GLORIA GAINES: Dougherty County must change

I hardly know anyone who does not find themselves on I-75, with dread, headed to Atlanta several times each year for business or pleasure. This trip rarely happens in reverse. That must change. Like a shapeless amoeba, Atlanta is on its way to consuming all of Georgia, from Macon north.

Some metro Atlanta citizens are now saying enough. As Amazon considers Atlanta a potential location for its newest 50,000-employee fulfillment center, some are saying that Atlanta’s traffic could not take the stress. Can you imagine having that problem in Dougherty County?

In order to attract more and better quality jobs to Dougherty County we must become a 21st-century county. We cannot continue to do things as we have done for the last 50 years that landed us among the top 10 poorest regions in the country. We have great institutions of higher learning; however, we train students and with diplomas and degrees in hand they head for greener pastures north the very next day. The migration pattern is too much outflow of the well-trained and educated and an inflow of those in need of marginal jobs and social services. This pattern must change. It takes strong elected, lay and professional leadership to change it.

Dougherty County has good bones. We have good health delivery facilities, developing recreational and cultural opportunities, good educational infrastructure and excellent transportation systems: air, rail cargo and highway. What we must do is stop so much fighting and bickering over crumbs, so much north verses south and black versus white. We must understand that while we are infighting, Columbus, Augusta, Macon, Valdosta, Savannah, and even Thomasville and Moultrie are working together and growing. I cannot for the life of me see where the recent attacks on the four black commissioners has helped our community.

Despite what some in the media may say, all my fellow commissioners have one thing in mind: what is best for this community. It is our sworn duty to do the best of our ability to make decisions that are in the interest of all citizens. There are no other motives on that commission, and it is hard for me to understand how the media that are pushing the division among us to see how that benefits anyone.

While some may not like any given decision we make, what hurts me and the community is that so many are so willing to ascribe petty motives to our decisions. I have worked hard all my life and have not one ounce of malice in my soul. For the media to suggest that I, at my age and looking at heaven’s gate, would act so irresponsibly and vengefully is shameful. I only want what is right for the common good, according to my best judgment.

My profession is city planning, and I have a fair amount of experience in understanding how people form communities around the globe. One thing I do know is that you cannot progress if we play winner-take-all games and if I lose one decision, I will destroy the whole. That, my fellow citizens, is an attitude that is sure to keep us stuck back in the ’60s.

We can grow together if we accept that we are all human and that we are all entitled to a modicum of respect and dignity. Even the best of leaders cannot deliver that if the media keep us fighting each other. The same tactic of divide and conquer is playing itself out on the national level with the Trump administration. We must not let it continue to happen here. It is suicide.

Gloria Gaines is the District 5 representative on the Dougherty County Commission.