RFP Staff
♦Dr. Ada M. Fisher upstaged a packed house sent out by the schools and the Main Street merchants. About 80 people spoke mostly from scripted talking points at a well-orchestrated public meeting that rambled on for approximately 2 hours. Over and over they repeated the words vibrant, visionary, and progressive and put forth empty ideas like ”school employees would feel better about themselves in this special building”.
Dr. Fisher, an outspoken critic of the school system and city hall, spoke from the heart about a subject she knows well: The proposed downtown central office. Dr. Fisher, a retired physician and a former school board member, drew attention with her sage commentary about the city and its latest project that simply costs too much for the taxpayers.
Many city hall observers were somewhat puzzled at the lengths city council and the school system were willing to go to play out this latest mystifying bid for a downtown Central Office at 329 S. Main. They realize if the city and the school system bothered to check the state statutes on their proposed 20 year lease and talk with the Local Government Commission, they would understand that final approval for the Central Office loan rests in the hands of the county commissioners. At least three commissioners will reject the school system’s latest overtures. Chairman Jim Sides, Vice-Chairman Craig Pierce, and Mike Caskey are disinterested in okaying a 8.37 million dollar loan for a building certain to run up far more costs.
Salisbury’s city council made a show of voting unanimously for the new office building. Some city hall observers believe city hall is making a show of supporting a project alleged to save the nose diving downtown merchants and get the school administration and school board members their names engraved on the building’s cornerstone plaque . At least three county commissioners will vote this 20 year lease down.
