Pickerington Area Taxpayers Alliance

This appeared in the Dayton Daily News the other day.

http://www.daytondailynews.com/localnews/content/localnews/daily/0612growth.html (I think you have to register, but it's free)

''Clearcreek puts moratorium on new subdivisions
Builders' group critical of move

CLEARCREEK TWP., Warren County ?— Fed up with the meteoric growth of this once tiny farming community, township trustees Thursday night passed a one-year moratorium prohibiting the development of new subdivisions...........''

Sounds like the residents of this little community are also tired of the builders coming in and taking over. In typical BIA fashion, they are opposed to this moratorium.

Warren county is located between Dayton and Cincinnati....another growing spot in our state.







By David

Apathy

I would expect the BIA to have its hands full in the coming months. Cleary the thinking that tax dollars from housing developments are viewed as some kind of a positive event within our communities is beginning to sink into the mind set of local leaders and the voters.

As we can see here in Pickerington our schools can't keep up with the constant expenses of funding additional teachers every year just to keep pace with the new builds. Many of these tax dollars from these new builds never reach the school treasury for up to two full years at the same time the rest of the community is educating the children produced by the housing developments.

As you can tell from the posting to the left Pickerington could have expanded Diley road in 2001 to only three lanes. The local costs for the expansion was 1.8 Million in 2001. However by allowing a couple thousand new homes be built along Diley the costs have moved up to over $2 million plus about an additional $4 million of local costs to build the northern terminus near the Drug Mart.

In additional to the new homes of 2001 and 2002 along Diley Road we find hundreds more acres that now can be rezoned to R-4 houses because the Land Use plan was changed with NO PUBLIC input. What a wake up call to those poor folks along Diley that just realized last month there properties will be impacted because of the actions of the previous city council and city manager.

So my question here is who is suffering now? Is it the builders that live in New Albany, Dublin or Bexley? I believe our first casualties are the folks living along Diley today.

Well I guess the first question to these folks along Diley Road is where in the hell were you people the last couple of years?

There have been a large group of people walking the neighborhoods trying to stop this insanity yet I don't believe I have seen one of your names on any of these petitions nor did you volunteer to help with either money or time to help these folks that were fighting for you. The majority of the current Pickerington City Council members were there fighting for you while your life went on without a second thought.

Now you are attacking them because they dared to tell you they have to widen the road. When will you all wake up to what is facing not only you but the entire community? The BIA dosen't care they only want to make money. Your enemy is not the current Pickerington City Council it is your own apathy.




By Sleepy

amen

Thank you for your excellent comments.

By petition walker

Get things straight

I have heard this said by one of the Councilmen to the Diley Rd. Residents ?– What do you think we?’re going to say to the residents of the over 2,000 houses that will be built further down Diley Road when they ask why we didn?’t widen Diley when we had the opportunity and funding?

That is a good question. An even better question is who is responsible for the 2,000 houses that will be built? The answer is right in front of your faces each time you come to a council meeting or committee meeting. Wright, Sabatino and Parker. Each of these had a direct hand in the cause of what you feel is ruining your life.

Let?’s look back a couple of years, shall we? Diley Rd. was a quaint rural farm road. Then the city found out that SR 33 was going to be made a limited access highway. Then they found out that Diley Rd. would be an entrance/exit to SR 33. So council and the former city manager decided there were bucks to be made off this deal. They said ?“Let?’s annex everything we can get our hands on.?” So the city did a rather hostile annexation down Diley. Hostile, that is, except for the Diley farm which an agreement was struck so all could profit. So they meandered down one side, jumped over to the other side, and on and on.

Then council had the bright idea ?“Hey, we stand to make a whole lot more money if we take the last potentially viable commercial and light industrial land in the city and rezone it to high density residential.?” So behind closed doors and by the usual emergency legislation they did so. By council in this, I mean Wright and Parker.

Now for our other mouthy friend ?– the builders rushed to Planning and Zoning with proposals to completely build out Diley Road. Who was there to act a liaison or conduit to council? Sabatino! He was on Planning and Zoning and instrumental in passing through the plat approvals to over 2,000 houses down Diley.

So my dear Diley Road residents, it?’s nice to see you have finally taken your heads out of the sand and realized there was a city being built around you. However channel your emotion in the right direction. The Mayor is not to blame. There are three sitting councilmen to blame. You feel you have to be angry with someone. Be angry with them. Next time you invite one of them into your home to be your liaison or conduit to council remember what they said just a couple of years ago. Find out how they voted just a couple of years ago.

continued...

By Ghost of Xmas past