Andrea Batista Schlesinger
Mayor Shirley Franklin: “Invest or die”
"Infrastructure isn't sexy."
So says Mayor Shirley Franklin of Atlanta. In her far-ranging MayorTV interview, she was the first to admit that aqueducts, sewage facilities and desalination plants don't exactly grab headlines.
That is, until the worst drought in 100 years hit the Southeast.
With reports that Atlanta has only three months of water left, Mayor Franklin is dealing with an infrastructure problem of biblical proportions. Naturally, "It all comes back to water, water, water -- everywhere," says Mayor Franklin. "Water is my top 10 priorities. Or top 20."
Washington, meanwhile, has compounded the drought by drastically cutting their investment in water infrastructure. "In the 1970s, the federal government gave cities 75 cents of every dollar they needed to build water and sewer systems," she explained. "Today, we get pennies on the dollar." The result? Leaking pipes, failing equipment, wasteful systems -- at a time when waste means disaster.
"There was a major campaign for the last presidential election called Vote or Die," the Mayor told us. "I would modify that to say, Invest or Die. Invest, or Atlanta's economy -- and the national economy -- is going to shrivel up and die."
Posted at 9:10 PM, Dec 13, 2007 in Mayor Shirley Franklin | MayorTV | Permalink | Comments (6)
Comments
I would like to suggest that Atlanta increase property taxes on all parking lots, this would help our town in many ways. First it would increase the depleting tax base of Atlanta. Next it will decrease the number of private automobiles coming into downtown each day therefore decreasing SMOG level in town and also decreasing amount of petroleum used. This would also decrease the ever growing problem of traffic, and not enough highways.
I am one that is against increase in taxes but I also believe that public transportation is the only PERMANENT answer to the ever increasing problem.
Please take this under consideration.
Thank you for your time;
John
Posted by: John Hobbs | December 29, 2007 02:47 PM
That's an interesting proposal John. I can definitely see its merits (though I have to admit that I know little about Atlanta). Just about anything that encourages the expansion of public transportation is good if you ask me.
Posted by: Elana DMIBlog | December 31, 2007 11:19 AM
Mayor Franklin, spend less time critizing President Clinton and more time running a very badly run City of Atlanta! Get back to your focus and the reason you are in office....to clean this "no personality" city up....get the crime rate down and the city operational.
Posted by: Tom Gouzoules | January 22, 2008 05:51 PM
Tom, the purpose of the MayorTV interviews was to get Mayors thoughts on what the Federal Government should be doing to support cities. That's the very purpose of this interview, so of course the Mayor is going to be identifying things that should be done of the federal level-- its the question she was asked.
Posted by: Elana DMIBlog | January 23, 2008 11:21 AM
I only now saw John's comment, and I want to applaud the idea of encouraging more public transportation.
Another way of reducing car dependency is to repeal zoning regulations that mandate free parking spaces around commercial buildings. If this is combined with something like a sales tax on parking, it will produce revenue as businesses charge for parking. It can also encourage expansions of those buildings, or new construction on parking lots, which will produce additional revenue from existing property taxes.
Posted by: Alon Levy | January 23, 2008 02:27 PM
While driving to Atlanta for a Braves game last Friday night, my husband and I had a difficult time finding our way around because, one street sign was covered by a tree and another was bent in the wrong direction (I believe it was Central and Memorial) I don't know if someone deliberately bent the signs or what. Also, leaving the field we had a difficult time finding signs for 75N. We saw many signs going in the southbound direction but spent a lot of time driving around to locate northbound signs.
Atlanta being a major city should have signs easier to find for people coming into the city for an event.
Posted by: Susan Tovay | June 8, 2008 11:17 AM