Spewing Thanks

It has recently come to my attention that someone in our fair city has issues with (and dare I say it?) doesn't like this blog. I'd like to take this opportunity to address some of the concerns of our reader(s).

First and foremost, this is a blog. It is not a newspaper. It is not a corporation. It is not a part of any government operation. It is not run, administered, or sanctioned by the city or any of its officials or employees. It is written by three people who live in and enjoy this community. It is open for comments by anyone. We think LaVergne is a dear town inhabited by lovely, caring people. We want to share information of value about this little city to our residents. We have restaurant reviews. We talk about politics. We provide bad news (officials under investigation) AND good news (officials cleared of wrongdoing).

But we've been accused of (and I quote) "spewing out false facts" and were told to call our city officials because "They're the leaders of the city. They have to answer to you. Their email addresses and phone numbers are on the La Vergne web site. Maybe you should look at that at one time or another." If you'll please note, we do actually have a link to the city and encourage any reader to go there for information. And yes we read the city's web page. How else would we have known that the city had posted something on July 7th, June 30th, and in February. The error here was that there were also posts on April 12th and May 30th that weren't mentioned.

But let's get back to this thing you said about "spewing false facts." What exactly was false in our post? Smyrna residents were invited to the Smyrna event. LaVergne residents weren't invited to the Smyrna event. We said LaVergne could follow Smyrna's lead and (oops!) didn't realize LaVergne already had an event like this planned (LaVergne's shindig was posted TODAY on the city's official website). We said it would be a good idea for LaVergne to have one. Is that a "false fact"?

We mentioned LaVergne has an Oldtimers Day. This, too, is true. That nothing at Oldtimers Day is free except the music and the goodies handed out at the business booths. Is there something else free that we missed? Oops again - forgot to say that it's free to get in.

We had a post about one of the police officers in LaVergne. That came from Channel 2 News (and the link is there to Channel 2 for anyone to read). We didn't make that up. In fact, we encouraged people to use the County's convenience centers in that post rather than trespassing. In another post, we talked about what a good man our county commissioner is - that he has integrity and is running a positive campaign by not smearing his opponent. That's not spew. Let's see, the kids have to hold their pee until they get out of their portable classrooms because there is no running water (or toilets) in them. True or False?

Okay, here's some real spewing, but I don't think it's "false facts." We do not like the name LaVergne Lake Elementary School. But I would be shocked if more than 200 people in this city like the name. The name (in my opinion) is a bit goofy. Because there is no "LaVergne Lake." Now parts of this city (Jones Mill Road and part of Lake Forest subdivision, for example) hold water (in fact hold even more water than the bladders of our wee kids in the portables) when we have a lot of rain.

I worked with government officials for years and years and years and years and years. Personally, I really like the idea of the brochure/pamphlet/newsletter-but-not-news-piece that was produced. Although I didn't read it cover-to-cover, I did offer some suggestions for future articles, but certainly do not consider making suggestions as "spewing false facts."

The times they are a changin' and the Internet and blogging are the future of mass communication. This is a forum that allows everyday people like me, like you, like your neighbor, like your colleague, etc. to speak up. A phone call is not mass communication. Once you hang up, the call is over. The ideas may linger from the call, but they too are over unless someone takes action. This is a resource that's readily available for the general public. It is here after the office is closed. We welcome any updates you can provide or that anyone who cares about this community can provide! For example, Terrie B's comments were awesome. She gave us information we were missing.

I think your heart is in the right place. I think you are very loyal to this community and your colleagues. Also, I applaud you for standing up and letting your voice be heard! I think we should be thanking you because you're raising awareness about our concerns at city hall by telling them about this blog. And in the last two days, the city added FOUR new posts about upcoming events.

As a side note, I apologize for having edited this post a couple of times because I want to encourage more comments rather than discourage them by being negative.