The 411 lost its damn mind

CITY GIRL!!!!!!! Wow, she can write. She’s by far the best writer on the Insider. The bar is set pretty low, but still. I love the idea of having someone contribute to the site that’s the polar opposite of me in terms of writing style. She is capable of writing about issues in an entertaining and loving way without relying on cheap laughs. (Just looked in the mirror to drive my point across). I hope you enjoyed her first piece.

Now let’s get back to the regular scheduled programming, shall we?

BOMA sucks.

Don’t lie, show of hands, how many of you did I just trigger? Judging by the 411, at least 8-10 (hahaha sorry had to get that layup).

Usually I would be hard pressed to explain that the previous sentences were satire, but I have been doing this for 12 weeks now and I’ve come to realize that the Nolies are a smart bunch who can spot a joke and not get offended by a one liner.

Nolensville is changing. And I’m not talking about the town in general, I’m talking about its residents. People are asking questions and demanding answers. That doesn’t mean we all agree nor does it mean we all have the same take on town politics. It doesn’t take a $30,000 study to figure out that tensions are high. Some are fed up with local government and others are fed up with people being fed up. (Complaining about complaining is still complaining).

I stay glued to the 411. I try to keep an open mind when I analyze the comments and for the most part, I make up my opinions after I follow up with some type of research. I have my own opinions about most things but I also realize that my opinions are just that, my opinions. What’s harder to understand is that we all have opinions and it doesn’t really matter how informed or engaged someone is, everyone has the same right to voice their opinion.

What I do not believe in or want to be a part of is talking points, especially ever-changing talking points. You know how it goes, once one talking point gets discredited it changes to a more appropriate talking point for the time being.

Let’s list some of the all timers. Bear with me as these will sound pretty familiar:

1. Just a few people, 8 – 10, are frustrated with the town’s officials

• Buuut soon it was clear they were missing a few zero’s, so it became….

2. Vocal Minority

• Buuut the vocal minority just got louder and more vocal, so then……

3. There’s so much misinformation out there on the 411

• Buuut the vocal majority started using facts, FOIA requests, and calling other government agencies themselves, so then…..

4. Keyboard warriors

• Buuut the keyboard warriors showed up in droves to BOMA meetings, so now……

5. Bullies

•  The solution folks, is to stop saying the word “BOMA”.  Start your own Facebook page. Just shut up and BE NICE!!!!!

 

All of these are not only wrong, but designed specifically to minimize and discredit any resident that asks the questions that have answers that make our elected officials a touch uncomfortable.

Let’s make an example shall we: “Nolensville clocked in a “profit” of over a million dollars, stacks on stacks on stacks”. The debate in that scenario should be: is the money designated? Do we have a policy in place for the general fund? Why aren’t we budgeting better? Instead the “debate” turns to “profit is the wrong term, you uneducated blogger you”.

Why?

Well, from my view point, it’s pretty simple. We do not have a policy for the general fund. Our budgeting sucks. And the money isn’t designated. How do I know? I asked the mayor. Our own study specifically says that our general fund policy should have 40% of yearly budget stashed away in the general fund. Or about a mil point five. We have over seven million. No one at town hall wants to debate this because it’s a loser for them. Once an actual debate starts, then questions about the lack of traffic lights will arise. Funding for NVFD will get brought up again. People will wonder why our roads are falling apart. So debating a technicality on the proper lingo is the only option left.

In all honesty, I’m guilty of a few things here too. I specifically used the word profit knowing that it would be called out as the wrong term. Low hanging fruit to entice a debate. But just because I admitted doing so doesn’t mean I wouldn’t do it again. Profit and “excess of revenues over expenditure” mean the same thing at the end of the day.

I hate talking points but I don’t mind getting hit with them. They are easy to spot and even easier to brush off. What’s harder to swallow is the obvious divide they create. We are made to pick sides and defend previous opinions with all our might. After all, we can’t back down on Facebook. That’s what losers do. So we double down and drive harder. Rinse and repeat.

It shouldn’t be that way. We should all extend the benefit of the doubt. We are all neighbors. We are all different.  We have different values, different religions, different colors and more importantly, we are in different stages of our lives. What matters to me is different than what might matter to you. It should stop there. Instead of attacking each other for having different opinions, we should recognize that opinions differ because we are all different. The way a democracy works is that everyone speaks their piece and the popular opinions win out.

There’s so many things we should be working on fixing. We are growing every day, and the more we grow, the bigger the problems get. We should all work together to point out areas of need without being labeled as a hater, or a no-good pot stirrer, or a vocal minority.  Labels lump people into groups so they can be discredited all at once instead of debating individual points. It’s like a censoring assembly line, efficient and swift.

When I first heard the idea of keeping politics off of the 411, I was kinda in agreement. It’s a local page to promote each other’s interests and stay informed about events. Then I thought about it for a little bit. Why are politics such a big trigger? Why is anything a trigger? Well triggers hit soft spots. That’s why we react to them. If they were pointless nonsense, it would be easily ignorable noise. Kinda like the Yankees (sorry Isamar, I was dared to put that in here) (inside joke, read our Facebook page if you feel left out).

So these issues are acting like triggers, hitting soft spots. And I don’t blame people for reacting negatively to it. It does suck to find out we have money and still don’t put in traffic lights or roundabouts on “dangerous” intersections. It does suck finding out that most reasons against SouthWalk are reasons only because the town didn’t address the issues in the past. Our roads do suck, and so does our budget. I cringe at some of these issues. But it would be a hundred times more embarrassing if we just swept our issues under the rug to avoid conflict. These issues do sound political, but they aren’t. They are community issues. I for one don’t care who dropped the ball and who will get credit for picking it back up…

Ffs just pick up the ball. I don’t care if it’s a Jimmy, a Tommy, or a Willy.  Start to fix things so we can move on to talking about snakes and meerkats.

 

-The Insider