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I have lived in Oakwood since 1963 and know that the Oakwood Police Dept. is among the best. They respond to petty crimes with the same response as if it were a major crime – be it stray dogs or a bank robbery. If petty crimes are not addressed, they become an invitation to serious crimes. Using this approach, people can now ride the subways in New York safely as we can safely take a walk in Oakwood after dark. (Ref. Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point, page 144.)
I am concerned that the potential conversion to a random dispatcher system will restrict the ability of our police to perform and protect the safety we enjoy in this community:
• Many police calls are made by citizens in serious trouble and the dispatcher needs to assist the caller in identifying their location. A random dispatcher may know all about the streets and landmarks in Beavercreek but have no idea about Oakwood’s.
• Many times during robberies, assaults and suspicious actions in progress, multiple calls to the dispatcher are necessary to update and guide the police – escape direction, car color, has a knife or gun, etc… Timeliness and invaluable personal touch is lost explaining the situation to a random dispatcher.
• Oakwood and other communities are responsible for the competence of their employees and can make immediate changes as appropriate. This responsibility would be forfeited with a centralized system.
• Dayton is a central location and I presume this would be the location for a centralized dispatch system. Is it adequately protected from flooding with a lower levy due to Riverscape and the five dams filled with silt? Will the centralized facility have an alternate power supply if needed? In a dire emergency, could essential employees be flown in by helicopter?
Thank you Oakwood for what you have created. Above all, keep it a safe place to live. If you need money, do what you have done in the past. Put it in a levy on the ballot.
Bob Alig
Oakwood
I read with deep regret that plan to implement the proposed Sugar Camp Development Master Plan is recommended for passage in March, 2007. What a loss for Oakwood and the surrounding area.
Yes, there are other very real problems that need to be addressed by the citizens, so I cannot understand why the very real problems this development would create are being brushed aside. To remind everyone of the very importance of this area, I would like to quote Nancy Bain’s letter from Dec. 29, 2006:
”But the natural area that is being developed is important in many other ways. Of course, the trees provide soundproofing and oxygen. But they play another
important role. Oakwood is a headwater source for the Great Miami River; thus, these trees help to regulate, store and clean storm water and stem erosion. But when the trees are razed, development typically replaces that function with sewers and retention/detention ponds (although there are far more innovative ways to deal with these problems). So all of the fertilizers, oils, pesticides and garbage will then gush into the Great Miami causing more erosion for citizens downstream and polluted water for taxpayers to have to pay for clean up. Storm water management is one of the most complex and expensive services that taxpayers pay for but developers,
politicians, nor the local media ever talk about”.
This appears to be the tip of the iceberg. Someone will be making a big profit at a great expense to the community in more ways than one. This is YOUR home, not the developer’s home. YOU and YOUR children will have to deal with the inevitable repercussions. Apparently, the public forums have been little more than placations and platitudes.
You can call my letter “Pipedreams and Moonbeams” again if you want. Sounds more like a nightmare to me. What a sad loss for Oakwood and another problem for your fellow citizen’s down the river, who had no say in the matter. Again, Oakwood has a Divine opportunity to be a forward thinking community that is progressive and proactive in implementing alternatives available that honor both the land and man’s needs. Do not let this opportunity pass by.
Here are some of the many websites that demonstrate the possibilities for building structures, sustainable energy and community awareness/unity.
www.cobprojects.info
www.thelaststraw.org
www.greenhomesforsale.com
www.grassrootsdayton.org
Respectfully,
Lynda Hollingsworth
www.oneheartcreations.com
By Tom Cecil
Did you notice lately that an avalanche of politicians have thrown their hat (or bonnet) into the ring for the 2008 presidential race? In Washington D.C. (Department of Comedy) you could throw a stone in any direction and hit one of them.
Thus, I was not surprised when an individual asked if I were going to run. (O.K., so it was one of my seven kids.) My answer was a definite maybe.
I think my first step would be to form an exploratory committee to test the waters as to a Cecil bid. After telling me how many million dollars I would need to run, the committee no doubt would tell me that their survey indicated that I couldn’t even be elected for dog catcher in Oakwood. But I wanted to keep the issue alive since “dark horses” have often made it to the Oval Office. Look at Ohio’s Warren G Harding.
Faced with the same decision, Civil War General William T. Sherman said, “I do not seek the office. If nominated, I won’t run and if elected, I won’t serve.” For my own part, I’m just not ready to make a “Shermanesque” statement with respect to 2008. How°©ever, I admit that I requested papers from the Federal Election Commission in Washington, D.C. and that on my desk are forms FEC 1 (Statement of Organization) and FEC 2 (Statement of Can°©didacy), together with several instruction booklets explaining how I, my committee and treasurer can stay out of jail. But I just don’t know what to say about running. Essentially I’m waiting to hear from my people.
Actually, my candidacy shrinks by comparison to other occupants of the Oval Office. I don’t have a full shock of hair like Kennedy or pet beagles named “Him” and “Her” like LBJ. I can’t speak “Nixonese” (“I want to make’ this perfectly clear’) or stumble off airplanes like Jerry Ford. Further, I don’t have a Pepsodent smile or peanut farm like Jimmy Carter. I was not blessed with Reagan’s charisma and never have I been clipped for a $200 haircut on Air Force One per Clinton.
In the old days, the question was posed, “Is he (the candidate) presidential timber?” I’m not sure how that applies to me. One of my people was talking about a “Draft Cecil” movement. I told him I thought I had done enough in 1945 as Mailman 3rd Class on the U.S.S. Kenneth Whiting and didn’t want to go into the service again. More confusing was a suggestion that I be a “dark horse.” I just don’t know what to do. I hesitate humbly, since I know the office must seek the man. But I will never shirk, if duty calls.
It is true that I have fleshed out a cabinet in the event I am inaugurated January 20, 2009. I can’t release these names now. However, I can tell you that my cabinet will be diverse, reflecting the face of my Christmas card list—-if not the face of the nation. I want to name people I can work with. None of these people have an embarrassing “nanny gate “ problem lurking in their closets. This much I can tell you. One-half of my cabinet will wear bow ties.
In the 1988 primaries, I suggested that Erma Bombeck toss her bonnet into the ring. In turning down the offer she wrote in her column, “I don’t want to work with Congress. Heaven knows, I’ve raised enough children.” In this same sense with seven children, I feel overqualified to work with a difficult Congress.
Although not born in a log cabin, I am fortunate to have a two-story barn behind my house. I want to form a “Barn Gang” as Kettering did when the self-starter was invented. The gang will meet periodically in my barn and act as Conservative advisers in the event I am forced into a campaign.
The Barn Gang will not try to “reinvent government” since Clinton and Gore have already tried this and failed. What they don’t know is that government was successfully invented over 200 years ago. We need to reinvent the integrity of those who run our gov°©ernment. And, frankly, before Gore does anything more, he needs to take a course on how to keep his audiences from yawning off on him as he speaks.
So please be patient with me. Give me time to test the waters and make the most important decision in my life. In the meantime, I have no problem with your circulating “Cecil” buttons or asking for an application to be part of the “Barn Gang.”
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