The Nati

I'm going to Tear It On Down... Jake Speed sings that. And oh how true it is. Here we have a situation, where there is a CVS already less than a mile away, and a locally-owned/operated drugstore Schaeper's Pharmacy only two blocks away. But somehow Walgreen's feels the need to come into a community that doesn't want it, in a location that doesn't fit. Northside is a very active community, with people who deeply care about their town. I saw this first hand when Give Back Cincinnati worked with them for Paint the Town 2004. The involvement we received from the community leaders was amazing, there is no way we could have been successful in painting 18 low-income owner-occupied homes without their help.

It's sad to see communities that work so hard to clean up their neighborhood get turned away. Why is it that zoning and urban planning decisions can't be made in a more distributed manner? I see the need for oversite, but I don't think the current beaucratic process works.

I was at a community meeting in Carthage last night (to present Paint the Town 2006 to the community), and the frustration with the Building and Zoning commission was clear. Nearly everyone there had specific complaints about a salvage business who had moved into a residential area. How does that happen? If it were left up to the communities that fight so hard for the places they live, this approval would never have come. The reason it happened is that some beauracrat sitting in his office looking at a map took out a red stamp and pounded 'approve' on the form. He doesn't really care, he just looks at what the code is, not what makes sense... how did we get in a position in America that common sense no longer has a place in government. It's all a bunch of pencil pushers doing their 'job', it's sad really. I must have heard 4 seperate families in Carthage say "That's it, I'm moving out of this city." Now I doubt that all of them will, but still, isn't this part of the problem? You try so hard to turn your own community around, and the only answer you can get from the city, is "tough luck I'm following orders"? I guarentee that Mason isn't going to let a salvage business open up next door to a family with 2 young children whose family has owned the home for over 100 years.