| | I am hopeful that some of our Peninsula Patriots will focus on Regionalism. Those who have attended the Middle Peninsula Planning District Commission have seen first hand regionalism in action. I believe that there are 22 planning district commissions in Virginia. Here is an example of what is happening in Georgia.
March, 28, 2013, Roswell, GA – Last night, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and PNC Bank hosted a community forum on Regionalism. According to the event marketing, the forum was a direct response to the failure of the transportation sales tax referendum last summer. The companies claim that T-SPLOST was actually a "failure of metro Atlanta's fragmented communities to work together as a region." Transportation Leadership Coalition (TLC) disagrees with this assumption and launches website RepealRegionalism.com in response.
"It isn't a failure of metro Atlanta's 'fragmented communities to work together,'" said Jack Staver, Chairman of the Transportation Leadership Coalition. "The issue is dysfunctional county governments who are not willing to do the hard work to protect their counties and come up with mutually beneficial solutions with their neighboring counties. This is highly concerning," Staver continues, "because regionalism is the fastest growing issue in Georgia that most citizens do not know exists."
Regionalism was first introduced to Georgians in 2008 when the Georgia General Assembly passed HB 1216 and was signed into law by Governor Sonny Purdue. HB 1216 reorganized the Georgia Department of Community Affairs. It established 12 regions and created the governing structure for those who would serve on these regional councils creating regional commissions.
"The biggest concern with this approach is that the regions are 'ruled' by governing councils who were not elected to serve," said Field Searcy, a key member of the TLC team. "We citizens have no recourse with regional councils like we have with an elected county commissioner or city council. If you think about it, appointed officials are not accountable to us, the people. They are accountable to whoever appointed them." Searcy continues, "The United States Constitution 'guarantee[s] to every State in this Union a Republican form of Government.' That means elected officials, not appointed ones, represent us. Our own state Constitution provides for Home Rule. Home Rule protects our individual rights, prevents state government from interfering in city and county operations, and protects the principle of one person, one vote."
RepealRegionalism.com aims to help educate the people of Georgia on the dangers of Regionalism and stop the growth of an unelected and unaccountable form of government.
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DeWitt Edwards
"When law and morality contradict each other, the citizen has the cruel alternative of either losing his moral sense or losing his respect for the law".
Frederic Bastiat | | |
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