Time to sit back and wait...

Ok, the county has received and verified all the initial surveys! Except for Commodore Drive - we never could find anyone on that street enthusiastic enough to get it done. Volunteers from other streets stepped in at the last minute and tried, but were not able to get the signatures on time.

So now comes the fun part...waiting.

The studies are scheduled to be done at the end of the year or in early January. Once we get the results, we will have a meeting with the county and get this project going!

Till then...enjoy the wait....

Ahead of Schedule!

Well, I guess I'm not the only one fed up with traffic in our neighborhood! I've already gotten back 9 of the 12 streets - 2 weeks before the deadline. So today I mailed in: Forrestal Drive, Commander Drive, Ellwyn Drive, Captain Drive, Admiral Way, Greenhill Drive, Longview Drive, Ensign Drive, Admiral Drive and Plantation Lane. Yes, I made copies of everything before I sent them in (can't trust government). I actually work for the State government, so I can say that, right?

Still working on Montford Drive, Seaman Circle and Commodore Drive. Stay tuned...

We Got the Surveys...and Surprise!

The surveys are do back within 45 days or the streets not returned "will automatically be rejected". Dang! Looks like I've committed everyone. Can't drop this ball.

So now we have "street leaders" and "street helpers" and they have to get 20% of the households on their street to sign this "traffic calming program initial interest petition form". No obligation what-so-ever. Just gets the process started.

Thankfully the county has accurate records of household numbers (of course, that's how they tax our neighborhood hundreds of thousands of dollars every year) and they have computers that can do basic math...so each survey states exactly how many signatures are needed.

Progress reports are due back from the team leaders in 3 weeks.

Ok, Not So Typical Government

A day after I left a message with DeKalb's 311 system, Elaine Turman, from the traffic department actually called back first thing in the morning! Wow!

It gets better. Seriously, it does. She was very helpful and even nice! And she let me request surveys for all the streets in the neighborhood. And her patience was admirable, as she waited for me to try and recall from memory all the street names (would have helped if I'd had a map, but I just wasn't prepared for all this so soon).

Then she put me in touch with Allan North (the sidewalk guy) and he was nice and helpful, too! He was even optimistic that we would be on the top of the 2009 priority list for sidewalks on Longview! Huh? It's not that easy, is it? I thought maybe I was still dreaming. I needed coffee.

So, what’s next? I’m expecting the petitions to come at the end of next week. I’ll divide them up and we’ll start going door to door for signatures (we only need 20% this round).

And for the sidewalks on Longview... we still have some more research to do about that. I'm optimistic but not naive...

Typical Government

We are ready to get started! The first step is to call the county and request petitions for each street. So I call DeKalb County's 311 number (at least they don't have us calling 911 for non-emergencies anymore). Well, I can't talk to anyone in the roads/traffic division (of course not), the person answering the phone knows nothing (surprise) and I have to leave a message (oh, joy). It gets better. I am told to call back if I don’t hear from anyone within 3 business days.

Now we see why others say that the only possible way to get anything done ever with the County is to master the art of following up.