Bye Bye Slow Growth, Hello Sprawl

Not sure how everyone else feels about our new GOP majority run Board of Supervisors, but I for one am appalled at their actions yesterday.

Consider the following:

Members of the board's three-member minority -- one independent supervisor, a Democrat and York -- said they were caught off guard by colleagues who they said kept their plans hidden from public view. York, who was elected countywide, at one point tried to delay the impending votes by calling a lunch recess and walking out of the Leesburg boardroom. He returned half an hour later after the newly elected vice chairman, Bruce E. Tulloch (R-Potomac), continued the meeting without him.

Under new rules adopted by the Republican majority and read into the record over 45 minutes, the county board's agenda will be determined by Tulloch, who will also serve as parliamentarian.


Smells like an autocracy to me with Bruce Tulloch as our new "leader." [xx(]

Here is a link to the full article if you haven't already read it.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A57380-2004Jan5.html

 

I read that article in the Post and am also dissapointed in the radical change of course of Republican majority Board. As a Geographer I can assure you that the backups we see in the morning at the Greenway toll plaza are only going to get worse as more development occurs between Ashburn and Dulles. The values of our homes will rise slower once more new homes are built closer in. I hope their plan for expanding water and sewer also includes building and widening the Eastern Loudoun road network. Currently Waxpool goes from a 1.5 lane dirt road to a 4 lanes in Broadlands to 2 lanes at Shelhorn and then back to 4 lanes past Ashburn Pkwy. Thats crazy and just one of many examples of how a poorly funded/planned road system is going to turn Eastern Loudoun into gridlock. I think the current policy is to require that developers build 4 lane major roads just to the edge of their development. The assumption I guess is that the Board figures that the road will get widened eventually by the next adjacent development. Thats nuts,[xx(] in the meantime we have to deal with roads that go from 4 to 1 to 2 lanes to get from Ashburn to Sterling/Fairfax. If anyone can direct me to the County's Transportation plan I would appreciate it.

 

http://inetdocs.loudoun.gov/bos/docs/boscompplanrevi_/revisedcompplan_2/revisedcountywi_/index.htm

 

I'm for one certainly not a Republican. But the problem is not building more houses. The problem is not providing enough money for transportation. We should have had light rail out to at least Tysons by now. Route 28 and Route 7 should have been improved by now. More houses actually will increase our home value. Look at Fairfax County. You can't find a nice home for under $500,000 anymore. The more houses that are built, the more businesses that will come. We do however, need to improve the transportation. You can keep cutting taxes all you want, like the Republicans like to do, but the funds have to come from somewhere. The increase in the sales tax, that was defeated by all of you that voted, would have done a great deal to solve our problems. Therefore I don't feel sorry for any of you that either did not vote, or voted no on the tax increase.

 

If you really looked at what the increased sales tax would have done then you would know that it was a scam. The money was to be set in an uncontrolled fund that would never have helped the community. I agree that transportation needs to be fixed though. Just getting thru the waxpool/28 intersection sucks. The main problem is getting all of the counties to agree. Getting light rail from loudoun to dc involves several counties and they just don't work together. Oh well. We're not the only county in NVA that has traffic problems...

 

Isn't anyone shocked about the manner in which the meeting was conducted and the procedural rulemaking that took place? That is my true concern here. The meeting was held without public notice - probably not a requirement, but has been tradition to do so - and the Board effectively turned Scott York into a mere figurehead with absolutely no more power than any one district supervisor, and considerably less power than Tulloch. York is our county representative. Tulloch is not, yet he holds all the cards now. While I may not agree with the GOP position on growth here, I certainly expect them to abide by our established principles of government. This, they did not do.

 

Yes, their antics are suspect and show they can't be trusted. I'm against sprawl, but the GOP needs to line their pockets somehow.

On another note -- I was looking at all the road improvement plans and was shocked to see how much these cloverleafs/bridges on rt28 cost. $32M for the Waxpool/Rt28 intersection? Seems a bit excessive for a bridge and a flyaway lane constructed of concrete and steel. It'd be interesting to see a breakdown of that $32M cost.

 

L0stS0ul, Sydney: Nothing that the Republican leadership in this county or any where else in the country surprises me. I don't think that I am all that jaded, but lining their pockets with coporate cash is the name of the game for the GOP. (Need an example? Just look at the Republican governor of Connecticut.) By the time that the in-coming Board is through, Lo. Co. very well could end up looking worse that parts of S.E. D.C.

 

Chris - maybe you should take your gas-guzzling SUV (thought only "Republicans" owned those) and move to D.C. You would be surrounded by your precious Democrats as DC is an extremely predominant Democrat stronghold. Or do you prefer to live in a usually Republican majority community such as ours?

 

T8erman, it sounds like you are defending what happened on the Council. Scott York is still a social and fiscal conservative. Aren't you disappointed when your own party turns on its comrades? You have to say that the Republican leaders in Lo. Co. do have a reputation for being pretty vile and backbiting. (To be far, I admit that the Democratic leaders just seems plain unorganized, so maybe the Republicans have to fight themselves just to look busy!)

About SUVs... There are conservatives aganist SUVs, too! So, I'll keep my American-made monstrosity (go Louisville, KY!) for fun and my gas-sipper for commuting.

Also, if I want to live in a Democratic majority, anywhere in the U.S. is just fine. Remember more Americans voted for Gore than Bush.

 

Not quite true. You would have to go to one of the Democratic stronghold states that gave Gore the majority popular vote (NY/CA/etc.). Bush won the popular vote in 60% of the states...

 

If you look at the country as a WHOLE, Gore got 50,996,116 votes while Bush got only 50,456,169. That is a difference of a 1/2 million. So, as a whole, the country leans more Democrat than Republican. I will admit, though, that the middle of the country (you know the flat open cattle farms in the mid-west) is pretty Republican. The coasts, where most people actually live, seem to have a better grip on reality.

 

Actually, in many states (such as California), they stop counting votes when it becomes impossible for the leading candidate to lose (due to the fact that the electoral votes are awarded on an all-or-nothing basis). Thus, many Bush votes in California (as well as Gore votes) went uncounted. California is the prime example, due to the large population. Thus, we will never know actually won the popular vote based on ALL votes. We only know who won the popular vote based on votes counted.