Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, April 15, 1995 TAG: 9504180056
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: WILLIAM GILMER SR.
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
To begin, the move to unseat two members of the Board of Supervisors has been not so much an effort to settle a political issue, as asserted. Rather, it has been an attempt to remove from office these two officials on the very rational charges that they were guilty of misuse of office in accepting favors from Corrections Corporation of America, which would be likely to influence their judgment on an important matter to be handled by the board at its next meeting. This and other charges made against these officials are clearly defined in the recall petition.
You further overlook the fact that these two officials were directed by their chairman to go to Tennessee to investigate the impact on the community of a particular CCA facility in that state. This wasn't an arbitrary selection by the chairman. The prison in Clifton, Tenn., was the only CCA facility in operation anywhere that's comparable in size and type to the 1,500-bed medium-security prison that CCA proposes to build in Wythe County.
What they did was to defy their chairman and go first to the CCA's corporate offices. There, they proceeded without authorization to negotiate certain ``concessions'' on the proposed project, ostensibly to render it more palatable to county residents.
After this, they journeyed, not to any prison site in Tennessee but instead to Cleveland, Texas, where CCA operates a 500-bed pre-release center. This was evidently CCA's facility of choice, which CCA considered most likely to lead to a favorable report. What was intended by the chairman to be an objective and relevant investigation turned out to be a farcical diversion orchestrated and financed by CCA, with the willing compliance of the two supervisors. Incidentally, you must surely appreciate the vast difference between these two facilities, and their likely impacts on the community.
Moreover, the Circuit Court judge didn't regard the charges against Supervisor Charles Dix as frivolous, as you seem to imply. In fact, he refused to grant the motion by the defense attorney to dismiss the case outright without a hearing, suggesting that there was indeed a possible violation by Dix in accepting payment for expenses of the trip to Texas.
You go on to state that the supervisors considered all available information, including, but not limited to, comments from the public (before casting their vote to invite CCA to Wythe County). Not so. As just stated, they patently avoided one of the most relevant bodies of information, namely the experience of the community of Clifton, Tenn. Furthermore, they effectively shut out any meaningful public comments on the question. To accomplish this, the same four-man majority who voted to invite CCA made it their first order of business at the meeting to rearrange the chairman's agenda to postpone citizens' comments until after the delegation had presented its report and the all-important vote had been taken. This is clearly not how representative government is supposed to work.
Feelings against the prison run broad and deep. Wythe County is being torn apart by this issue, and there are some like yourself who seem prone to place all the blame on the prison opponents.
However, the fact of the matter is that most of this strife could have been averted had the supervisors seen fit to authorize an advisory referendum on the question. The enabling legislation had been introduced in the General Assembly by Del. Tom Jackson, and was backed by the signatures of some 3,600 registered voters. Whatever the outcome of the referendum, the result is something that the vast majority of us could have accepted, however distasteful it might have been. What we find difficult to accept is that the supervisors, by the same 4-3 vote, denied us that opportunity.
To be sure, the four supervisors who have shut their ears to the voices of those who placed them in office will be vigorously opposed when and if they next stand for election. In the meantime, we shall continue to use all legal means at our disposal to keep the prison out of Wythe County.
William Gilmer Sr., of Wytheville, is retired from Texaco where he was a manager of licensing.
by CNB