Rockdale Citizen

The Citizen Poll is a weekly compilation of reader comments on subjects of local interest. The Citizen publishes as many comments as space allows. Comments, which may be edited for space or content, are published anonymously on Sunday. To submit a comment, call 770-483-7108, ext. 402, email: poll@rockdalecitizen.com or complete the online form.

"I noticed there are some decorations on that fountain in the roundabout. Is that just neighborhood people doing it or is it an official club or something? It doesn't look like it was done by the city. It looks good. Like somebody cares."

"I want to see some new years resolutions from our community leaders to lower property taxes. What do you think? If you read this and think 'can't do it this year,' please call a press conference and let us know so I can know who not to vote for."

"Dear 'Johndoemo' the ... commenter. It's time for a reality check. I saw your comment this week where you stated. 'Many people know of my comments here in the Citizen and have described them as "negative" in nature. The truth is that I comment very truthfully.' I know you 'think' you are being truthful, but you are being very negative, rude, and unnecessarily mean with your comments. Need examples? I got em. About the bike lanes, you said, 'Huge waste of money. IDIOTS!' About Huckaby's columns you said, 'Your articles and books suck to high heaven. No one wants to hear about life in Porterdale' as well as 'Hackadumb ... can you ever pen something worth reading? JEEZ!'. About a parade in Porterdale, you said 'I hope the tubas don't blow the shacks over.' About our county, you said, 'Enough is enough. Rockdale has blacks running the county and to watch it today is a better show than watching Ringling Brothers circus.' (that is a very racist comment because you are attributing bad leadership with a race). About the man who was given the death penalty, you said, 'Another one bites the dust. Yeah.' And lastly, about the J.H. House fashion show you said, 'You should have used ponchos and sombreros. Kids would have related a bit better.' So, yes you are very negative and a lot of your comments are mean-natured. So stop trying to hide behind the 'I'm just trying to tell the truth and you people can't handle it.' The truth is, you are very unhappy and do not mind saying mean things about others to relieve that unhappiness. I have agreed with a few of your comments and we tend to lean in the same direction politically. But you are not nice. Very few of your comments are helpful or conducive to us working together as a community. It only makes people dislike you."

"Hotchkiss and the other school board members are not very smart if they think that people are satisfied and that is the reason of low attendance. She needs to walk the schools more. Her school system does a terrible job with discipline and she and her policies have allowed plenty of socially maladjusted children to continue terrorizing our schools. Tell her to peruse the suspension records for the last semester at the high schools. Then list them all for the newspaper and defend the decisions to keep some of these kids in school system. There are repeat offender fighters, drugs, weapons, and sexual crimes occurring at these schools and they do nothing but give them a few days off. I am waiting for big news stories to break due to their continuous sweeping under the rug."

"My prediction for RCPS in 2012 is as follows. First, more administrative work and data collection for teachers will lessen the quality of education for our students. This is because Dr. King and the board accepted federal Race to the Top Money and multiple 'guess' questions are 'good.' Test data anyone? The high schools will return to a seven-period day with the teachers conducting class six out of the seven, not five of the seven that they used to do. It is also predicted that most teachers will not learn of this schedule change at the high school level until it is reported in this paper and after contracts go out. There will be a mass exodus of educators who remember what it was like to actually teach and not test prep all day. Parents, as a whole will not get involved either at the school level or the district level. These are my predictions; let's see if they come true and I hope that I am wrong."

"If the city of Conyers needed to raise revenue for any projects I have a simple solution. Have the police sit at the intersection on Hwy. 138 that comes up from Walmart. If you are traveling on Hwy. 138 toward I-20 you are lucky to get through the intersection after the light changes due to all the drivers that run the light coming from Walmart. They completely block the intersection. It's funny how you always see the county running radar just down the street but the city cannot enforce the law at this light. Come on city of Conyers police give us help here. Its only what a half a mile from your station. It's free money for the City."

"My friend moved from Conyers in 2003. He said you're an idiot if you stay. I asked him why and he said that all of the black folks moving in are going to ruin it. Your house value will drop, the schools will get worse, and the crime will go up. I thought it was racist of him to say that and to run like that, even though he really is not a racist from anything else I know about him. I love Conyers and don't really want to admit that he is right, but it is hard to ignore the crime report that is mostly black. It is hard to ignore all the rude black kids that look angry and think it's cool to dress like a criminal. I wonder what the good people in the black community have to say about this. I feel racist just speculating about this, but it bothers me so bad that Conyers used to be a lot better. I don't feel like many of the new people care."

"If you are considering voting for Ron Paul for president, just remember that Hitler was elected."

"A suggestion for Rockdale County would be to put a place on their website where people could submit problems with roads. Similar to the 'pothole' line that Atlanta implemented a few years ago."

"As usual, it appears Rockdale County is among the last counties to put Sunday alcohol sales on the ballot. I don't drink, but can't imagine voting no for it at this point. With all of the surrounding counties passing the law, why would we even consider missing out on the revenue? If people want alcohol on Sundays, they might go to a grocery store in DeKalb and buy all of their groceries as well as alcohol. We have to make sure we are not shooting ourselves in the foot."----

"It does say a lot about a community that it cannot support a book store. All readers should be aware, though, that there's still one excellent book store in the community: The Friends of Nancy Guinn Library Book Store, open the second Saturday of each month from 10:30 a.m. till 2 p.m. Please visit to see what a fine collection of books is available for extraordinarily reasonable prices."

"Most people are not vile and crude when speaking in the real world, so let's not transform your personality simply because you are not face-to-face, be respectful of your audience and the other posters here in this poll please. Happy New Year."

"I saw where a police chase ended with a downed transformer at the corner of Pine Log and Main Street on Sunday night. Several officers had streets blocked off and they had to warn the train to keep people from injury. Everyone seemed to be doing a great job as usual. I do have a question though. Is there any way we can have the criminal pay for everything or do we just have to incur that cost without it being our fault at all. That perp needs to pay for the transformer and whatever equipment damage that the police suffered, plus some percentage of the police wages."

"I would like to know if anyone can tell me what causes one of our area teachers to 'turn her head' during which a young child is being bullied? This happens daily in my granddaughter's life as well as others in her classroom, one being a special-needs child. A young man callously bullies several children daily, to the point where these other children fear telling the teacher, because she does nothing! I would love to believe that children are safe at school, but I have my doubts now. These children are unable to learn what they are there to learn! This young man needs to be dealt with by the principal and his parents ... beyond that, I believe they still have Alpha Schools within Rockdale County where they can try to correct these children's problems before they get into adulthood, when they will be even more dangerous ... God bless the children ..."