About Pickens County progress. (Jasper, Ga.) 1899-current | View Entire Issue (June 6, 2024)
“Well-behaved women seldom make history.” — Laurel Thatcher Ulrich Opinions & Community Views The Progress Editorial June 6, 2024 Teamwork will make our dream work on parks There are many sayings about teamwork in sports, such as “teamwork makes the dream work,” “there is no I in team,” and “talent wins games, but teamwork wins championships.” Even those who possess great natural skills are thought to fail if “they are not a team player.” The simple concept of working together is instilled by coaches from the youngest recreation teams through the Atlanta Fal cons. When the Braves are rolling, Coach Bri an Snitker will comment on how “the team” is functioning well - pitching, hitting, and defense all taking care of business. Hope fully, we’ll see that later this season but it’s looking a bit rocky right now. Somehow this concept hasn’t translated to the state of recreation in Pickens County. There is no team, just different bodies locat ed in the same community. As the city of Jasper and the county are both (independently) looking to expand, re-design, or at least clean up their park fa cilities, it seems obvious a little cooperation would be best for everyone’s game plan. The county is planning to install pickle- ball coruts and fund a new pool next year. The city has just opened new mountain bike trails and is looking for ideas on what to do at the city park (duck pond), an area often criticized but with a ton of potential - ball- fields, a wooded area, paved trails, the pond. Talking Rock boasts nice trails, a creek, and great hanging out/picnic spots. Nelson has ballfields, playgrounds, and trails. There is also a private mountain biking trail. This doesn’t even consider the numerous gyms/fields/playgrounds located on school campuses, which for reasons hard to fathom are not routinely figured into overall recre ation plans. We would remind all parties that these all were funded through our citizens’ tax dollars. (Editor’s Note: We know the vast majority were funded by sales tax, but it’s managed by our taxpayer-funded bodies, so close enough - it’s from the public cof fers.) You would think the cities and county would jump through hoops to work together simply to stretch park budgets. If the county is funding a pool, then the cities can fund something else. And if you have baseball fields at the city park, there might be room for new soccer fields at Roper Park. As far as we know there is no set-in-stone rule that different governments can’t com bine forces on recreation, maybe even make it a permanent deal as in consolidation. Yet, teamwork never seems to happen. In fact, at a meeting with the county’s recreation board last fall, some of those members were incredulous about the lack of joint discus sion on locating one larger set of pickleball coruts for all to enjoy. Ultimately to people out enjoying a pic nic under a pavilion, kids playing ball or on a swing set, or someone walking around a track after knee surgery, it doesn’t matter one bit if the park has a county logo, a city’s logo, or the school’s at the gate. To get the ball rolling we’d like to ask why the cities and county do not have joint recreation meetings? Even if they aren’t combining, they can still be publicly coop erating. Surely a good sit-down discussion (with the public invited) would help move this ball towards the goal line. To spark some new ideas about renovating what we have and, hopefully, planning and funding some improvements for all residents of this county. In the words of our undisputed Georgia sports authority, our leaders need to “Sur round yourself with people who have the same goals and the same mindset. Together, you can accomplish anything.” Coach Kirby Smart. Agree or disagree? Give us your thoughts with a letter to the editor. 400 words or less, senttoarticles@pickensprogress.com.Westrivetoincludevoicesfromallourcommunity. Random Thoughts Along the Way The Speed of Light By John Feight We sat in silence for a while and then he asked his After painting murals in the St. Albans VA Medical Center in Queens, NY I went outside to wait for a taxi. When I reached the area for taxis I sat down on a park bench. A homeless man ap proached me and asked if he could sit next to me. I said of coruse...so he did. first question. How many points are there to the star under the Statue of Liberty? I had no clue.. .1 guessed 13 and was wrong...so he en lightened me. My mother, the history teacher, would have loved this encounter. His answer was seven. Thanks to Google there are a few interesting facts about our Lady of Freedom: • The Statue of Liberty’s pedestal sits atop the remains of Fort Wood, originally one link in a chain of defenses protecting New York City. The fort was built between 1808 and 1811 in the shape of an eleven-pointed star. • The Statue of Liberty is 151 feet tall; • Frederic-Auguste Bar tholdi almost made the statue in Egypt; • The Statue of Liberty is coated in copper; • The Statue of Liberty was once a lighthouse. Okay, back to my con versation with the homeless man. His next question was “Do you know what is faster than the speed of light?” Of coruse, I again had no clue. His answer, ”A thought.” Four months later I was painting in Los Angles and went to dinner. After dinner I walked out of the restau rant and discovered a man playing a violin. I went over to him to drop some money in his hat. He stopped play ing, thanked me and asked me, “What is faster than the speed of light?” I knew the answer and told him. We both laughed. There must be a homeless network out there that con nects that community. I still wonder what it means. Do you? John Feight is an Ameri can artist and founder of the Foundation for Flospital Art. He lives in Big Canoe. ’riigwss (USPS 431-820) Published by Pickens County Progress, Inc. 94 North Main Street, Jasper, GA 30143 (706) 253-2457 www.pickensprogressonline.com DAN POOL Publisher/Editor Published each Thursday at Jasper, Pickens County, Georgia. Entered at the Post Office at Jasper, Georgia 30143 as Mail Matter of Second Class. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to PICKENS COUNTY PROGRESS, 94 N. Main St., Jasper, GA 30143. One Year Subscription: $45.00 for residents of Pickens County or the cities of Ball Ground, Fairmount, and Ranger; $57.00 for all other Georgia residents; $68.00 out of state residents. Old School By Dwight Henderson Other Voices Foothills sewage decision has risks for county By Dan Loy Pickens County is con sidering discussions with Utilities Inc. per the re cent story in the Progress. The topic is potential sew age service for the Foot hills commercial area, which remains unresolved over several years now. I wrote previously on this topic. Why do I write on this topic again? I have 40 years of past work in the water and sewage treat ment business that includes, plant operations, equipment sales and maintenance. I previously suggested the Foothills commercial area owner retain the services of a qualified engineer to in vestigate the problems and recommend upgrades and or improvements to get ad ditional reasonable lifecycle performance from the septic system they already have in place. These types of sys tems are usually reliable for decades and it’s likely this system hasn’t been proper ly maintained. The solution may be fairly simple and not involve needing to extend the Big Canoe sewage pro vider’s system outside their gates. There are multiple companies that design, man ufacture and service onsite sewage treatment systems like the one at Foothills. There is nothing complicat ed about identifying what the current problems are. It is understandable that the Foothills shopping center needs reliable sewage treat ment. If the county gets in volved in the solution it may bring good results but it will likely also bring substantial high density development. It is not uncommon for devel opers that want to build new projects outside of the tradi tional sewage service area to include the cost of building the required infrastructure and treatment systems. This is how Big Canoe and the Foothills shopping center were originally permitted. Why can’t that approach continue to work now? Why does the county have to become involved in a privately owned utility? This applies to the shopping center, Big Canoe and Util ities Inc. In addition to the question of what is the prob lem at Foothills, it would be appropriate to know the business plan of the pro posal? The new connec tion if approved will not be cost free. And the pumping of sewage to the treatment plant in Big Canoe will have Correction In last week’s election coverage, Josh Tatum was incorrectly listed as the west district commis sioner. He is in fact the east district commissioner. costs too. Who will pay them? Who will own the pump station and maintain it? The actual sewage treat ment will also have an ongo ing cost. Who will pay that? If Utilities Inc., promises to cover all these costs it will be based on getting a large number of new customers connected to the system. The current agreement between Big Canoe and Utilities Inc. was covered in several past articles in the Progress. Some casual re search finds that some prop erty owners in Big Canoe are not happy about the agree ment and have posted details and discussion points as to their objections and reasons for opposing online. Being serviced by a private water and sewer utility has pros and cons. Please recall the original Big Canoe develop er was the first utility owner/ operator and not everyone was happy with them either. Let’s be clear. One rea son the current connection between Foothills and Big Canoe is being proposed is for development of the sur rounding property. Anyone that doesn’t see this is not being realistic. The treat ment plant in Big Canoe can treat significantly more flow per day and use the same staff resources. This was previously noted in the Progress. This creates better economic efficiency for the plant owner, Utilities Inc. This is a privately owned utility seeking to make a profit. Expanding the num ber of connections is the eas iest way to accomplish this. Looking at the qPub- lic.net website for Pick ens property records it’s easy to spot nearby par cels that would be ideal to use an option for sewage to then seek rezoning for intensive development. County Commissioner Josh Tatum ran on a plat form that included keeping Pickens County from be coming another high densi ty extension of all the other towns and cities north of At lanta. Chairman Stancil and Commissioner Tippens have stated viewpoints in line with that same reasoning. The Utilities Inc. busi ness is an investor-owned company originally fund ed by venture capital. That company was Hydro Star and HS Holdings. They owned the majority of Util ities Inc. until they sold their ownership to Corix Infrastructure in 2012. Then Corix just merged with Southwest Water Company. The new company is called Nexus Water Group, head quartered in Sugarland, TX. They operate utility com panies in 20 states and 2 Canadian provinces. They state on their website they service 1.3 million custom ers. Our county government structure will be no match against the resources this large corporation can bring to promote new connections. Our elected county offi cials need to examine this Foothills situation very care fully. We have seen what access to municipal sewers has resulted in for the city of Jasper. 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