Village Living
| July 2010 |
www.VillageLivingOnline.com
neighborly news & entertainment for Mountain Brook
Sam Gaston
Market Day
Sports
Lane Parke Yes pg 10
pg6
pg 12
Volume 1 | Issue 4 | July 2010
Watkins Brook flood work City Council approves amended plan underway By Jennifer Gray
By Jennifer Gray and Dan Starnes
The City Council voted by a show of hands
On Monday, June 28 the City Council voted 4-1 to approve the proposed development known as Lane Parke. The vote came after a year long process that involved multiple hearings, hundreds of emails to council members, and yard signs both for and against the project around the city. After the meeting John Evans said, “We’re gratified that the City is giving us the opportunity to do this project after three years of planning.” The ordinance passed with
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• Swank
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• Kari Kampakis
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• Summer Reading
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• Andy Portera
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• School House
16
• Renee McMinn
18
• Calendar of Events
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councilmen Billy Pritchard, Jack Carl, Jesse Vogtle and City Council President Virginia Smith voting in favor. Councilman Bob Moody was the only “no” vote. In his statement before the vote, Moody said, “This is the most important decision the City Council will or has ever made.” Others making statements prior to the vote were City Council President Smith, councilmen Vogtle and Pritchard. All emphasized their appreciation for the public’s involvement in the process. “The design has changed and evolved for the
better because of your comments,” Smith said. Immediately following the meeting, Mayor Terry Oden addressed the crowd still present, speaking most directly to those who fought against the Lane Parke plan. “I know exactly how you feel,” he said, referring to his own disappointing loss in his fight against the Cahaba Village project that culminated in a failed lawsuit. “Learn from my mistakes,” he said. “Get on board or let it go.”
Since 1995, when Hurricane Opal swept through our state -- including Mountain Brook -- flooding has been a severe and reoccurring problem along Watkins Brook. The brook is a tributary of Shades Creek and the portion that runs through Mountain Brook Village is of greatest concern. Flooding in this area creates the potential of large amounts of property damage in the historic Village and the areas surrounding it. This area is home to many of Mountain Brook’s local businesses and is a source of the City’s tax base and revenue. Large amounts of property damages in this area could result in a financial blow to those businesses and the City along with the potential threats to individual safety to those in that area. Finding a solution to this problem has been a top priority of the City for some time. After Hurricane Opal, the City of
SEE FLOOD | pg 11
“The Girl With A Future” Faye Ireland Remembers the U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps during World War II By Jim Noles Sixty-five years ago, on July 4, 1945, President Harry S. Truman delivered a brief speech as his war-weary nation paused to celebrate the anniversary of its independence. “In this year of 1945,” the President declared, “we have pride in the combined might of this nation which has contributed signally to the defeat of the enemy in Europe. We have confidence that, under Providence, we may soon crush the enemy in the Pacific. We have humility for the guidance that has been given us of God in serving His will as a leader of freedom for the world.” But bearing the mantle of freedom’s leadership through the Second World War exacted a heavy toll. Birmingham’s Faye Belt Ireland, a member of the U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps during the Second World War, still attests to that. On December 7, 1941, Ireland was a freshman Chi Omega at the University of Alabama, attending a Sunday lunch at the Pi Kappa Alpha House. One of the Pikes turned on the radio for some music; instead, they heard the announcement of Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor. “We didn’t know what to think,” Ireland recalled, “but the world changed
Faye Ireland with her granddaughter Kitty who is studying to become a nurse
right there. We knew that, with Roosevelt supplying Great Britain, there might be a war with Germany, but Japan?” “It seems like everyone ran off to enlist,” she said. “But so many of those boys had what we called ‘white-coat syndrome’ – as soon as they saw the doctor walk in his white coat, their blood pressure rose and they failed their induction physical.” “But they had a solution for that,” she laughed. “They’d go home and go on
a four-day diet of grapefruit and epsom salts. By the time they went back in for their physicals, they’d be so washed out and weak that high blood pressure wasn’t a problem!” As Ireland watched her friends depart for the war, she decided that she wanted to join the effort herself. Before, she had harbored ambitions of studying to become
SEE NURSE | pg 9
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