Florence City Council votes not to restore funding to teen center, Weed and Seed
FLORENCE — A discussion Monday by Florence City Councilman Ed Robinson for the city to open a $2 million line of credit to repair and/or renovate homes will draw breath again at council’s Nov. 9 meeting.
Council members Robinson, Bill Bradham, Mayor Pro Tem Billy D. Williams and Mayor Stephen J. Wukela voted for city staff to prepare a proposal in line with Robinson’s request. Council members Buddy Brand, Octavia Williams-Blake and Steve Powers voted against the measure.
“It is estimated that there have been less than 15 new homes constructed in certain section of the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) areas to include North, West and East Florence areas within the last 20 years with the exception of CDBG funds,” Robinson said. “It is also noted there is an approximate 15 to 20 percent decrease in habitable dwellings within these areas as well during the same period.”
Robinson suggested with the $2 million line of credit that the city take one square block and target each house on the block for repairs or renovation. He said funds could be made available by using titles as collateral to the city.
“With this line of credit, we could repair and or renovate 80 houses at an average of $25,000 per house,” he said. “With 80 loans we could begin renovation on a house every month based on payment of $300 a month. At 80 houses, that would yield $24,000 per month and let it run for five years.
“I think it is the city’s responsibility to provide the infrastructure needed to create growth and development. What other options do we have with the CDBG areas of Florence? This is something I would like staff to look at, crunch the numbers and let’s make it work.”
“We’re not in the banking business,” Brand countered. “Two million seems excessive. We’re not up here to lend money.”
Robinson said the city is in the banking business, that it found the money it wanted to redo the downtown. He specifically pointed to the Arts Center, Veterans Park, fire station and others.
He calculated the city was spending $20 million in downtown and that $2 million for the CDBG area he is recommending isn’t that much.
“Whatever we need to do, let’s do it to help those CDBG areas,” he said. “We need to help the people there. We’re starving and hurt and we need help.”
Robinson said he had been working on the Teen Center for eight years.
And in the same breath he questioned whether the Downtown Development Corp. was a private development corporation.
“I want to bring people together by having the Teen Center,” he said. “We need this center for the older kids.”
But his plea fell on deaf ears. Council voted 5-2 not to restore funding to the Teen Center. Voting in the majority were Bradham, Brand, Powers, Williams-Blake and Wukela.
Williams spoke strongly for funding the Pee Dee Community Action Agency’s request for funding its Weed and Seed Program.
Also speaking for the program were Mack Hines, PDCAA director, and Emma Sellers, a volunteer with the Weed and Seed program.
A motion was made by Williams to take $75,000 from the city’s supplemental fund to rescue Weed and Seed. Robinson seconded the motion.
Robinson then proposed an amendment to take $100,000 for two additional police officers and give that money to Weed and Seed “so that we will have a safe haven for our kids.”
Brand noted the Weed and Seed request was last minute coming before council and that 80 percent of the funding for Weed and Seed went for salaries, not the kids.
“All the additional police officers are going to do is take kids to jail,” Robinson said. “They aren’t going to do anything to improve the condition of our community.”
“We’re giving $250,000 for an animal shelter and won’t fund $75,000 for Weed and Seed,” Williams said. “The city of Florence hasn’t given Weed and Seed any money in I don’t know when. Come on fellow council members. Let’s be careful how we do things. Are animals more important than our children?”
The motion to eliminate the two police officers to fund Weed and Seed failed 5-2 with Robinson and Williams voting for it.
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Reader Reactions
Wasn’t it about three meetings ago where Ed was screaming not to tax “his people” because they couldn’t afford it?
Now he says they could pay $300 a month to pay back a loan for renovating their homes?
Yeah right…..
When did it become the job of government to renovate private residences? I want to put an in-ground pool in my back yard. Will that qualify for one of Ed’s CDBG loans?
Let me start by saying that Ed Robinson is a sorry excuse for any kind of representation, for ANYONE! I agree that he is an embarrassment and his constituents should be ashamed to be represented by him.
Let me finish by saying that my neighborhood is part of what “Lisa” coined “Eddie-ville”, and I am a little sick of being lumped in with “His people”! My husband and I are hard-working, tax-paying, law-abiding, PRODUCTIVE members of society that are raising our children to be the same (along with the rest of our neighborhood)! So please do not assume, LISA, that everyone in his district should be “fenced up”! That is a highly judgemental and assuming remark, not that I’ve come to expect any less from you. Maybe that fence would be of more use around your computer thus limiting your many insulting and offensive posts!
They should put a fence around Robinson’s district and call it “Eddie-Ville”!
Then he can start his little Teen Center and what not!
Good Point Ruby’s Shack
The city can barely collect property taxes…...off cars and homes…you think for one minute you gonna collect $300.00 a month after you renovate their homes….HAAAAAAAAA!!!! They would be like “Thank’s sucka”....and keep it moving. I if wante to fix my home up, I would either have to take out a 2nd mortage of use my own cash….they can do the same. I could see if the you had some elderly people living there and there home are just really not livable, etc…maybe the city could donate or help modify the imperfections via GRANT MONEY ONLY. I swear, the council has really lost there damn minds…..some of them at least…
Ed Robinson doing what he does best…trying to get money from the public till and give it to “his people” (i.e. those who are too lazy and irresponsible to take care of their own homes). And only Ed would believe that “his people” would actually pay $300 a month back. I used to work in collections, and I can tell you, the city would be lucky to get 20% of the money back; the only way the city would come out even is if they aquired the land after the debtors inevitably default. Then you would have Ed picketing because the city took their homes. This is a mess the city should wisely avoid.
As for the police officers, considering all the crime in his district, you would think Robinson would want more police on the streets, taking more thugs to jail. But again, this is Ed Robinson. It’s because of politicians like him that so many inner cities in the country have a history of crime and corruption. Yet Ed Robinson keeps getting re-elected. Which proves his constituents are as ignorant and illiterate as he is.
$250,000 for a animal shelter….hmmmmm, sounds fishy to me. I love the cat/dogs/etc….but come on Council….we can find better use of $250k. More cops needed…YES. There is a Boys and Girls Club on that part of town….invest in it…clean it up, etc. Maybe, just maybe take a little time and look into the “DOWNTOWN” nightmare and retract some funds from there…..that’s a disaster in the making. Weed and Seed could be and is meant to be a good thing, but some people that are running it are not operating it the right way. And as far as given money to renovate housing…please!! Most of those houses over there are not even worth $25,000. The idea may sound like a good plan (using there titles as collateral)but the land is worth more than the houses. If there were to pass that an move foward…there would be alot of homeless people in that side of town….and the city would be sitting on a wealth of land…and with “Powers” influence…...oh my!!!
So Ed wants to loan 80 homeowners $25000 each, to fix up homes that they didn’t take care of in the first place, for a total of $2,000,000. Then have them pay back that loan at $300 dollars a month for 5 years. So on a $25000 loan they would only pay back $18000. I would gladly take a couple of these loans, but I don’t qualify because I actually maintain my home and would not dream of letting my most important investment get rundown. Why don’t we take that $2,000,000 and give interest free loans to the responsible Taxpayers who have been paying for all these Help the Lazy programs. As for the Teen center, there are plenty of places for the youth of this town to gather and be productive and stay out of trouble. But they choose not to use them. The Weed and Feed program needs to be eliminated completely because there is too much Feeding and not enough Weeding. Ed is right about one thing though, there is way too much Tax money being poured into downtown redevelopment.
Well at least they got what really goes on in that neighbor-“hood”
“WEED” ot the weed and seed !!
Heres my thought…where does Ed Robinson think he can choose which houses need to be renovated…have them renovated…and then expect the people living there to pay for it? Don’t you think if they had the extra $300 to spend each month they would be doing this themselves??? Maybe I am not reading the story right but that is what I got out of it. And another thing, why should the city have to pay for a teen center to keep teens off the streets? If their parents can’t get them to act half way decent what makes you think they will be able to get them to go to a “teen center”?
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