To the Editor,
Whenever I went before you last year to ask for your vote, I made one thing very clear - I have no agenda or score to settle and I want to continue helping our city move forward. Today, my purpose is the same.
This letter isn't a rebuttal to anything anyone has said; it is to explain my thinking on the decision regarding where to locate city hall and what we need to do moving forward.
The discussion of city hall's location has certainly not been an easy one for anyone involved. However, one thing I know for certain is everyone involved had good intentions to do what they felt was in the city's best interests.
As my votes indicated, I believed the Northwest Medical Center would have been a good purchase for the city at a great price. Engineers, in their inspection reports, said the medical center was a solid structure and I believe any negative aspects to the building could have likely been remedied - making it a very secure, reliable, and functional facility for many years.
However, by a majority vote, the council decided to opt out of its contract, which was entered into a few weeks ago. This majority vote should be respected and we should move forward.
Moving forward, everyone can agree on one thing: the building which housed city offices and continues to do so for city court and the Council Chamber is absolutely deplorable and something should have been done a long time ago to remedy its condition.
If anything can be learned from these last several months, it's if the city is going to be successful in its endeavors, our council must work together and towards unity.
Throughout all of this, what hasn't changed is the spirit and resolve the citizens of this community have to see progress.
This week's vote now serves as an opportunity to build up the city's reserves, get our house in better order, and re-think some of the issues, together, as a community.
Steve Davis
Councilman At-large