Another Post First: Annexation lawsuit filed against city of Murfreesboro on The Murfreesboro Post

By: Oblio on 2/26/07
Vote? What vote? Of the seven elected city officials, only three will be up for reelection in 2008: Washington, Bratcher, and Gilley. Only Gilley will be vulnerable. The other four are safe until 2010: Bragg, Edwards, McFarland, and Young.

That's right - only seven elected officials for the whole city of Murfreesboro! Fact is, with all city officials elected at large, it is the same thing as if there were only one elected official.

Oh how I wish you were right, Spanky. But the fact is that it doesn't matter whether they get it or not. Wake them up? Why bother? They have things so under control they can run this town in their sleep.

I wonder what it takes to de-incorporate a town or city? There is precedent - Smyrna was de-incorporated for awhile in the 19th century. Wouldn't it be fun to de-incorporate Murfreesboro and put the area under the direct administration of Rutherford County! Laugh (or groan) if you like but it WOULD be more democratic and representative that what we have now. Only problem is that Eagleville would probably annex us and we would be right back on square one.

Any other ideas?

By: snook on 2/27/07
All this talk about remembering them on election day... forget it. People have a very short memory, about 18 months worth of memory. It's the same old thing. They get elected and go wild and peopel moan and groan then about 18 months later the same old ones get reelected and for about 6 months they ride rough shod over us. People simply don't remember anything after a few months... they will reelect the same old bunch time after time.

By: soon2b6 on 2/27/07
Annexation has to occur in this area or else it will be an "Island" set in the middle of Murfreesboro. You brilliant people didn't see this coming? Don't blame current elected officals, this area of development was planned out years ago. Your hometown is either growing or drying up..... nothing "stays the same".

By: Stingray on 2/28/07
soon2b6,
As one of the "brilliant people", I saw this coming years ago when several of the Murfreesboro and Rutherford Co. boards were comprised of members with a possible conflict of interest. Island living does have benefits.
I don't believe Murfreesboro ever had a plan. If we did, then there would not be the road design mess we enjoy daily on Old Fort Parkway. Now that was a plan!

By: soon2b6 on 2/28/07
Stingray, as a proud Murfreesboroan, I take offense to your use of "we" on your last post. You don't live in Murfreesboro yet. I sure hope your not going around and telling people you are from Murfreesboro. Any of you annexee's that are currently claiming that you live in Murfreesboro are lying and the rest of us might sue YOU!

By: Stingray on 2/28/07
soon2b6 = I grew up in Murfreesboro but now live in Christiana, "God's Country". The way things are going, it won't be long before we become Metro and are neighbors.

By: soon2b6 on 2/28/07
OK...
DMW37128- What would be your plan for the future? Stop growing and dry up?
Maybe we can put the new county dump in zip code 37128, which I'm assuming you live in.
Stingray- We all live in "God's Country".
I am so proud to call Murfreesboro my home!
Good luck newly elected officials. Please remember taxpayers.....you can't have your cake and eat it too! Go Murfreesboro... about those post offices???

By: DMW37128 on 3/1/07
soon2b6 - surely the planning department and council could come up with a better plan than building starter homes all over the city, and then have someone like council member Doug Young (and planning commission member ) ask when it comes to business, "Well, what does Franklin or Brentwood do?".

I am not against growth if it is PLANNED. I live in an area with homes of 2000 sf, at leaast acre yard. Behind me they have built 14 sf homes, two stories, on top of each other.

Tell me the planning in Evergreen Farms was great. Go over there on a weekend and try driving the streets, say Wellington, and see the cars parked on the streets (not supposed to do it but I have even seen police cars on the curbs) and in the yards. Great planning.

Look at Medical Center Parkway - a four lane road with no paved median nor shoulder, yet in a few years an ambulance is going to have to rush one of your family members to the new hospital. Drivers have no where to go, especailly if the traffic at the Avenues is going to get better.

Look at Vine Street at NW Broad where idiots try to turn left onto Broad. They could go one block east and catch the traffic signal at S. Church - but Planning does not see the traffic problem.

Try turning off Memorial onto N. Maple there at Blue Coast. That should be made no left turn - I see too many accidents by people being kind to let people going south to turn left, and then almost getting hit. If no left turn drivers would learn to go one more traffic signal down onto Lokey.

I am saying Murfreesboro either needs to decide if it wants to stay a small, blue-collar town with small starter homes and factory / service jobs; or become a bigger, white-collar town. The desire of such as Destination Rutherford does not coincide with the housing market.

Plan an area, not a plot > unfortunately City of Murfreesboro plans a plot with alot of restrictions.

By: bigpop on 3/2/07
let's talk about city elections, again. Have you ever wondered why Murfreesboro has elections that do not coincide with traditional election days. Here's an idea, they (city leaders) do not want it any different because they can control most of the votes or voters and either be re-elected or they can sway a smaller number of voters to elect their good ole buddies.

Folks, a traditional voting calender would turn out a larger number of voters, thus, make it harder for the good ole boy system to operate. Another plus for this idea is that it would save tax payer money to hold elections on traditional election days. We need council districts and do away with the at large game and make these politicians answer to somebody.

By: DMW37128 on 3/3/07
bibpop - the election day was set many many years ago so must have been "good old boys" back then.

I have mixed emotions about districts for city council members - on one side I would have a council member fighting for my area; on the other if the other council members get mad at my council member, then they could pull a fast one and not give our distict anything.

I do wish our council members lived in different areas of town, not all together. Chris Bratcher lives in the Blackman area but remember he is part of the development cartel.

By: GrumpaEd on 3/3/07
And speaking of the development cartel, what did the city council do a few nights ago? They approved an amendment allowing a developer to increase his original density by over 150 units consisting of town houses, about half without garages.

Other than developer enrichment, what other cause benefiting the city does this bring?

By: Geana on 3/3/07
DMW, I agree with the majority of your opinions. Evergreens and Eastwoods (off N. Rutherford by MTSU) are subdivisions built by the same developer. Both of these subdivisions have very narrow roads... little sharp curved ones at that. It's impossible for two cars to pass each other with other cars parked on either or both sides of the roads. It's a common occurence, especially in the Eastwoods subdivision with many homes inhabited by 3 or more college students who love to throw keg parties. It's both a nuisance and a danger to all the families especially those with little children. The planning board could have prevented this by insisting on wider roads or restricting onstreet parking and commercial vehicles. Sidewalks would be nice where warranted, also. Some of the houses in the Eastwoods have a county road running behind their small yards, with no barriers to prevent their homes from being struck by trucks or cars should they run off the road. Oh... and the little mountain of big rocks, dirt and other debris the developer left smack in the middle of a road. Higher than and right beside houses. How could the planning board or the city let them leave it like that?

And you're so right, Murfreesboro does need to decide which way it wants to go. Big-city or small-town. Nothing seems to be going up around here except housing and retail businesses. It may have been worth a commute to Nashville at one time, but with rising gas prices and having to overturn vehicles every five years people are looking to work closer to home.

By: Boo on 3/4/07
Stingray-DMW- Even though I do not live in the "city," most of my money goes to Murfreesboro,( Food, clothes, gas, insurance, entertainment) as I'm sure yours does. I thought this gave us a right to have an opinion here. apparently not. But keep the faith guys, if they keep annexing it won't be long til you and I will live right in the middle of this mess and then maybe someone will want to hear our opinions and ideas.

By: etech30 on 3/6/07
Granted, I use to brag about being from Murfreesboro myself. I also remember Murfreesboro being a community, not a giant subdivision with strip malls, thus I was blessed enough to move out. This idea that things will "dry up" if it doesn't grow at an outrageous rate to the point of ruining quality of life is ridiculous. Things can, in fact, get to a certain point and stay that way and still be good for a community. Go out to the mid-west where there are communitites of only 200 people or so, and have been for generations. The history and character of Murfreesboro is slowly fading. And why? So we can ensure developers and those that work for them have jobs? I know M'boro wants the numbers to look good, but good grief, how much more can we take? How many more people can we cram into the county? Enough!

By: spanky on 3/21/07
Good for them ! It looks as if the good Old Boy network, is at work. Or you can call it the Bubba faction. Whatever !

Half of the polititions are probably in the constuction business and the other half in real estate anyway.

It really does not make any difference, most will be indited before they get out of office anyway...