Wows and scowls
Scowl: Even if it was designed to get things moving on certain issues of concern to him, Fayette County Commissioner Joseph A. Hardy III had no business threatening to disband the Fayette County Airport Authority back in 2004, as documented in a letter Hardy sent to now-deposed former FCAA board Chairman Fred K. Davis. Even if Hardy felt strongly about what was, or wasn’t, happening at the airport, and thought disbanding the authority was the way to go, he should have made that suggestion in public. Authority boards are created to be autonomous bodies, theoretically exempt from political influence. That’s not always the case, unfortunately, but Hardy’s behind-the-scenes involvement in airport business offers proof of a long hand stretching too far from the commissioners’ office. Scowl: So the intrepid U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development investigated the Fayette County Housing Authority’s Section 8 Program after Fayette County Commissioner Angela M. Zimmerlink publicly announced, in July 2003, that she had found out her estranged father was a Section 8 landlord. HUD found that eight FCHA employees with Section 8 relatives who were landlords had no conflict. But two of them – Zimmerlink and finance director Sonya Over, whose brother was a landlord in the program – were judged to have conflicts because of the high-ranking positions they held. Interestingly, HUD’s microscope was nowhere to be found during the multiple-year tenure of former FCHA board member the Rev. Howard E. Dantzler Sr., whose sister was a Section 8 landlord. Think politics might have something to do with Zimmerlink and Over getting hammered?
Wow: Uniontown is offering event parking for a discounted $2 per vehicle at both of its downtown parking garages. The program started Jan. 28 for the State Theatre Center for the Arts’ performance of “Urban Cowboy.” It’s a good way to help foster increased attendance at downtown events.
Scowl: Fayette County Airport Authority Chairman Jesse Wallace, one of the “Airport Four” who voted in favor of a controversial name change for the facility, says his public agency wants “to hear what Connellsville wants” in reference to the rename of Connellsville Airport. What Wallace and Co. should be concerned about is what all of Fayette County wants. The airport is, despite its provincial name, a county facility, operated by a county authority.