August 9, 2010
County Commission district lines to be redrawn?
The last time the county commission district lines were voted on was after the last census in 2001. After the census this year, I wonder if the lines will be redrawn again in 2011?
This may be the time to change some districts and make them more consistent. Really--what do East Lake and Lookout Valley have in common? Now with both the county commissioner and school board representative from Lookout Valley; it's time to redraw the 6th and affect several commission districts with this redesign.
Here is my proposal starting with the 6th:
Let's make the 6th more in one place instead of connecting two vastly different areas by a one-mile wide precinct.
I would suggest dropping the following precincts from the 6th:
missionary ridge, east lake, cedar hill, ridgedale, piney woods, sunnyside, highland park, eastside 1, eastside 2, and moutain creek 4.
And now let's make the 6th more in one area by adding these precincts (all from district 2):
lookout mountain 1 and 2, lookout valley 2 and 3, st elmo 2 and 4
Now that would make a common-sense district 6.
The dominoes are falling now because what to do with the former 6th precincts and what to add to the district 2 precincts?
District 5 would pick up the sunnyside and ridgedale precincts.
District 4 would lose Harrison 3 and 4 (picked up by district 9) and also lose North Chattanooga 1 and 2 (picked up by district 2 which would also pick up mountain creek 4)
District 4 would add Highland Park, Eastside 1 and Eastside 2.
District 8 would lose Concord 1 and 2 and Brainerd Hills and pick up cedar hill, missionary ridge and East Lake!
Sounds like a good plan. Many people from East Lake and Cedar Hill shop in East Ridge anyway--a lot more than Concord 1 and 2 residents do.
Just an idea--who knows: it all may stay the same.
| By theearle | 11:14 AM | Comments (0)
March 29, 2010
WTH Chattanooga
Okay, I know I'm supposed to stay within my little neighborhood of East Lake on this blog, but really Chattanooga, WTH is going on?
Gangs have been in East Lake since the beginning of East Lake--well not quite that far back but close. What has Chattanooga been doing? Ignore and grow. As opposed to the Weed and Seed concept.
The desecration of the park serenity has been happening at Coolidge park for years and now after four gang-initiation butt shootings happen everyone is finally realizing the desecration.
The media are unaware of the significance of the butt shootings! You know--butt-buddies forever.
I guess you have to live in East Lake to know that.
And what is the Mayor doing? He campaigned on neighborhood versus downtown in order to win his first election. Haven't seen a hair of him or his administration in East Lake. Children still walk the streets to school in lack of sidewalks.
And now his Mayorship is wanting merger so bad that he cares not on combating gang-related crime. Wants to pay the chief of police with double-dipping. And we expect our police force to operate under positive morale against apathy and blind-in-the-forest leadership. Did a tree fall Freeman, I don't know boss-too many trees.
Mayor Littlefield thinks he so great that he should be declared the "last mayor" of Chattanooga. If he keeps this type of leadership up, he may well become that.
| By theearle | 12:52 PM | Comments (0)
March 10, 2009
Let's Close Some Schools--My Suggestions
Open letter to Superintendent Scales, Commissioners Mackey and Brooks:
The Hamilton County Department of Education has too many schools.
And the single path diploma doesn't allow students to train for technical careers.
I would suggest the following changes.
City schools is still used as an euphemism for black schools. The vestiges of the old city school system need to be broken down and incorporate county schools in forced zoning. This would bring a sociological paradigm change in the racial overtones in county public education.
Howard High School needs to be closed as it is now.
Signal Mountain, Red Bank, and East Ridge high schools would be rezoned to go south (or west) to pick up the zoned students of the former Howard High School.
The high school grades only of the 21st Century Academy need to be rezoned as a zoned magnet to incorporate 23rd street to 28th street and 4th Avenue to 6th Avenue. This will provide 21st Century high school grades with a student population and provide students from that geographical area exposure to a magnet-type curriculum provided by 21st Century. This is a win-win situation for both the school and the students.
The former Howard High School needs to be re-focused as Howard Middle School and as a county-wide 11th grade and 12th grade Chattanooga State satellite technical school. The students in this new 11th and 12th technical satellite would be placed into a different diploma path than the single diploma path. These students would, however, be exposed to the single path curriculum in 9th and 10th grades in their zoned or magnet high schools.
Other changes include combining McBrien Elementary and East Ridge Elementary schools; combining Harrison Elementary and Hillcrest Elementary into Lakeside Elementary School; and combine Barger Elementary into 21st Century Academy.
The above adopted changes will go a long way in providing long term stability of costs and maintenance, rezoning the vestiges of the "city school" providing needed sociological change, and making Hamilton County schools more marketable to attract more students.
| By theearle | 9:20 PM | Comments (2)
November 26, 2008
East Lake Update
Another police sting and another roundup of prostitutes along Hickory and Watauga streets again. No surprise there. The bottom of the barrel type of prostitutes too. You have to be pretty desperate to want to buy their services.
While the police stings take the prostitutes off the street, at least temporarily, it does nothing to affect the structure of prostitution. The pimps are still forcing their way and until the cycle of pimping and of drug accessibility is interrupted, nothing will stop the spread of prostitution or the spread of gangs.
| By theearle | 3:33 PM | Comments (1)
August 20, 2008
The Icee Man
Glad to see Mike the Icee Man driving around East Lake yesterday. It was hot enough for an icee. Getting an icee from Mike while in front of your house is a pretty neat thing for the young and old. Sadly, I don't think individual owner
| By theearle | 3:53 PM | Comments (0)
August 8, 2008
2008 General Election
As I predicted, Jim Hammond won the sheriff's race. The Republicans had the county-wide advantage of having a competitive primary election in House district 31 between Cobb and Vincent. This brought in more Republican voters in a light election turnout. This combined with a less-than whole hearted campaigning by the Democratic nominee led to a huge Hammond victory.
Thank you Sheriff Allen Branum for your wonderful service and leadership to Hamilton County. You should be recognized for it.
Rhonda Thurman's attempt to hijack the school board failed as she was the only one who got elected as an unopposed candidate. Her comments that people around Howard shouldn't complain because the constituents re-elected Matthews is undemocratic. If she is really an American, she should respect the wishes of the voters and their elected representative. Not throw sour grapes because the election didn't go her way.
Anyway, it isn't like half of Howard's zone voters were even able to vote in the district 4 school board election. East Lake, Cedar Hill, Piney Woods, and the southern half of St. Elmo are in the gerrymandered district 6.
Perhaps school board member districts should be more aligned with their school zones instead of copying county commission districts. But that would be headache and expensive for the incompetent county election commission who would surely mess up the ballot printings several times over anything that complicated.
Nice to see that a financial business person won in district 7 (and increased the number of women onto the school board).
I wonder if East Lake will get some new sidewalks from Littlefield. Sidewalks are needed around Clifton Hills Elementary, especially to the north towards 28th street with all of the commercial traffic and pedestrian traffic currently merging on the streets.
| By theearle | 8:55 AM | Comments (0)