Are fees to high?

First of all, what my story today did not say was that most of the permits and building the discount did spur was for decks, additions, pools and other smaller items by people like you and me. I asked for a list of people who applied for permits during the "permit sale" and found that most of them were average jane and joes. There were some company names on there but I didn’t see any major project. Muvico got a discount for its fireline by the plumbing contractor. Green Turtle, which will open at the mall, got a discount for its fire sprinkler. That’s the kind of stuff that’s on the list, and it does not say what the charge is for each project, but I didn’t ask for that.

I was reading the comments on the story today and one person said this:

"My husband, who is an engineer, built a deck (16X16, not enclosed or covered) on our home in the spring. The cost of the building materials was approximately $2,000. The cost of the permit from the county was $422.73. This was before the discounted fees. Maybe this is why the number of permits has decreased."

Is that too much? I have heard residents, big-scale developers, and even supervisors complain that the fees are too high in Spotsylvania County, but when staff does a comparable test with other similar localities, they find that they are in line, and sometimes even below. Maybe I should get a list of all the permits you need to build a deck or an addition from our entire coverage area and compare the fees. This wouldn’t be much of an assistance to the major commercial or homebuilders but it would to the average person in the county.

What happens when you reduce fees? Most of the positions in the planning, code, and building departments are fee supported. If you don’t get the fees, you have to let people go. Most of the county supervisors have made it clear that they do not want to do anymore layoffs.

Post tags: fees

Permalink: http://news.fredericksburg.com/spotsygovt/2009/10/13/are-fees-to-high/

lgross

BINGO!

why would they – as a group – not advocate for more/better accountability of transpo funding to start
with?

part of the problem that we have, in my humble opinion, if we have a lot of different opinions about
transpo and transpo funding – but it’s not really based on the facts – and it really should be.

If everyone better understood the facts, their expectations might well be different – more pragmatics
and more focused on actual things that might be done (or not).

since we’re not going to do anything about transpo funding for the next year or three ( I think we’re
going to have our hands full just trying to deal with the shortfalls)… then perhaps this might be a good
time to get the budget info house in order….
gramps

We know they, or at least some, are “lurking” out there and reading this blog. The data we are talking about and the source of the data are all spelled out in this blog thread.

I ask “them” to review the data and/or put county financial experts to work on the data. Show us where we are wrong or determine the truth of the matter in any way they see fit. Then publicize the information so that the citizens have the facts at their disposal.

I am not afraid or ashamed to be told I am wrong. Lets just determine the facts whether they agree with our analysis or not. I think it is high time that our elected officials step up to the plate here and participate in the debate.
MAVRICKinc

Bill: we know you’re not the CPA. That’s why we had so many in citizen oversight committees, who came to US (ALL), for free, but this BOS elected to eliminated these committees 2 years ago.

Are those past committee members still around? Yes they are, and in abundance.

The only ones I would have a problem with, would be those who crunch numbers for the C500.

VACORRESPONDENT recorded lots of numbers in prior blogs that were very insightful as it relates to County spending practices. Give him a shout. If he has any more time to be another concerned citizen, who has lots of skills we couldn’t possibly imagine, WE would be well off to hear him out, before trying to bring him to yet another County tribunal, aka BOS and running against their 3 minute miles worth of silence.

If you down loaded the current information you are evaluating at this sight, would appreciate being provided an email version of what you’ve have found so far to my site. Dan Telvock has my email address. And, NO, I’m not a CPA.

Since most if not all of the information we are looking for, to be made public, is in or should be in the hands of our elected officials and should necessarily be at their fingertips or know where to get it and who has it, WE should go directly to the BOS for answers unless County Attorney Strohman has served a gag order on the BOS under their Southern Fried version of the Freedom of Information Act.

The BOS silence is almost deafening, and should WE go one more decibal or 8 octaves higher, WE only get arogance back.

If this blog site is dedicated to it’s readers as just another reason to scratch our heads, for want of answers on which we WE can make informed decisions, then we are lost and still wandering around in the tall grass.

Simply said, if IT doesn’t make sense, but necessarily should, then we should stop asking this very small group of citizens, with entirely too much time on their hands, and start spreading out the questions to those of independant resources, without the politics, party lines, ulterior motives and markets that are not afraid to tell US where we really stand and what to make of their input as it rubs up against County government and their working agenda.

With apologies in advance, Dan Telvock, of the Free Lance-Star, doesn’t have the answers. He has a deadline, reporting schedules and an assigned interaction with the same people we would propose to answer our questions: Spotsylvania County government and ALL its component parts.

The FLS is dedicated to balance, even if it means they have to tone down the rhetoric for want of staging polite and politically charged conversations and debate to a whisper. The only exceptions I know of, to their journalistic rules of engagement, is their editorial page, where Paul Akers rules on what goes in and what goes out.

I usually walk around with a dictionary hung around my neck when Mr. Akers shares his insights into the public conscienceness. His history is always impeccable. His magic comes from how he weaves his rug and how not to pick up a stitch unless absolutel necessary. If I didn’t know any better I could swear he is an agent provocateur.

Bill, Larry, we’ve been on this trail for over six months.

Larry, your conclusion that only 99 1/2 percent of Spotsylvania County citizens don’t know or even care about how their tax dollars are spent or will be spent in the future, leaves how many, out of 120,000 citizens, to weigh in on issues of how our tax dollars are being spent and who the real stakeholders are and where they intend to take us?

Is this enough people left over to make an informed decision on where our money goes, what we get back and how much we’re really spending, including the cost of yearly debt service?

I’m of a mind that is willing to listen ad nauseum, but when the conversation has ended, or continues to run around in the same circles, I like to end the conversation on one of two lines of thought. Either “show me” or provide me with the details on which their decisions are made.

It occurs to me, that in all these years, our BOS could not bring themselves to publish or provide their constituents with a copy of the VRE Master Agreement until just before they staged their vote on joining VRE, August 2009.

So, I’ve been labeled anti-VRE when nothing could be further from the truth. I’ve read the VRE Master Agreement. I know for a fact the VRE Master Agreement has nothing to do with gas taxes. There is not one mention of a gas tax in all its 20 pages. The VRE Master Agreement has everything to do with how VRE will manage our yearly budgets.

Look for yourself. Even Dan Telvock couldn’t bring himself to say VRE Master Agreement while in the midst of covering our BOS candidates. He used “contract” when referring to the VRE Master Agreement and left his readers with this vague notion that joining VRE, was best suited for the encumbants, Skinner and Pitts, and their laqnduse agendas.
gramps

No need for email, go to this site http://www.apa.state.va.us/ComparativeReport.cfm and look at or download the report. Remember to also get the NOTES for the report. Without them it may be impossible to interpret the date entries. Good luck and good hunting.
gramps

Oops, “date” should have been “data.”
lgross

http://datapoint.apa.virginia.gov/

but as I’ve said before – citizens have a duty also to
find out – there is a lot of info available and with a little
initiative like Bill did – you can develop a better
understanding for yourself and it’s really not the BOS
job to spoon feed per your desires.

I’s not Dan’s fault either – he reports .. he’s a beat
reporter who simply does not have the time to dig that
deeply into things and still keep up with the other stuff
he has to do.

It would be nice for the FLS to be able to afford
investigative reporters but alas .. they’re headed in the
other direction money-wise. We’re lucky to have Dan
assigned to the county an not the region.

Similarly, virtually every BOS and many city/town
councils in Va are primarily citizen boards consisting of
folks who have day jobs and families and the BOS job
at times, can be all consuming.

Our boards are part-time and they are not
professionals. They are basically citizens with a strong
sense of duty to the community.

they appreciate citizens taking some initiative on some
of these issues.

it’s also fertile ground for citizen groups where you can
get a group together and work together to basically
find, develop and provide information that others can
access and make their own decisions about – as
opposed to taking positions when you don’t even have
the info either.

there is no law that says you cannot put together a
website with all these links that we’re talking about
along with some commentary… and encourage others
to participate and comment.

but I digress… big time…

The citizen committees are a pain in the rump. trying to
keep peope appointed – who will regularly attend and
actually produce a work-product that is not agenda-
driven is problematical.

It’s a good-sounding idea that depends a lot on who is
involved and how much they put into it.

sorry but I never saw a work product from the budget
committee and I don’t believe they even managed – as
a group – to do the research that Bill did… nor end up
providing a higher level of transparency – advocating
more/better transparency by digging the info and
providing it themselves and asking for the county to
provide it when they could not dig it up.

they seemed to spend their time talking about their
personal ideas about what to fund and what to cut –
and that is not their job – as far as I’m concerned.

There job should be to provide a better understanding
o the budget to citizens so that citizens can make up
their own minds.

A good group of people could form their own citizens
budget group and accomplish much of the same things.

The job of citizens groups is not to represent their own
personal views about the revenues an expenditures in
the budget but rather if those expenditures are cost-
effective as compared to standard metrics and other
localities budgets.

For instance, instead of making a an arbitrary
statement about whether we should be spending more
(or less) for schools or deputies – their useful role is to
find comparative peer data and provide that data so
that everyone – the BOS and citizens can be better
informed and let that be the basis for future decision-
making.

This is why the APC report is so useful – and important
to a lot of folks but one would think – especially for
those who say they are specifically interested in budget.

There is a ton of info in that spreadsheet.

You can find out a lot about how Spotsylvania does
business especially compared to other counties an
fertile ground for discussions about potential changes.

Mr. Logan – made excellent use of that spreadsheet to
show that Spotsylvania already does a pretty good job
of school funding compared to their peers.

that was a significant contribution to a dialog that until
then was going round and round about how much
funding was “enough”.

I’m going to stop here.. but we don’t need to blame
others.. there is ample info available for those who
want to plow through it.
gramps

The clock is ticking…while we wait for a response to my appeal.

Larryg…Datapoint is, indeed, a good site and it promises to be better. Right now the only details available are for General Funds. But they, the auditors, are promissing more in the future. I read where the “source” of the data for Datapoint is the Comparative Reports. This may be a “gold” mine of info in the future. Now, if I just don’t die before they complete it, I might learn something.
lgross

ha ha – you’ve throughly entered the world of WONK.
Congratulations.

I regretted the last longish post because it sort of “walked” on your
appeal. Sorry.

My view is slightly different but we are very close.

I think the BOS should WANT to provide the fuel tax data as much as
I think they SHOULD because in comparing BOS – across VA – this
one is no better, no worse than many… in that regard.

Until we get to the point that they say “something” needs to be done
about transportation funding.

I would not give up – Mr. Logan – at the last meeting specifically ask
VDOT for an accounting – and the District VDOT Engineer was in
attendance when he asked.

I also want to point out that the county did a study on transportation
costs when they were considering UTSDs because the offer from the
GA was to give Spotsylvania count-wide impact fees including on by-
right parcels in exchange for Spotsy taking over their roads – and
they turned it down – ostensibly because they had done a study and
determined that it would cost them more than if they let VDOT do it.

I don’t think that study is available on their website but it might be
available on request (it ought to be, it was/is a public document)

Isn’t it peculiar that – unlike schools – there just is not a clear state
level accounting and if there is going to be one – each county has to
do their own.

FINALLY and I’ll shut up.

I know Senator Houck is a member and past officer on the
Commission for Open Government and he is a senior member of the
Transportation Committee in the GA – and I’d wonder what his
response would be if he was requested to submit legislation requiring
the state and VDOT to provide an accounting on a per county basis.
MAVRICKinc

Guys: too many excuses! “its really not the BOS job to spoon feed your (my) desires.” Then you tell me who has the information and not at some way off web site location.

If our elected officials are not accountable for the decisions they make, what difference does it make that “virtually every BOS and many city/town counsils in VA are PRIMARILY citizen boards consisting of FOLKS who have day jobs and families and the BOS job at times, can be all consuming.”

You go on to say “Our boardsw are part-time and they are not professional. They are basically CITIZENS with a strong sense of duty to the community.”

They make decisions, don’t they? Big decisions that WE have no idea how they arrived at many of their decisions. Why? The BOS have an entire government staff that bows to their needs. The BOS dictate policy.

So, who’s accountable? With absolutely no one looking over their shoulder or demanding the information they used to make these decisions, how can WE possibly make an informed decision about anything related to how this County does business in their citizens and constituents best interest? As part of the public domain, who else should I call on to give me answers? You? Bill?

I don’t think so.

Why are YOU exempting our BOS and its constituent PARTS from accountability, responsibilty for their actions, and a transparency long over due? As far as I can tell, YOU are ready to plead the 5th everytime WE ask a question of the same people, our elected officials, under the guise that they are just folks doing there best with what information they have on hand and claiming to represent the best interest of the entire Spotsylvania County population. If you don’t know what an oligarchy looks like, or sounds like, you may want to have your vision and hearing checked out.

Larry/Bill, you are finest examples of an agent provocateur that I’ve ever found on the other side of a line that was drawn in the sand long before WE ever came calling.

When you draw up the rules for “A good group of people could form THEIR OWN CITIZENS BUDGET GROUP, just who did you have in mind?

The C500 could supply you with all the NUMBERS you could possibly imagine, but what website do WE go to, to check their numbers? They did a great job in prividing us with the NUMBERS surrounding the gas tax, but failed to mention to the public there was a VRE Master Agreement that should also be taken into account andconsideration.

Now that you have excluded the BOS from overview or accountability, with no hope of Federal and State ever coming to the plate, who do you propose WE shout out to, for want of basic basic disclosure? Santa Claus?

I, personaly and professionally would prefer not to be considered naive. If you want to insult my person or intelligence, go for it. I’m just a simple person that continues to be annoyed by your smoke screens,detours, convoluted circles and directing US to look for answers on internet web sites that have nothing more to offer than more confusion and obfuscation of what really goes on behind closed doors.

Denial is something we find only on one side of the equation. You have failed to supply US with anything that would serve this community in better understanding of what tomorrow will bring, except another website to explore and well beyond public comprehension.

While YOU maintain the high ground, what’s in it for US? Higher taxes? Well “DUH”, what’s next on YOUR agrenda.

Can we sell Spotsylvania County to the “outside world?” We have already sold the County to the highest bidder; DEVELOPMENT. Read any ORDINANCE changes in Spotsy that underwrites construction and development that live and breathe within the borders of Spotsylvania County. This ain’t rocket science.

Larry, protest all you want but you are not the answer, but just another delay tactic WE started with six months ago.

You were cast as the Bully Pulpit, long before I ever arrived on the scene. You’re still in charge of this website and the FLS will back you to the hilt, whether you are leading us to yet another abyss or brokering another deal for Spotsylvania County and ALL its constituent parts. Who would even know the difference, unless you hit THEM over the head with a 2×4.

Larry/Bill, I’ve come to respect your cunning and passion, but YOU still don’t have answers to the questions and apparently, neither does our BOS.

Go figure, unless you already have the answer but can’t afford an anwser because you can’t stand to be alone.
lgross

and you’re going to be talking to yourself.
lgross

I found these:

” County Maintenance of Roads in Urban
Transportation Service Districts (UTSD)
Urban Transportation Service Districts (UTSD) was
a topic of discussion at the Board work session on
HB3202 on November 27, 2007. The legislation
grants the authority for Spotsylvania County to
establish UTSDs. The County would need to
assume maintenance responsibility for roads
within the service district. If the county creates a
UTSD, it may also establish impact fees related
to an expanded list of public facilities, such as
parks, libraries, school, and public safety. The
impacts fees may only be imposed on parcels
zoned for agriculture that are being subdivided
for by-right residential development. If the
County pursues this, the UTSD(s) must be
established and impact fee adopted by December
31, 2008.
On February 22, 2008, the County received a
letter from David S. Ekern, P.E., VDOT
Commissioner, requesting that the County
contact him by April 30, 2008 if the County is
interested in pursuing a UTSD(s).
On a motion by Mr. Jackson, seconded by Mr.
Pitts and passed unanimously, the Board directed
staff to cease any further action in developing
Urban Transportation Service Districts.”

http://www.spotsylvania.va.us/DownloadFiles/Minu
tes/bos/Min%20031108.pdf

and then this:

http://tinyurl.com/yl4qqdt

which is a powerpoint discussion of the 3202
which addressed UDA, Road Impact Fees and
UTSDs

A company was hired to generate a study:

Tischler Bise
􀂄 Tischler Bise under contract as of June 2007
􀂄 Major Tasks:
– Identify Impact Fee Service Areas
– Conduct a road improvement needs
assessment and develop
improvement plan
– Develop impact fee methodology and run
calculations
– Conduct funding and cash flow analysis
􀂄 Tischler Bise contract includes a 5 month
timeline to complete
tasks upon receipt of a calibrated traffic model
􀂄 County received the traffic model and will be
meeting with
Tischler Bise on September 27, 2007.

http://tinyurl.com/yl4qqdt

I do not see this report online – not that it is not
there but I can’t find it but I assume it does exist
since the county paid for it.

Now the whole 3202 land-use deal is back in play
at the upcoming GA and changes are expected
including, if developers have their way – abolition
of cash proffers.

but the point is that both Stafford and
Spotsylvania did studies on the UTSDs and I
have been told that both of them decided once
they saw the data – and looked at other
city/counties (Henrico, Arlington) who do their own
roads and get what is called the “urban rate”
from VDOT – that counties and cities that do this

.. let me try to word this correctly …

it was determined that the county would pay more
than they get in services from VDOT for the same
work … I think…
MAVRICKinc

Larry: you’re going to have to supply US with your definition of “personalizing issues” and this mindless rhetoric and promise that if I don’t conform and communicate at your level of polite conversation, I’ll be talking to myself.

I just browsed the FLS news, letters to the editor and the voluminous comments made to both and found some of the most onerous comments and personal attacks you could imagine, unless of course, you were playing dodgeball at a 5th grade level of school, in someone elses back yard.

You were found among those who pontificated on their allegiance to one side of an issue, or another, based on market share, TV ratings and the number of channels they could or would access in order to sustain an opinion they have developed over the years, not out of knowing anything about the issue, but the “numbers” and their allegiance to anyone or thing that appears or is perceived to be in first place.

I noticed it only took 10 minutes between your threat and then comming up with massive amounts of what YOU FOUND on the Spotsylvania County website and BOS meeting minutes in 2007.

My BOS meeting minutes go back to May 2005. I’m sorry it took you so long to tell US what was afoot in 2007 and 2008 and how the BOS backtracked on UTSD’s, HB3202, and VDOT’s best efforts to have Spotsy pay more for less.

Try taking this information to current circumstances and you will see that it’s been repackaged under the guise of rezoning, ordinance and Comp Plan changes as well as the UDA’s (Urban Development Areas) and special taxing districts, that we’re right back to where we started: lots more development, with road, infrastructure cost being on the shoulders of the tax payer.

Were you not around when Mary Lee Carter made this point abundantly clear to everyone in earshot of her voice, that the citizens of Spotsylvania would pay for the roads. It was right about the time TRICORD put their Sumitt Crossing project on the drawing board.

At this rate I would probably be better off talking to myself.

As far as I can tell, we have arrived back at the same point you started from. I asked my questions and you can’t bring yourself to answer any of them, from any perspective, other than making threats.

You’re starting to sound more like a bully every day, but that’s only an opinion long held by me when you first started out throwing rocks at anyone and anything that cared to have an opinion, other than your own.

When you find something WE can all understand and appreciate about current issues, without your disclaimers, discourse that winds up to be nothing more than a guess, or “I really don’t know” maybe we can better understand what you mean when you try to sell what a “good citizen committee”

If, as Bill has said, he has a goldmine of information on the internet, but is still WAITING for someone to translate the data, what contributions has Bill made other than to refer us to yet another website he can’t understand?

If you want, I’ll send you a copy of every comment we have made at this sight and see who comes up with answers instead of emotion, detours, smoke and mirrors.

I’m not sure WE care anymore that you don’t have answers, just dialogue that leads no where.

If our BOSs can’t be called on to account for their actions, because they’re “just folks”, maybe we should get a better definition of what an elected official is and what responsibilities they have toward the citizens who put them in office.

As far as I know Larry, you do not represent the BOS, and apparently have little if any leverage in getting answers from the BOS, for public consumption. Based on my read of your position paper, you have an excuse for everthing and everyone, once the questions start to get a little too close to another kind of truth.

Look for yourself. The question is “Are the fees to high?” ANSWER: NO. Is development paying for itself? NO. Is the Planning Commission waiving appropriate proffers so that the builders and developers can take the field with a captured work force for hire and jobs, without the overhead (Mallard Landing)? YES. Who cares? no one really. The only people in this County that show up are the real stakeholders of Spotsylvania County and they are in charge of what this county charges for admission to those FOCUS meetings, that no one seems to know anything about, except for BOS members who have managed to assign THEIR interest to THEIR subordinates.

But, Larry, I’m called on, by you, to regard this government of ours as just “folks”, part timers, with another job to attend to and the responsibilities of having family. If they are so constrained, but emotionally attached to their idea of serving, what do we get back for all this emotion and constraints for their part time efforts to the citizens of Spotsylvania County? If your goal is to give the BOS a pass on how they conduct business for this County, why would any of US want to be lead by the sound of your voice?
gramps

You know Mav you are a real irritating fellow. GO BACK AND READ MY POSTS ON THIS BLOG AND YOU WILL FIND THAT THIS NON CPA HAS POTENTIALLY UNCOVERED SOME INTERESTING INFO. We are now trying to determine its worth. The point is that “ain’t” easy.

The problem with you Mav is that you spend too much time writing and not enough time reading. I presume that is because you like your version of things better than anyone else’s. That’s really too bad because it makes a dialog with you a one way conversation…you do all the talking. The other interesting thing about you is you do have something to say; the problem lies in how you say it.
MAVRICKinc

BILL: I’m really more than just a “real irritating fellow.”

I can recall Supv. Hap Connors calling me an “angry little man” and all I had to do is show up at one of his citizen district meetings with HIS constituents and addressing the VRE agenda, but only from one perspective; gas taxes and how much the County has “projected” they’d get back from VRE. When I asked him about the VRE Master Agreement he deffered any comment on the VRE Master Agreement over to Matt Kelly, member of Fredericksburg’s Town Council.

When I tried to open up a dialogue with Mr. Kelly, with pertinent questions about the VRE Master Agreement, all I got back from Mr. Kelly, was that the Master Agreement remained a work in progress and he could provide no definitive answers to my questions which were directed at the Master Agreement’s contractual language, that had nothing to do with gas taxes, but budgets, the insuring agreements and most of all, the VRE operations framework being applied to ALL participating jurisdictions, including Spotsylvania County, that our BOS coundn’t bring themselves to even post on their website until August 2009.

But, I’m also a real pain in the butt when it comes to getting answers to my questions.

While I’ve read your posted comments from March 2009 to today, I can’t recall a single moment, comment or contribution that would put us ahead of ourselves, without having to circle an issue adnauseam and come up with the same result: ie, …THIS NON CPA HAS POTENTIALLY UNCOVERED SOME INTERESTING INFO.”

Where exactly do any of us put the term “POTENTIALLY” into something worth understanding? That’s the same kind of language used in the VRE Master Agreement: ” We’ll do our best to hold cost down.”

When you say “We are now trying to determine its worth.” Who is “WE”? Is this a committee of two and if not, who’s your CPA? And when can any of US expect a translation back on something you are holding out as only POTENTIALLY INTERESTING INFO?

Bill, the problem is not about conducting one way conversations. The only reason you have, to describe my communications, as a one way conversation…”because I’m doing all the talking”, is because you don’t want to answer the questions being asked of you and I hardly ever ask a question that I don’t already have the answer to, as well as yourself, but prefer not to say. That’s why the problem is not how I say something, it’s how far away you can get from answering, making comment on what you really know that might not fare well with your long time friends and acceptance into their polite society and their rules of engagement.

I don’t spend too much time writing. The only thing I do is read, find out, research, create a paper trial and record everyones take on what I found, make it into a question and see what pops out at the other end. So far, and I have described it in detail on more ocassions than I care to recall, ALL I got back was silence, a BOSs who needed to alter my freedom of speech because I was talking about their long time friends, 3 minutes at a time, in a manner that best addressed my idea of a legislative agenda that called for change in the construction and development communities, who continue to take shortcuts in their business models to THEIR bottom lines and to the detriment of the home buying public and County tax payers.

Too harsh? I don’t think so.

You PRESUME I like my version of things better than anyone elses. In response, I can only ask you what version of anything you or Larry have offered by way of comment that leads any of us to step forward, short of all your disclaimers, “I don’t really know, but that’s my opinion”, “I’m confused, who can help out with some answers”(usually provided by Larryg after he inserts his own disclaimers) or “Take a look at this or that website to see what you think of it.”

If you think I’m about one way conversations, why don’t you try conducting a dialogue with any member of the BOS and see what you get back…ever.

Bill, you can characterize me anyway you wish, but you’re still a company man and will never be anything but just that. After the emotion, and drawing these invisible lines in the sand, and making people with opinions and FACTS to back it up, go away, because our BOS and County government can’t be bothered by serious questions that require serious answers.

Fact of the matter is you and Larryg are just folks, just like me, but you’ve sworn an oath and allegiance
to a small gathering of people who actually run this county. Who are they? That’s a question Bill, that you already know the answer to. What more can I offer, but the truth, anyones version of the truth, that comes with only one caveat: I’ll decide for myself whether we’re being fed bull or just another kind of hay that may taste good, but usually winds up being a mouthful of major indegestion.

The only reason I write is because serious conversations are something that are lost in the next 3 minutes.
gramps

Further dialog is useless….!!
gramps

have you checked your email lately??

bhaas
lgross

yes.. was I supposed to get something? Should I
check my spam filters?

I’m watching whats going on and I sympathize…
and sorry you got draw up in it.

lcg
gramps

Larryg…No problem with spam filters since I had not sent it yet. Will do so right after this message is posted.

bhaas
MAVRICKinc

If I’m not mistaken, you (plural) just confirmed you really don’t have anything more to say on this subject or this issue that you haven’t already said.

Since you’re still looking for answers, I’ll wait around until you have something more to offer our citizens and has more than just POTENTIAL and more guess work and theories. Since our BOS don’t have the answers or viable solutions, I guess we’ll be caused to rely on your interpretations and served up with yet more disclaimers.

Anyone in our viewing audience witness Supv Logan telling our VDOT representative, and our County transportation associate, Rodney White, who is also Chairman of the FAMPO Technical Committee, at the BOS televised Board meeting of 10/13/2009, that he had no idea how much gas tax money was being sent to State coffers and how much transportation money the County was getting bacK. The VDOT representative making his monthly presentation told US, the viewing audience, that VDOT has that information and is readily available to the public. Who could possibly have known?

So, instead of guessing, and using Supv. Logan’s and the BOS’s math skills and equations, let’s call our VDOT representatives for the answers and cut to the chase, or call up Supv. Hap Conners, our BOS Chair as well as Chair of FAMPO and George Washington Regional Commission. Or, is that not allowed within the framework of your research and rules of engagement? Why is it that YOU can’t bring yourselves to engage the people empowered to make decisions at the local levels of our government?

Why are you causing us to run all over tim-buck-too for answers when the answer is sitting right in front of your face?

WE need to know, one elected official at a time, what they know, don’t know and how this PROCESS, if known, really works. I would love to see a show of hands, but like so many other business matters that go on in Spotsylvania County no one appears the least bit interested.

The signature comment I’ve chiseled in stone is when Supv Conners calls for public presentation, asks who is signed up to speak, is told by staff no one is signed up to speak, and closes out any further comment from the public.

The last time the public showed up was when the “noise ordinance” was being debated by three citizens as to the kind of changes should be made to this ordinance and why. The ordinance was tabled, but I can still recall Supv. Marshall saying this is only three people out of 120,000. What difference could they make?

Maybe we should start looking at the BOS reruns more often. Apparently the only thing they don’t like about people showing up at their meetings is for County Attorney Strohman announcing the BOS will have to re-advertise their agenda and that the issues at hand require yet ANOTHER public hearing.

Since the BOS are just folks and part timers, I’m not sure we could or should expect much more than a well scripted presentation everytime they show up to conduct OUR business…now and far into the future.

Your condesension is appreciated by all who care to show up at this site, including myself. You’ve earned your place in Spotsylvania County history as guardians of all their estates, territories, districts and the last words….maybe, but not now.
gramps

Have you found the Tischler report of any use or interest. I am still “wading” around and will post later on some things that may be of interest.
lgross

having a senior moment this morning.. where is this
report ?
gramps

LOL…I emailed a copy to you a couple days ago. It was an “attachment” to the email. If it did not arrive let me know and I shall try again.
lgross

I don’t think I got it. looked at my Spam and did
not see it either…. it’s lgross@pobox.com
gramps

Resent at approx. 10:16 AM.
lgross

will read and get back. thx
lgross

was this doc made available to the general public
and I just missed it?

who highlighted the yellow?
MAVRICKinc

Checking in to see if you have found the document you were going to read and get back with US. How long has it been? Over a week? Any answers or just another “possibilty” of valued information that has turned to stone>

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