Taxpayers’ Association under attack

After being called “domestic terrorists”, the Dougherty County Taxpayers Association now find themselves in the cross hairs of the Secretary of State’s office, who sent a letter to the association inquiring about details of their inner workings. Richard Thomas believes the inquiry was initiated by Commissioner Roger Marietta, a charge Marietta denies.

Isn’t it glad this could be handled like adults?

For the record, there have been accusations thrown around that the DCTPA was “making money off the membership”, probably based on the fact that the organization isn’t a 503(c) organization, a move Thomas told the Herald was to protect members who may have a business relationship with the City and County. Associations leaders tell SWGAPolitics.com that many of the expenses are paid directly out of member’s pockets due to a lack of funds. For example, Tim Coley’s suit against the city to block the now infamous $6 million bond was apparently paid complete out of Coley’s pocket.

Then, in a WFXL interview, Commissioner Marietta referred to the group as “domestic terrorists”, a statement he said was taken out of context. Now, let’s just skip the fact that “domestic terrorist” is a term that should never be used to describe any group of citizens who engage in non-violent means, and say we accept that Commissioner Marietta at his word. He shouldn’t have said it, but everyone says things they shouldn’t. However, the Albany Journal reports that Commissioner Marietta engaged in the same rhetoric at least one more time since then.

Now we’ve got the Secretary of State’s office looking into the group, and a city commissioner claiming he had nothing to do with it, despite the ongoing feud with the group. Obviously, I’m quite sure that Commissioner Marietta understands if some people don’t believe him. Personally, I’m not entirely convinced he did launch the investigation. The reason? It’s really pretty simple.

A group like the DCTPA is going to make enemies. That’s kind of the point after all, and not all of those enemies are going to be vocal about it. Commissioner Marietta has engaged the group in emails for some time now, but other commissioners have remained fairly silent, and this doesn’t even touch the County Commission that the group plans to set it’s sights on soon enough. This significantly increases the potential pool instigators. And this says nothing of citizens who simply disagree with the group.

Who started the investigation? Who knows. What I do know is that it’s ridiculous that a group of concerned taxpayers is coming under fire from government sources, the target of their efforts. The DCTPA is definitely rattling some cages, which is obvious from the fact that now the Secretary of State is digging.

Luckily, I feel that if anything isn’t on the up and up, it’s merely an administrative issue that can quickly be cleaned up and moved past. Regardless of who launched the investigation, it’s clear that they’re grasping at straws to silence a group of concerned citizens who have organized and are scary to those in power. Sounds like they’re accomplishing part of the goal already, if you ask me.