Citizens discuss future of Floyd
Industry, traffic and an arts center are big topics during a meeting on the comprehensive plan.
10/11/05
By Alan Riquelmy, Rome News-Tribune Staff Writer
Most everyone has a worry when it comes to the future. Kay Whatley’s happens to be about industry on Ga. 53.
“We want it livable,” Whatley said at a public meeting Monday night on a comprehensive plan for the next 20 years. “They have spot zoning. They’ve taken our agriculture and made spot zoning.”
Another Ga. 53 area resident, Janice Holley Houck, nodded her head. “Fifty-three is all heavy industry and no planning.”
Whatley and Houck were two of some 50 people who spent their Monday evening looking over maps of Rome and Floyd County. The members of the crowd, broken into smaller groups for discussion, talked about their problems, dreams and the current realities of a county everyone calls home.
The exercise, which will be repeated today from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Hearn Academy building in Cave Spring, is an essential component of a comprehensive plan currently in the works. The state-mandated plan will serve as a blueprint for development. While the Unified Land Development Code is a set of rules for development, the comprehensive plan helps shape what those rules should become for years.
That is, if it’s done correctly.
“People will say, ‘We want high-paying, clean jobs,’” said Michael Lauer, principal of Planning Works. “Who doesn’t?”
“Comprehensive planning is a process,” Lauer continued. “It’s a document you need to open regularly, or else it’s going to be a dust collector.”
In order to provide public input to the plan’s creation, people discussed questionnaire points in small groups. Frank Murphy of Rome pointed to traffic congestion, unplanned growth and spot variances as some problems.
“We have a very high high school drop-out rate,” said Frank Beacham.
Each group wrote down discussion points. Moving on to the strengths, Murphy pointed to the county’s rivers and colleges. Allen Bell, executive director of the Rome Area Council for the Arts, added its medical facilities and cultural environment.
Debra Cook, the new director of the Rome Symphony Orchestra, agreed. “I think the arts play a major part of what needs to happen in the next 20 years,” Cook said. “I want to see more in the way of arts, in the collaboration with RACA, Rome Little Theater and the orchestra.”
Both Cook and Dan Bishop, Darlington School’s fine arts department chair and chorale director, want a performing arts center in town. “That’s something we are badly in need of,” Bishop said.
Planners now will take Bishop’s desire for a new arts center, Murphy’s traffic congestion and Whatley’s industry concerns, along with everyone else’s completed questionnaires, and use them in developing a community assessment.
The assessment will include the public input as well as information such as current and future population and the number of buses in the community and their routes.
Rome-Floyd County Planning Department Director Sue Hiller will work on the assessment during the next month. The comprehensive plan process could take as long as 18 months, though two more sets of public meetings are planned.
“We don’t know your problems,” Lauer said. “That’s why your participation is essential.”
IF YOU GO
What: Comprehensive plan workshop/ice cream social
When: Today, 7 to 9 p.m.
Where: Hearn Academy building, Cave Spring
10/11/05
By Alan Riquelmy, Rome News-Tribune Staff Writer
Most everyone has a worry when it comes to the future. Kay Whatley’s happens to be about industry on Ga. 53.
“We want it livable,” Whatley said at a public meeting Monday night on a comprehensive plan for the next 20 years. “They have spot zoning. They’ve taken our agriculture and made spot zoning.”
Another Ga. 53 area resident, Janice Holley Houck, nodded her head. “Fifty-three is all heavy industry and no planning.”
Whatley and Houck were two of some 50 people who spent their Monday evening looking over maps of Rome and Floyd County. The members of the crowd, broken into smaller groups for discussion, talked about their problems, dreams and the current realities of a county everyone calls home.
The exercise, which will be repeated today from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Hearn Academy building in Cave Spring, is an essential component of a comprehensive plan currently in the works. The state-mandated plan will serve as a blueprint for development. While the Unified Land Development Code is a set of rules for development, the comprehensive plan helps shape what those rules should become for years.
That is, if it’s done correctly.
“People will say, ‘We want high-paying, clean jobs,’” said Michael Lauer, principal of Planning Works. “Who doesn’t?”
“Comprehensive planning is a process,” Lauer continued. “It’s a document you need to open regularly, or else it’s going to be a dust collector.”
In order to provide public input to the plan’s creation, people discussed questionnaire points in small groups. Frank Murphy of Rome pointed to traffic congestion, unplanned growth and spot variances as some problems.
“We have a very high high school drop-out rate,” said Frank Beacham.
Each group wrote down discussion points. Moving on to the strengths, Murphy pointed to the county’s rivers and colleges. Allen Bell, executive director of the Rome Area Council for the Arts, added its medical facilities and cultural environment.
Debra Cook, the new director of the Rome Symphony Orchestra, agreed. “I think the arts play a major part of what needs to happen in the next 20 years,” Cook said. “I want to see more in the way of arts, in the collaboration with RACA, Rome Little Theater and the orchestra.”
Both Cook and Dan Bishop, Darlington School’s fine arts department chair and chorale director, want a performing arts center in town. “That’s something we are badly in need of,” Bishop said.
Planners now will take Bishop’s desire for a new arts center, Murphy’s traffic congestion and Whatley’s industry concerns, along with everyone else’s completed questionnaires, and use them in developing a community assessment.
The assessment will include the public input as well as information such as current and future population and the number of buses in the community and their routes.
Rome-Floyd County Planning Department Director Sue Hiller will work on the assessment during the next month. The comprehensive plan process could take as long as 18 months, though two more sets of public meetings are planned.
“We don’t know your problems,” Lauer said. “That’s why your participation is essential.”
IF YOU GO
What: Comprehensive plan workshop/ice cream social
When: Today, 7 to 9 p.m.
Where: Hearn Academy building, Cave Spring
posted by Webmaster at 10/11/2005 07:20:00 AM
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