PART 5: A Radical Restructuring of Jonesboro and the Surrounding Area
Jonesboro Part 5: A Radical Restructuring of Jonesboro and the Surrounding Area
You may have recently been targeted to participate in a survey from the Jonesboro Metropolitan Planning Organization entitled “Jonesboro Metropolitan Area Community Values Survey”. We were specifically asked by Jonesboro residents to look into this and to send out an alert. We are recommending that you DON’T participate in the survey because we think the outcome has already been pre-determined! They want the community to think they have input when in all actuality, we feel they really don’t. DO NOT FILL OUT THE SURVEY. Do you honestly think they’re concerned about YOU? If so, we’ve got some swampland in Arizona we’d like to sell you. If you choose any of the options on the survey, it could register your support of their proposed plan.
Reasons we believe you should not participate:
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It appears that you’ve been targeted for their survey
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They will be keeping track of your answers
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They may continuing contacting you, even by phone
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These surveys are NOT anonymous
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Home addresses of survey participants are geo-coded, and possibly put on a publicly-accessible map and even archived for later use.
ETC Institute, the company that put out the survey, states on their own website:
“The map below shows the physical distribution of respondents from a survey conducted for Broward County, Florida. The dots show the location of respondents based upon geocoded latitude and longitude coordinates of their home address.”
In our research, it didn’t take us long to see that they (ETC Institute) are Sustainable Planners. If you do an online search of “ETC Institute Sustainable Planning”, you’ll see for yourself.
If you don’t want to participate, then you need to contact these people:
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Patrick Dennis, Director of the Jonesboro Metropolitan Planning Organization at (870) 933-4623 or fax (870) 336-7171
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Mayor Harold Perrin at (870) 932-1052 or hperrin@jonesboro.org
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The city council members who passed a resolution to have the survey conducted. Their contact information is in the table below.
Tell them that you DO NOT WANT TO PARTICIPATE in this Regional Planning Survey, and you don’t want your home address to be geo-coded, put on a publicly-accessible map, or archived.
This resolution was passed in May 2014 allowing ETC Institute to conduct a survey of residents in the Jonesboro MPO planning area. If you’ll click on the “1. Agreement” hyperlink on that page next to Attachments, it will bring up the 31-page Agreement of Services. (Or you may read it here.) It’s a long document, but you’ll want to read it, as it may affect you. Page 29 addresses non-English speaking participants (the survey may be conducted in Spanish), and page 30 mentions that the survey was mailed to 2,000 residents and that ETC will conduct follow-up phone calls to ensure that 400 surveys are completed.
Keep in mind, the Jonesboro Metropolitan Planning Organization is in cooperation with Arkansas State Highway & Transportation Department. We went to the Jonesboro MPO (Metropolitan Planning Organization) website, and one of their pages says this:
“Additionally, the MPO provides technical assistance relating to transportation and development planning; conducts special transportation studies; develops maps and other data products for use by planners, developers, elected officials and other stakeholders; and engages in a variety of other activities that promote regional planning.” [bold emphasis ours]
We have written articles in the past warning you of the dangers of Regionalism and regional planning.
It appears that this survey is really just asking for your support and consensus. The Metropolitan Planning Organization of Jonesboro has gone too far, and the residents are going to have to decide that ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!
In case you didn’t receive a survey, here are a few of the sample questions:
#11 of the survey asks “Would you be willing to pay a little more in taxes to fund any of the following? [Check all that apply.]” They mention new roads, new sidewalks, bikeways, multi-use trails (trails for pedestrians and bicyclists), expansion of bus routes to include more places in town, expansion of bus days/hours of operation, acquire land for future roads, and an option for “I am not willing to pay more taxes to fund any of the above.”
#12 of the survey asks if you’ve ever used public transit in the Jonesboro/Craighead County area (JETS, BRAD, or NEAT) and, if so, how often.
#24 asks your household’s ANNUAL income.
You can’t have a Metropolitan Planning Organization without them implementing and being involved in transportation.
Some deceptive and misleading practices Sustainable Development / Regional planners use:
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Manipulating the vocabulary – Planners use leading, manipulative words and marketing vocabulary to skew their audience’s opinions and garner support. They want you to buy into their sustainable plans. Phrases like “healthy cities”, “sustainable homes”, “livable communities” are used to create subconscious support by the public without a true understanding of long-term and, we believe, unfavorable outcomes.
J. Gary Lawrence, advisor to President Clinton’s Council on Sustainable Development, said:
“Participating in a U.N. advocated planning process would very likely bring out many of the conspiracy- fixated groups and individuals in our society… This segment of our society who fear ‘one-world government’ and a U.N. invasion of the United States through which our individual freedom would be stripped away would actively work to defeat any elected official who joined ‘the conspiracy’ by undertaking LA21. So we call our process something else, such as comprehensive planning, growth management or smart growth.” [bold emhasis ours]
Mr. Lawrence has also stated that any references to the U.N. (United Nations) should be avoided. He recommends that Agenda 21 should be described using terms like Smart Growth, STAR Sustainable Communities, green jobs, “going green,” alternative energy, regional planning, conservation easements, and sustainable farming.
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Manipulating and controlling the process
Mr. Lawrence writes in The Millennium Papers “ISSUE 2: The Future of Local Agenda 21 in the New Millennium” that planning should “change community decisions about what can or will be discussed and who has a right to be at the table.”
America’s leading planners, like Andres Duany (the Architect of Seven-50), believes that public meetings are no longer needed and that we should just “trust them”. This is NOT what America is all about! Our government should be of the people, by the people, and for the people… not an unaccountable bureaucracy whom we should just blindly trust with nearly every facet of our lives.
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Managing resident and public behavior
Some training organizations recommend models for changing public behavior, and these involve: defining their target, impressing that target, tracking those you have convinced regarding your plan/idea, developing rapport with the target, and finally asking the target to agree with your plan/idea. Metropolitan planners use similar schemes. It appears to us that this is what the Jonesboro Metropolitan Planning Organization is doing.
We believe all Sustainable Development plans have restrictions and regulations that could infringe on your property rights and lifestyle, and that these designs will raise taxes and hidden costs that will be uncovered as the plan goes along. This will restructure the economy of the whole City of Jonesboro. We believe that participating in these Sustainable schemes could cause detrimental outcomes in the long run.
This Greensboro Village Town Center plan, which we’ve mentioned in our past 4 articles, falls under Sustainable Development which is under the U.N. Agenda 21 plan. We may have shared this quote before from The Local Agenda 21 Planning Guide published in 1996 by ICLEI (International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives): “No one fully understands how or even, if, sustainable development can be achieved; however, there is growing consensus that it must be accomplished at the local level if it is ever to be achieved on a global basis.” This is what Metro Planning is all about, and this involves Sustainable Development.
The World Commission on Environment and Development (the Brundtland Commission) wrote “Our Common Future”, a report that includes information about President Clinton’s Executive Order 12852 – The President’s Council on Sustainable Development. Sustainable Development is defined by the Brundtland Commission as “…development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” But we must realize that this present generation has needs, too.
A lot of federal grant money (YOUR tax dollars) is being used by Sustainable Development planners, and it can really restrict community planning choices. It’s not “free money”! It has strings attached… and consequences.
In closing, we encourage you to continue to ask critical questions and contact your elected officials. Please protect the future of Jonesboro. Don’t buy into Sustainable Development / U.N. Agenda 21 schemes! They involve a leftist/ communist/ fascist plan of oppression under the guise of Environmentalism.
Shame on us for our lack of involvement in local government. Because we’ve not attended local quorum courts and city council meetings, we’ve inadvertently allowed the state and local government to implement Regionalism. Remember: whatever the consequences are which befall Jonesboro, it’s in the residents’ hands. It looks to us like you have no choice but to attend these meetings… or send someone who CAN attend.
Please forward this email to your family and friends!
Securing the blessings of liberty,
Secure Arkansas
securetherepublic.com/arkansas
info@securetherepublic.com
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