Pickerington Area Taxpayers Alliance

The more I read about this development agreement the more I believe that the trustees have gotten greedy and this may very well back fire on them. For years the trustees conducted a smear campaign toward the City officials. They have made some very negative comments toward the City Council and the Mayor. It seems now using past tactics they felt they were into really giving the City of Pickerington the shaft along with 42% of their constituency.

I fully expect a full court press by the trustees really stepping up the smear campaign against the dissenters of this agreement. OH!! We had all of these wonderful commercial projects ready to go but you said no so we are going to do it ourselves. OH!! Pickerington won?’t deal with us so will deal with Canal and continue to put the screws to the school district.

I have read a couple of places where there could have been an unanimous vote from the Pickerington City Council on this agreement but Heidi Riggs and Jeff Fix said no. Is it wise to only get 4 votes on board? I have also read where there may be a referendum on this agreement. Can they really get that many signatures in three weeks? I guess we will see. What happens if they get the required number of signatures? Doesn?’t that hold up the measure until next November?

It appears that the Violet Township trustees want to really give the shaft to the Pickerington City residents and give the residents of Canal Winchester a great deal. Why the difference?

Maybe it is time to end this taxation without representation. If you look around and see who actually controls your tax dollars then you would realize that you have FIVE SCHOOL BOARD members that ALL live in Violet Township and you have THREE VIOLET TOWNSHIP TRUSTEES who all live in the unincorporated areas of the township. Look at their work. They have built a Taj Mahal for the township High school and they have built a Taj Mahal for the township fire station. Since the City of Pickerington voters are a minority in both government entities maybe it is time to separate ourselves from this madness.

Clearly this brings up the City Township issue again and I think its time has come. We are at the very highest percentage of Township assets in the fire department and once the abatements come off of the Canal Pointe the city's portion will surly decrease. We in the city can get the biggest bang for our buck now if we start and complete this process of forming our own paper township and run our own fire department. We can see that our council majority is more concerned about the township residents and for this to happen it will require an initiative drive by the voters.

Once we have formed our paper township I think we need to work on the Pickerington City School district. This would give the city voters true representation on the school board and the city tax payers would divest themselves from all the township schools and its debt.

The township voters would be left to deal with their overspending elected officials.

Chin Up

Why so gloomy? The decisions for elections this fall have been made crystal clear to me. I will not be voting for the puppets of the trustees.

Was it wise to get only 4 votes? No. It's taken Fix less than 9 months to divide council. And the mayor promoting his negotiated agreement is a huge mistake. After all the work and money spent for the last several years by the senior council memebers and the mayor to put the city in excellent position for managing residential developement, there is no excuse for throwing it all away. The mayor has shot himself in the foot.

Can they really get that many signatures in three weeks? Yes. The money's been raised and the people are in place. Should the petition's be tossed for any reason, the mayor will be asked to put it on the ballot through council. If he says no, he'll have hypocritically and hypothetically shot the other foot.

Doesn't that hold up the measure until November?
Yes. That will give time to put a campaign together so the residents can control their borders. And it will be interesting to see if Fix uses city money to fight the residents.

Why the difference?(Between Pick. and Canal) To stop the growth of Pickerington. Lancaster bigwigs are afraid the city will become larger than them. Once Pickerington is halted then they will turn their efforts on Canal. Pickerington is the weakest of the heard. That's why we are being separated from the pack.

Paper township? You've obviously not read the agreement. Council majority just gave away that right. It's in the agreement the city can't do that.

Nothing to fear! Referendum is near!




By More Optimistic

Fix is breaking the Community

I think what Mr. Fix is missing here is does he have public support for his plan with the township. Will he along with his poorly thought out plan take him and the trustee down? From a politically standpoint it is never good to promote and push a public policy that does not have the voters support. Citing testimonial evidence that everyone ran on cooperation with the township and if that is only talk from them then any policy created from that is bound to fail. I think this is a good example of a handful of local leaders getting together and promoting a policy and not having the public support needed to carry out that policy.

I have read the papers and I have looked at the minutes of the various meeting concerning this agreement. There have seen no one speaking in favor of the agreement. All have been speaking out against the agreement. Leaders can quickly get out on very thin ice when they ignore those that voted for them.

Judging by Mr. Fix?’s comments that he would like to meet with anyone circulating one of these petitions seems to show that if he has enough time he can wear you down to support this agreement no many how flawed the document may be. What Mr. Fix fails to understand is that the elected leaders of this community all must report to the voters every four years or sooner if they really screw up. Apparently his illusions of grandeur seem to over ride any judgment he may have to basically say to the voters that we are not worthy to talk about or oppose this agreement because we haven?’t reached that high level of experience as Mr. Fix.

I will tell Mr. Fix as a voter I voted for two of the three City Councilmen that he now claims are unqualified to be in the same room with him and that only he can make the correct decisions for this community. I will tell you Mr. Fix I did make a huge mistake last year when I voted for you instead of Mike Sabatino. Believe me I will not make that mistake again.