Pine Lake Voice

01/10/2025

10/09/2024

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kl1xwLbaN-M

03/11/2024

https://www.pinelakevoice.org/post/the-red-flag

I met a man named Vick; far away from where I live now. We got to talking and discovered we had attended the same high school at different times. We became friends; he was a neighbor. He owned the Grand Hotel; the only thing grand about the Grand Hotel is the sign which sits just above the door and....

03/09/2024

https://www.pinelakevoice.org/post/time-for-some-plain-talk?fbclid=IwAR3hJDGaL8TT5oatR5MHoe0U3GQH5Guk34NRIaw-TjVCa7LMko6FOqhSdvc

Originally, PLAIN was known as Pine Lake Association of Neighbors or PLAN. Mayor Mike Stuckey, (circa 1995) co-opted PLAN. Mayor Mike added ‘Involved' and PLAN became Pine Lake Association of Involved Neighbors or PLAIN. When Linda and I first moved here, year 2000, we joined PLAIN; the dues, $35 ...

03/07/2024

Dennis Rotch
21 hours ago
2 min read

Time for some PLAIN talk
Updated: 14 minutes ago
Originally, PLAIN was known as Pine Lake Association of Neighbors or PLAN. Mayor Mike Stuckey, (circa 1995) co-opted PLAN. Mayor Mike added ‘Involved' and PLAN became Pine Lake Association of Involved Neighbors or PLAIN.

When Linda and I first moved here, year 2000, we joined PLAIN; the dues, $35 a year. A Board Member of the organization explained the purpose of the Association; as I recall, went something like this: PLAIN members get to decide what the City’s agenda and order of priorities. What I am describing here is a politically motivated home owners association; a welcome wagon of glad handers. At that time the “Involved Neighbors” was not classified as a 501-C3 non-profit organization.

The Association of Involved Neighbors plotted the removal of the popular Mayor Al Fowler(circa 2001). Fowler, at that time was the first openly gay Mayor of a city in Georgia. Fowler’s removal split the Association and the town. Two council members resigned in protest to Mayor Fowler’s removal and formed a “Lakers” group to counter the Involved Neighbors. In the election to replace Mayor Fowler, the Laker group candidate, Greg Zarus, won the election.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this missive, it was Mayor Mike that set up the Association of Involved Neighbors; there-by, creating a wedge that divided the constituency into two camps, those who are ‘Involved’ and those who are, allegedly, not ‘involved.’ As a member of PLAIN, according to the narrative, you achieve a special status..

All of us are involved, not because of a PLAIN membership but because we share a common aspiration for truth and justice, we share creativity, we share a location, we share the burden of property taxes; these are unities of the community. An Association of Involved Neighbors does not define a community. The Association; however, enables cronyism, a form of in-group favoritism, especially between council persons and the supportive organization, that leads to abuse of power and to corruption. The Association of Involved Neighbors has a number of charitable endeavors: food pantry, library and raises money to help people. Given the Association’s glaring divisive flaw, the good deeds amount to the put of lipstick on the proverbial pig.

I served on a non-profit for 4 years. Our goal was to create affordable housing. We accomplished that goal. When I look at PLAIN and see officers of the organization using the organization to advance their political aspirations, I am appalled. The goal that PLAIN has set for its Involved Neighbors is to control our City government and that is not a ‘charitable’ goal.

Dennis Rotch



22 views

05/08/2021

DeKalb County is hosting the DeKalb Virtual Career Academy this summer for youth ages 14-24, and applications close May 11.

06/20/2020

FROM THE MAYOR:

June 19th, 2020

Dear Community,

Three days ago I got an email from one of our residents. Not an unusual thing—except that this resident is 6 years old. I’ve heard from him before when he’s been concerned about our turtles and the upkeep of the parking planters.

In this email, however, he simply asked: “What are you doing?”

The last time I scheduled a Tot’s Town Hall my six-year old pal was there. This is how he and I met—he’s a TTH regular. Tot’s Town Halls are meetings for residents age 6 and under. We sing, the Tots ask me Mayor questions, usually somebody falls down and cries. Sometimes it’s the Mayor.

In the City of Pine Lake, relationships are centerpiece to how we assemble the blueprint of this small municipality. That’s what every city wishes it could provide. It’s the goal of urban planners, it’s in the language of sacred liturgy.

So let’s talk about COVID-19. In Montgomery Alabama Mayor Steven Reed signed an Executive Order mandating face masks. Wearing masks in public is proving to make a fundamental difference in controlling the spread of coronavirus. Our disinterest in the virus does not make it less virulent.

When I wear a mask , it protects the six-year old I know. And everyone else, whether I know them or not. It’s personal: it’s a kind, compassionate pre-vaccine. 30072 is not yet listed on the Dekalb County zip code COVID statistics map because we’ve only had four cases. Let’s continue to keep it personal, relational, and masked.

Public health. Public safety. Fiscal responsibility. Who we are to each other. All intertwined in ways we can’t begin to address without compassion in the mix. Without relationships.

Face: please mask it.

Hands: please wash them.

Feet: please stay 6 of them apart.

In answer to my pal’s question—that’s what I’m doing my best to do.

mh

Melanie Hammet

Mayor, City Of Pine Lake GA

“Arts’ Natural Habitat”

06/11/2020

https://www.facebook.com/traecrowder/videos/280243350019850/

06/09/2020

So you want to be an ally but don’t know where to start? First of all, thank you and welcome. This is an ever growing community of people who refuse to accept Black death and institutionalized racism as the norm. This community takes measurable steps, is intentional about their day-to-day interact...

06/08/2020

A Call for Dialogue
Published by Dennis Rotch

Gentrification is the process of repairing and rebuilding deteriorating homes in order to accommodate an influx of affluent people that results in the displacement of citizens with fixed or low incomes. Housing that was once affordable is being turned into vaulted, marble homes in order to attract affluent buyers into Pine Lake’s real estate casino culture.

The principal instruments of gentrification in Pine Lake are the City Government, real estate brokers/renovators and the so-called ‘Involved Neighbors’, that work together seamlessly to create a fiscally toxic environment for low and fixed income homeowners and buyers.

Let’s examine how the entities contribute to the gentrification process. The City has engaged and continue to engage in policies of exclusion. The most notable policy was the Park Card, an odious instrument of discrimination that enjoyed a 25 year run that was vigorously endorsed by the governing council, the ‘Involved Neighbors’ and real estate brokers/renovators.

We can take solace in the fact that the park card is no longer in place, but the impetus for discrimination is very much with us as there has been no apology or expression of regret for such an appalling and illegal device; in fact, the very opposite has occurred with some demanding that the park card be restored.

Gentrification usually leads to negative impacts such as forced displacement, a fostering of discriminatory behavior, abuse by people in power and a focus on housing that excludes low-income individuals and people of color.

One of the City’s principal instruments of gentrification is the costly part-time Police Department which creates an illusion of enhanced security. Twenty years ago the City was facing a crisis brought on by an intense citation regime on Rockbridge Road that allowed the City to keep taxes low by turning 1500 feet of Rockbridge Rd into a ‘cash cow’; 75% of the City’s budget was covered by the citation frenzy. As a result, protesters demanded an end to the predatory practice. I should note that the City is well within its right to patrol Rockbridge Road; however, the ‘lay and wait’ policy faces a serious obstacle as parking on Rockbridge is illegal.

Gentrification occurs because of a lack of policies that value community. Without policies that attempt to remedy the trends that cause forced displacement, gentrification will continue to displace low and fixed income residents. To develop remedial policies, we must recognize the disproportionate and destructive effects of gentrification. Remedial policies will require a political realignment combined with the reigning in of the ‘Involved Neighbors’ from its outsized influence over governing policies. The ‘Involved Neighbors’ is a political device, known as a ‘wedge’, that divides the constituency and promotes gentrification that degrades community.

Formation of a non-profit whose mission is to preserve and promote affordable housing, would be a good place to start.

“Be transparent. Let's build a community that allows hard questions and honest conversations so we can stir up transformation in one another.” Kent

Published by Dennis Rotch

06/05/2020

Why do we need Ortega Road?

Fifteen years ago, I was talking to City Manager Phil Howland, when a Pine Lake Police officer approached us. Phil introduced me to Officer Ortega; he had just been hired as a part time officer; Ortega also worked as a security guard. A young man, 25 years old, determined to advance his career as a law officer. I shook his hand; as Officer Ortega walked away, Phil vouched that he is a good person and a father of two children.

A few days later I walked to City Hall. Officer Ortega had been shot; he died just a few steps outside the Post Office entry. Overhead there were no fewer than five helicopters whirling in turbulent unison. I thought of our brief encounter. Ortega, he was young, strong and looked unbreakable in his freshly pressed Pine Lake Police uniform, it pains me to this day to say, “…he was…”

I walked into Phil’s office. He had just finished talking to Officer Ortega’s father, who wanted Phil to confirm that his son had died, emotion & shock were of the moment. Phil and I walked to the clubhouse and lowered the flag and raised to half mast.

In the evening, at the lake, media lights illuminated a group of citizens, police, elected officials and members of Officer Ortega’s family. Mayor Zarus, Chief Greene and a few others spoke about the day’s tragic event.

What drew my eye were the Ortega children, five and three year old, a brother and sister holding hands, standing resolutely in the media glare, with the same determination, I had seen in their father’s eye. I let out a long sigh and thought, they will be fine; because, Francis Manuel Ortega, a good person, was a hero before he became a Pine Lake Police officer, where he fell victim to the systemic failure of police training.

Time for Pine Lake to honor someone worth honoring. What a gift to the family and the citizenry if ‘Ortega Road’ will replace the name of a racialist tyrant. The question is are we a genuine community? Or a clubhouse? Another name that should be changed.

06/01/2020

“Another form of violence is the violence of the indifference of our institutions...” Bobby Kennedy’s words are as relevant today as when he spoke them. https://youtu.be/Vt7IuKoETEc

Excerpts of the speech delivered at the City Club of Cleveland on April 5, 1968. Footage Courtesy of NBCUniversal Audio Courtesy of The City Club of Cleveland