DHS teacher Chris Billingsley notifies us that he’s been using DM and InDecatur this week to teach a unit on local government!

Just to let you know that DHS students in the 9th grade have been looking at your Decatur Metro blog this week as part of a unit on local government. Many of my students complain that the only thing more boring than local government is yard work. Not true but it can be hard to get students excited about Decatur unless you mention zombies. The students were very interested in the information posted on Indecatur and Decatur Metro blog sites concerning the movies being filmed this week in Decatur. One of my students later told me, “Your class was not too boring today.” Thanks Decatur Bloggers!

What is the world coming to!

But seriously.  Wow.  I’m flattered!  As I’ve discovered for myself over the past year and a half, local activity is just as interesting, if not more so, than anything at the monolith, national level any day.  You just need to know where to look.

Thanks for stopping by DHS students!  Come back tomorrow (and the next day) and amidst the seemingly ENDLESS talk about development, I promise to incorporate more talk of zombies even when its completely unnecessary and inappropriate.

One more photo after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »

So you’ve probably already heard about the state’s billion dollar deficit, yeah? What with the sagging economy and…

“Local governments!”

Whoa. That was weird. Here I am trying to rationally explain the reasons for the state’s bad math and suddenly someone brings up local governments. Odd.

Where was I? Oh yes…so like many states, we have this massive deficit…thanks in part to overly optimistic projections. What to do?

“Local government spending is out of control!”

What the…? Now hold on just a minute! I’m trying to discuss a very important issue here and you keep attempting to distract me by shouting things about local government spending! What’s your problem?

“Local governments are spending ALL of your money!!”

Dude! Get your hands out of my face! I’m trying to explain what happened to Homeowners Tax Relief Grant money that we usually see in the form of a tax credit on our property tax bill and you’re all up in my business! Look I even brought along a pile of money as a prop to represent the HTRG money…hey…where’d it go? I could’ve sworn it was here a minute ago…

Governor Perdue! Stop! Bring that back here! What!? Yes, I know you’re short on cash, but couldn’t you try tightening your own belt before stealing my pile of money in broad daylight!? Sir! Sir?!

Hmm…you would’ve thought that the fact that the bills were multi-colored would have tipped him off that they were fake. Oh well, I guess I shouldn’t question him…he is the professional.

Good luck sir! Spend it wisely!