The Citizen's Voice

A citizen's voice is a powerful thing in Polk County.

We can remember, in the early 1990s, when the county board still met in a small meeting room. Citizens attending were almost seated as equals with the elected officials. Speaking at will, any average Joe could, and often did, change the entire course of a debate.

Each elected official determines how he will make up his mind. But we wonder at the weight given to arguments whose only merit may be that they were made in person.

A few, truly just a handful, came out to a county hearing last week and dissauded the county board from pursuing Family Farm zoning for Cooper's Gap and White Oak townships. Never mind that written surveys time and again have shown a majority in favor of protecting the county.

Chairman Harry Denton at the hearing last week said many of those he meets on the street favor protections, but won't speak up for fear of rude treatment from angry neighbors. So, it isn't really free speech for all that takes place in the county boardroom. The commissioners know that.

The commissioners also know that speakers are sometimes misinformed, confused, misleading. The commissioners know the issues, having studied and heard from state and local experts in land use and North Carolina law.

The commissioners know that Polk County's ridgelines are unprotected. They know what is happening in neighboring counties, like Madison, where 600 homes are under construction in the high ridges around Wolf Laurel. They know the mountain views can be quickly destroyed, along with the mountain streams. They know sensible laws can be put in place to require development practices suitable to degrees of slope. They know what they do today may affect the county their children's children inherit.

But, if a few speakers are willing to wag their fingers and look them in the eye in a meeting, they forget everything else. They know nothing, do nothing. ~ JB