Concerned Citizen

My First Township Meeting

It was my first chance to get involved with my community. Living in Iosco Township was a choice that I took a few years back, moving from the Monroe County area. Working nights full time as a plant supervisor I had little to no time to get involved with local issues. Thinking everything was great living my American dream I come to find out there are rats in the sewers. Now don’t get me wrong here, I am for making a profit, especially if you happen to own the land. I am into cutting a few corners to get through red tape, after all that just might be the good old American way.

What I am not willing to compromise is my living conditions or my way of life, but someone else is. They are willing to change not their own lives but mine in the process of making their dollars. The big word here is DEVELOPERS. The big D for no better of a term we will call them from here on out. Now the issue at hand is did they play fair when it came to what transpired to bring about the matter of developing on a 55 acre area located East off Bradley Road and South of Robert’s Road.

Being a private person and really not up on all the technical things that go on to build or develop a project of this magnum, the size of property, restrictions, or much of anything else that it takes to start a big D. What I do know is things like will it affect me and my way of life? Will it give me something that will keep me up at night to worry about? Will I have to take more out of my pocket to put into some builders pocket or what that builder has envisioned for the future? Will it increase my taxes; will it affect the sale or the investment value I have in my own property? And most of all was I considered in the plans while they were making the decision to develop.

I was over to a neighbor buying hay for some horses of mine when the conversation came up about the big D’s plans for the Robert’s property. Just the day or two before, I was in another conversation where this same issue was brought up and thrashed about, so in agreement with my now small group of concerned citizens I decided to join the next meeting just for the pure pleasure of seeing what actually goes on behind close doors.

Not to say the issues were not ones to be addressed at hand. I did however when made aware of what was taking place have questions. Questions, questions and more unanswered questions. I was told that this was a done deal but from what I saw there at the meeting, neighbors were up in arms over it all. No one was any wiser than I was at how it all came about and how it got in the making without much input from us the working public, the community, and the existing homeowners. Now what you do in your backyard I agree is your backyard and I can give a damn, but when you bring it into my backyard and I have to become a participant to your actions then it is no longer an issue for just you. You make it public and it involves me.

So now the question is was this an issue that was pasted together in a back room as I was first made to believe through idle gossip or not. I took the floor and was recognized to ask my questions and try as I may to get some answers. This is what I discovered; there are no done deals until the deal is done. Does that make sense? Perhaps and perhaps not, just the same way most issues are left lingering. Now maybe I entered the order of the issue a little late or after the fact, maybe I am not all up on the issues at hand for that matter. What I do know is that anything of this magnitude is bound to affect any community no matter how big or small it is.

I know for future purposes I will not be a back seat driver I will be at public meetings; I will take notes and read the articles posted in local papers. I will get first hand information rather than second hand input at what is taking place in my community. I will become the interested resident in all issues that will affect my way of life. I suggest if you are interested in what is going on with your community that you do the same. The meeting was a bit of enlightenment for me, whereas in the end I found out that by October, 2002 the township and residents will loose most of their voting power anyway, when the State comes in to take over. From my understanding, and again this is second hand to you, but my understanding is that the state can veto, override or by pass any legal issues that the township makes.

So I suppose my next stop will be state steps to find out what is going to happen in my district, my town, my township, and my community. It’s a step by step process to climb the latter for information. Once supplied with that information you have a better platform to stand on, but not necessarily a strong one. See you at the meetings, with my little notebook in hand.

Thomas Goodall
Concerned Resident