Editor:

The move to create the city of Brookhaven started over two years ago. In that time, DeKalb County failed to improve our neglected parks, failed to fix the potholes and remove the metal plates obstructing our streets and DeKalb has failed to provide the police protection it has promised.

DeKalb spends a mere $331,040 to operate Ashford, Blackburn, Briarwood, Lynwood, Murphey Candler and Skyland Parks. Yet DeKalb has put $26 million dollars into the Wade Walker YMCA in Stone Mountain and $7 million into a water park in south DeKalb.

DeKalb has a 10-year backlog for fixing it’s roads. The cost to the taxpayer? An additional $120 million of taxpayers dollars on top of the $179 million in bond money that we are already paying for.

DeKalb County’s North Precinct only provides three to five officers for the 50,000 people and 12 square miles of the proposed city of Brookhaven. And we wonder why there were five armed robberies within seven days in June of this year.

As a comparison, the city of Dunwoody provides a minimum of seven officers at all times for the same population and within the same square mileage.

If DeKalb, in the face of losing $25 million to $27 million in revenue, has not decided to fix the road under the metal plate on Dresden between the fire station and the tax and tag office (both are county facilities only 75 yards apart), has to raise an additional $120 million of tax payer money for a 10-year road repair backlog and has neglected to provide more police officers to prevent violent crimes, then chances are DeKalb will continue to let the problems linger ignore you if you vote "No."

Ensure a better future for you and your family.

Vote “YES” for the City of Brookhaven on July 31st.

Dean Stansel
Brookhaven