To the Editor:
TC lights: This is just another example of the city's total disregard for its residents. How many of the School Board members live in the impacted residential area? How many of our council members? How about the mayor? It's easy to support the "greater good" when it doesn't directly impact you. I have a suggestion, place portable floodlights behind the board and council members’ homes. Do it for 30 consecutive nights, say from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m., along with a PA system to inflict crowd noise; add an announcer and high decibel music to simulate the accompanying effects of a lighted field in use. Let's see how they like that, how their neighbors like it. I suspect it will give them some much needed perspective, since they have no regard for that of the impacted residents. Yes, I'm assuming our elected officials will simply rubber stamp the board's decision. That's what the voting record reflects.
Look, I'm no zealot, I've lived here since 1998 and my son graduated from T.C. Williams. However, like many residents I've grown weary of the total disregard our officials have for neighborhood interests. Perhaps a compromise is in order, when the School Board can demonstrate academic achievement on par with other affluent communities within Northern Virginia, the case for lighting of sports events might be more palatable. Should that occur, property values will ascend in the community. I hope the council and the mayor will focus on holding the School Board accountable for academic excellence within the Alexandria school system, if not the moral imperative of keeping a promise to the community in question. We all know how this will end. Those who govern will ignore the governed. The city will likely face a lawsuit, bleeding scarce revenues away from more vital needs. Fix our schools, raise the academic standing of T.C. Williams, then worry about lights.
Roy Byrd
Alexandria