculty do without much-needed class rooms, equipment, and improvements on the existing structure? How much more money and classroom time will be lost transporting students to the even older Gordon Street facility when there is ample space to add on to JCCHS? So I asked around between games that night, what was going to be done? Who was going to stand up for the Panthers? It apparently isn’t the principal, and the faculty have been stifled by him, and the lone newly-appointed board member from the West side has a wife who teaches in the school system, so he won’t be rocking the boat. Well, when I heard that the exceptional Friday night “Voice of the Panthers,” Mr. Steve Crawford, is on the board agenda to speak in January on behalf of the West side of the county, a smile came to my face. It should be the voice of a devoted parent, one who has made long Friday nights a more exciting place to be, one who has spent countless hours at various sporting events, working the clock, score- board, concessions, one who has donated money, equipment, and supplies to vari ous Jackson County school needs for I’m told over 14 years. It should be the man that upset parents call at night to voice their concerns when they were without Panther leadership this past spring. It should be the man that provides stu dents with a kind, encouraging word when they need it. It should be the man that has stood up for the Panthers time and time again. It should be the man that Mr. Lancaster called a “Lightening rod” when he told him he didn’t want him announcing the players as he has done for several basketball sea sons Saturday night to not upset the East Jackson crowd. My advice to the West side of the county: YOU ALL NEED A LIGHTEN ING ROD because your superintendent, your school board, your new principal, and your athletic director continue to ignore and not listen to your concerns. Oh and by the way, for all of you read ers, the Panther varsity girls and boys won both at home and away. I usually support both, not really caring who wins since I know kids who attend both schools. But today and for many days to come, I’m praying for many more wins for the Panther faithful, on and off the court. They truly deserve it! Sincerely, Becky Desilvestro Lawrenceville Fixing some holes in the road As chairman of the State Transportation Board, Mike Evans knew he would be having a lot of conversations with the person that he and other board members recently appointed as the new commissioner of the Department of Transporta tion. But he may not have expected the communica tions with DOT Commissioner Gena Abraham to be this extensive. “Gena and I talk at least once a day for 45 minutes,” Evans said. “Over the past couple of weeks, it’s been a daily diet of bad news.” Abraham, a civil engineer who was formerly the director of the Georgia Building Au thority, officially became the DOT commissioner on Dec. 1. In her first weeks on the job, she says she quickly discov ered a government bureau cracy that was in need of a drastic overhaul. When Abraham tried to determine how many construction projects DOT had pending, she received answers that ranged from about 1,000 to more than 9,000. She learned that the depart ment has five separate accounting systems and not all of them can exchange data with each other. There was apparently no one at DOT re sponsible for managing the hundreds of lawsuits involving the agency. “Gena has been up to her eyeballs in alligators since she got there,” a transportation board mem ber confided. “It’s probably going to be 60 to 90 days before she can even come up for air.” Abraham did come up for air last week, holding several meetings at the capitol to brief legislators, state officials, and the media on the administra tive problems confronting the agency that has a $2 billion annual budget for building highways and bridges. “The only surprise to most of us was the depth of some of the problems,” Evans said. “It’s some thing that’s been a long time coming.” Evans and fellow board members like David Doss had been agitating for several years for wholesale changes in the way DOT has been op erated. This often resulted in conflicts with former commissioner Harold Linnenkohl, a lifetime DOT employee. “It’s difficult to make headway when you’ve got a commissioner who’s working against the board,” Doss said. When Linnenkohl decided to retire a couple of months ago, the Transportation Board had the opportunity to appoint a new commissioner who might be more agreeable to making the kinds of changes envisioned by the board’s “revolutionar ies.” “We’d been waiting for someone who could come along and fix these problems,” Evans said. “We’ve got the right leader at the helm.” So far, officials say, there’s been no indica tion that the DOT situation resulted from ethical malfeasance or financial misdeeds. The problem is rooted in a bureaucratic process that has long been in need of an overhaul, they contend. “It’s a 50-year-old system that’s worn out and antiquated,” Evans said. “The folks at DOT are the most dedicated people in state government. It’s not been the people, it’s been the process. It’s organizational breakdown and we’ve got to bring the organizational processes into the 21st century.” There’s no question that an agency as large and tradition-bound as DOT could benefit from an organizational shakeup. If it saves some of our taxpayer dollars, so much the better. But it may be that the departmental problems are being exaggerated a little for the benefit of people who have their own agendas. By emphasizing the need to fix administrative problems at DOT, Abraham is giving political cover to a governor and legislators who don’t want to face up to the fact that a tax increase may be needed to upgrade Georgia’s inadequate transportation infrastructure. For the next couple of years, any requests from outside groups for funds to build new highways or get a commuter rail system underway can be shunted aside with the excuse that DOT has to be fixed before we can even consider such things as a new transportation tax. That would enable Gov. Sonny Perdue to avoid having to make any big transportation decisions before 2010, when he will be stepping down as governor and can hand the problem off to whoev er is elected to succeed him. Likewise, Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, who would like to be the person succeeding Perdue as governor, won’t have to do something messy like preside over a Senate that votes on a major tax increase for highways. If that means you’re the one who’s stuck in yet another traffic jam on I-285 or Georgia 316 in the meantime - well, you’re just going to have to wait a while longer. Tom Crawford is the editor of Capitol Impact’s Georgia Report, an Internet news site at www. gareport.com that covers government and poli tics in Georgia.