Portland, Tennessee Blog

No, El Moro is doing well as always. The Donut sign was in their old building across from the JR Mart/Keystop. El Moro moved quite a while ago to the old Crossroads restaurant building.

Is El Moro out of business now.

Too funny, too bad it isn't for real. But I did see a sign on the old El Moro building that a new donut place was coming. Didn't we have one of those within the last year that only stayed open for a very short time? Hopefully this one will have better success, especially if they put in a drive thru!

There is a sign up on 52 saying Taco Bell and Captain D's coming soon.

APRIL FOOL'S

I know it is a bad joke but wont it be great when we can say it for real.

Happy April Fools day.

The Links to the HWY 52 Design are now active, however I couldn't get the pdf file to load.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronnie_McDowell

Just because you haven't heard of someone doesn't negate their accomplishments. I'm not what you would call a "fan", but I can appreciate his obvious talents and think it's great that Portland has honored him with a sign.

People were talking about the watershed sign's a couple weeks ago and while I like those signs there is a sign coming into Portland that I have to laugh at everytime I come home from eating in Gallatin or Hendersonville. The one that says Home of country music recording star Ronnie McDowell. What a joke. When I bring friends home they always say "who is Ronnie McD" And I just laugh and say nobody. I sure hope that someone donated that sign to the city and the city didn't waste tax dollars on it.

When they see the Corey Brewer sign at least they know who he is if they follow basketball.

Did anyone go to the Johnny Cash - June Carter festival event in Franklin, KY Saturday ?? It was a great event....Blue Highway Band gave a free concert....and Johnny Cash karaoke contest at the Brickyard later in the evening that was really fun.

That's what I thought but wanted to ask. Wanted to make sure there wasn't something weird wrong with my computer. Hope they notice the problem monday and fix it.
Thanks Debra P

No links there to click on!!

Has anyone been on the Portland website and seen this.

Hwy 52 West Design is in full gear - Click the following links to view conceptual plans that were presented at the March 25th Public Meeting:
Conservative Scenario: Land Use Transportation
Aggressive Scenario: Land Use Transportation

I can't seem to open the link's and wanted to know if I'm alone.

Just saw the Fox 17 news and the Kentucky casino's are dead for now.

Anyone having a yard sale this weekend? I'm itching to start going.

No, but that would be just GREAT!!!! :o)

Anyone hear about Molly Hatchet playing this year's Strawberry Festival?

Good Idea
I would like to see the Pictures since the Portland paper didn't put any in the paper for the readers to see. Would also be nice to have the pics put on the www.cityofportlandtn.gov so we could zoom in and out on the pics to see more detail. Don't think we can do that on here can we.

We went to the meeting and were very impressed by the pictures and plans for this area.I would like to see Charlie start a thread with some of the pictures so the rest of the town could discuss this.The city is wanting input on the direction they should go.That's what the last two meetings have been about,just giving opinions.

Anyone go to the meeting tonight (tuesday) about Highway 52 West visioning workshop. If so were there any good ideas discussed. I would liked to of went but didn't have time and forgot about it.

We have a dog that we are not going to be able to keep. If you would like to have it please post here. it is part lab and the other part we don't know. Maybe shepard? about 6 months old. Needs loving home and discipline. FREE. Urgent that we find it a home.

Anyone else get a weird Gas bill this month from the City??? My gas portion of the bill was only $24.64, last month it was $93.01 I'm in shock!! Surely it's a mistake, but I don't want to get hit with a $200. gas bill next month, I tried calling on Friday, but must of been a holiday. Guess I better overpay my bill so I don't get slammed next month!

There is no city election this year so the answer would have to be no.The next city election will be May of 2009.

Does anyone know if we will be able to have Liquor by the drink on the Ballot this fall. I know the last one only failed by five votes but don't know how long before we can vote on it again. Jody Mc if you read this I'm sure you know the answer.

Charlie,
If I see the dog again I will do so, but I won't be home until late this evening.

Hi, Tina,

Can you post the ID number from the black dog's rabies tag? Also is it a TN or KY tag? If we have that information, we can probably find the dog's owner.

Thanks.

If anyone has lost a very friendly black dog in the past couple of days, there is one over here by airport road in lindsey estates. It has a collar and a rabies tag on, but no id tag.

Speaking of junky lawns why isn't the city making these people clean up there property. There is a law on the books about this but it doesn't seem to matter. I don't know which place Moose is talking about but i have a few Ideas. I like the entrance coming into town on 52 between Dollar General and Krystal. That is the first thing many visitor's see coming into town. What kind of Impression does that leave on people.

Does anyone have a dump near them that needs cleaning up. Put it on here and maybe someone with the city will see it and we can get this town cleaned up. I think people take more pride in there town when it looks clean and neat.

Enough about the cool Watershed signs. They are up and paid for and life goes on. Time for a New subject.

Also if those signs have that effect, put one next to that junk pile going out of town on 109. You know the place I'm talking about. They need it.

Why does the general public need to know where the water drains to?
No one could care if anybody misspelled something on here, but $313K should be enough to make sure the signs are proof read and then double checked again for spelling and grammatical errors. I agree that people misspell things all the time. But, if it's something that important I'm going to double check and triple check it to make sure it's right.
If signs might keep people from littering, the "No Littering" signs with the fines clearly posted on them should be more than enough.

Another reason NOT to shop at CVS:

http://consumerist.com/369369/cvs-to-pay-367-million-for-improperly-switching-medications

Actually the cost of the signage came from the TDOT press release, not from the commentary articles, so I presume it is accurate.

MDL...Call some of the factories. They usually have pallets that they don't need.

MDL
The furniture store across from captian video usually has alot of stuff piled up by their dumpster. They might have some they would let you get.
If you don't have luck there ask the grocery store's.

I also like the sign's.

Since they put up the sign on the ridge I noticed a few other places in that area have been cleaned up. We will never know if this has anything to do with the signs or not.

I read the article in the Tennessean and it was a letter to the editor. The person that wrote the article said (There is no Watts Bar Lake Watershed). If you google Watts Bar lake you will see that the lake does exist and if there is a lake then there's a watershed that feeds it. The person was not smart enough to research what he was writing about. If they couldn't get that right the rest is probably not right including the cost of the signs. Also everyone misspell's from time to time and don't usually catch it till it's to late.

The writer sounded like they where a former employee of the company and wanted to stir up something.

Off topic....

Does anyone know of anywhere in town that I can get some free pallets?

Sorry CD, I'm still not convinced that it is money well spent. Please don't misunderstand--I'm not denying that protection of our water supply is important, I just think this was not a useful way of achieving it. I'm not convinced that the cleanup of that dump has anything specifically to do with the watershed sign, and I still don't buy the idea that $313,000 spent to educate one person is a justifiable expense--you could have contracted a dozen people to go town-to-town educating people for a year and had a much greater effect for the same amount of money and given a dozen people an employment opportunity for that year. I believe most people who care about what they are dumping don't have to be told where the water drains to know it's a bad idea to dump pollutants. People who didn't care before still won't care.

I like the new signs. Since they put the one up on the ridge going to Gallatin I've noticed that the dump next to the sign is finally being cleaned up.

I heard the sign's were the frist step in educating poeple that their property drains into certain water supply's. If they dump something like trash, used oil, or other chemicals that it will end up in there drinking water. Now people that are dumping can't say they were not aware they were polluting our water systems. If it makes just one person stop and think twice about dumping some poison that will end up in Portland's drinking water don't you think it is worth it.

Nashville-Davidson county has been cleaning up all the streams in their area because it is good for the enviroment and it cost a lot less to process drinking water if it is clean which helps keep water rates down.

Money well spent.

I feel more educated about the different ways the taxpayer get screwed. I wonder whose pocket got lined for this B.S.?

Sorry, I did a little different Google search and found a TDOT press release explaining the watershed signs from April 2007. Frankly, I don't feel any better about it now--$313,000 for 187 signs across Tennessee--and from two other newspaper commentaries I found, the information is not even all accurate, and some of the signs in the Knoxville area are actually misspelled. The stated purpose is just to educate the public about these watersheds. Does anyone feel educated after $313,000 worth of signs? Does anyone feel like they are going to do anything differently than they are currently doing because of where the water from a particular area will end up? If you are not conscious of the contamination of waterways with littering or chemical contamination of groundwater, I believe that these signs will have zero impact in your life; and if you are conscious of such things, it likely will also have zero impact in your life. This money would have been better spent to maintain the state budget for educational and home care programs for disabled Tennessee residents or law enforcement or...well, I'm sure there are at least a few dozen more projects where this money would have reaped more benefit for the taxpayers.

Does anyone know the significance of the "Watershed" signs that have appeared on several highways. I drove up I-24 to Kentucky over the weekend and saw them there, in addition to the ones that appeared on I-65 and Hwys. 52 and 109. At first blush, this looks to me like somebody's pet environmental project and it looks like they have wasted a lot of taxpayer dollars on these signs that mean nothing to most people and which will have minimal benefit to anyone. I've been watching for any news stories that tell me there is a really valuble purpose in these signs, but if there has been such a story, I've missed it. I'm surely willing to listen if anyone has answers.

Thanks for the help guys! I got my stuff listed LOL

Here is a Yahoo group for Sumner Co.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SumnerCountyBST

You can advestise things For Sale and also Yard Sales.

There is a Portland freecycle website you can access which will allow you to post items for free. You can access it at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PortlandTNfreecycle/

Also, there is a Portland "garage sale" site where you can list things to sell. You can access it at http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/PortlandTennesseeGarageSales/

Hope this helps!

Is there some site that we can use to advertise yard sales/moving sales, or just things we are selling? We are going to be moving and are selling ALOT of our stuff and need some way to advertise LOL I'm not sure if we can do that on here or not.

Thanks

Does anyone Know if they are going to tear down the old Car wash by the Panther Den. There is a sign up on the fence saying Panther Pride car wash coming soon. Just wondering if it was going to be revamped or knocked down and rebuilt. It needs something since it is an eyesore as you are coming into town.

Yeah, I think mine was a different case, sorry about the mix-up!!! I completely agree with you guys though...your heart pours out for the kids because they didnt do anything wrong to deserve the conditions they have to live...and whats worse they probably dont know any different!

Sorry guy's half of my comment got cut off, it should read that if Unknown did go to the P.D. that she done all she could do and it's sad that so many people have abused the system by trying to get people they didn't like in trouble that when someone is trying to help a child that need's it, noone want's to help them, and I agree with DeeAnna that I have no word's for these so called parent's of these children or what should be done to them...

Unknown, you must be talking about 2 different cases, the 11 mth old that's in Vandy lived I believe it was North Harris Rd. I could be wrong about the road but it was on Sunday the second. I listened to this on the scanner and it was pitiful. You could hear the panic and sadness in the officer's voices and it is such a shame. What's even worse is you are talking about a completely different family and yet it's almost the same story. What is wrong with people? I can't stand the thought of my child having their feeling's hurt much less taking them and throwing them around and beating them. I feel bad for you having to have seen these kid's in this shape, and if you went with DeeAnna about not having word's for these so called parent's or what should be done to them...

I read the portland leader and **if im not mistaken** it said they found them on Thursday..I may be wrong though. Unfortantely I left my cell phone at my inlaws so I couldnt call..the other three ladies did call, and I went to the police station. I completely agree with you, which is why it makes me furious! There are families who cannot have children who wold love to give them a better life. The parents did not seem to care, and never comforted the baby after he was found...i researched this a little more...i think this maybe a different case...this happened right down from city hall..I think that there are just two different cases, but I could be wrong.

Unknown,

I am not sure where you got your info, but the 11 month old taken to Vandy on a Sunday March 2nd. Did you find the other siblings the week prior or after? If you found this situation, you should have stayed at the house and called 911. That way the police dept could have seen it right then and there. Did the mother even say 'thank you?' Either way, this couple obviously does not need to have children in their custody. There are plenty of families out there more than willing. and capable of caring for children.

Hey guys..thought i would give a little insight on the child issue.. I was riding home the other day..on Tuesday (they found the boy on Thursday)and that little boy was out in the middle of the road. A truck almost hit him, so 4 of us women stopped to see what was going on! When we walked him up to his house we found 4 more kids. One was in a bathing suit with no coat or shoes, one was in short overalls with no shirt or no underwear, and the 11 month old was missing a diaper and a coat! The kids were covered in mud from head to toe and looked like they hadnt had a bath in about a week! I always saw this kind of stuff on the news, but never knew it was around here. When we asked for the parents...they were in bed ASLEEP!!! They walked out and had no clue what was going on...the house was not up to codes and was the nastiest site ever!! No back door, trash everywhere, etc. Stuff that could easily be taken care of without spending money, but simply picking up. So when we were heading back to the care, the mother yells to the kids, Get your a**'s in the house right now!! We all knew we werent leaving them in good hands, so we went on up to the police station. We went on Tuesday, and this supposedly happened on Thursday...I wanna know why it wasnt taken care of on Tuesday..maybe this would have been prevented!

Speaking of terrible things, a couple of weeks ago, there was a man arrested on my street for molesting children. I've seen this man many times outside with his kids and neighbor children playing with them, riding bikes with them, etc. I have 3 children myself. My youngest is a 5 year old little girl. It makes my stomach turn, to think that you can't even let your children go outside to play in the sunshine, b/c you never know who your neighbors are! I've even gone on the pediphile website prior to this man being arrested, to see if any lived near us. It's just a crying shame. What is this world coming to? To beat all, I could have sworn that I seen him in the car with his wife on Friday.

I saw that on the news and in the paper.
This story is just beyond horrible and tragic.
On one of the tv reports, I thought it said the child was crying and interrupted the video game the dad was playing !! Yes, will be sure to keep the child in my prayers ....I have no words I can put in print for those parents.

Hey guys, Has anyone seen the report on the local news stations about the child abuse that occured in Portland on 3-2-08 to an 11 month old boy? If so, please keep that child and his brothers and sisters in your prayers. They really need it now. The news and Portland Police stated the child was not doing good. He had a couple of skull fractures from being thrown around. Great job by Portland Police on the investigation quickly arresting the parents. Who knew running out of cigarettes could cause this.

What a great idea about putting the restaurant comments on the blog....that would be really a good thing....I hope they do it.

Someone that starts these threads should talk to all the local restaurants and see if they would like their own thread for input. Each restaurant could use these to improve their service and quality by reading customer's comment's. People could leave their complaint's or praises about their visit. The restaurant's that want to do this could have this blog address available ( VISIBLE ) for their customers to go to and leave their comments. This could help them and also be good advertisment for this site.

The restaurant manager's or owner's would have to get on here and read what people are saying though. They could also use this to inform people of changes or even specials if this site would allow that. In my opinion this could only improve everyones dining experience's here in Portland.

My dog is loving this snow. He has been romping and playing in it all day. As it was coming down, he was catching snowflakes out of the air in his mouth. I think he played himslef out though. Now he is sunning on the concrete pad.

My wife and I thought about bundling up our son Jack and getting him out in it, but we just didn't feel like he was old enough yet. If we could have built a snowman and got a fmaily picture beside it real quick, we may have done it though.

Hope everyone enjoys the snow.

It was pretty though! We got maybe three inches here at our house. No snowman making though!

Wow! I am surprised we got so much snow! Too bad it is too powdery for snowman making! :-P

I have seen them advertised in the local papers, I assume this is still being done.
As with all public meetings they are open to all.
The most I have ever seen attend is 3 at one time, most of the time there is only 1 or none.

I asked Ms.Johnson about a month ago if a calender such as the one posted on the city hall bulletin board could be posted on the city's website.It is a physical calender of each month showing the meeting dates and times for that particular month.She said she would look into seeing if it could be done.It would make it much easier than trying to figure out what thursday of the month it is or whether a holiday has pushed a meeting back a week or not.Just a suggestion.

That's great, Mike. WHERE are the meetings advertised? When Mr. Calloway was in office, the Town Meetings were held every month, I believe, and were in the newspaper. Is this still being done?

The Mayor has held one every quarter, just to let citizens share their thoughts and concerns on any topic.
They are advertised.

Could one of our council people post something about the Town Meeting with the Mayor that is on the calendar for March. What's it for, who can attend, where, etc. etc. Is this the first for this or have I not realized these have taken place in the past. Thanks - Judy

I am glad to see them fix the building up and use it. Great improvement from it's previous condition while sitting vacant.

I heard that a thrift shop is going in at the building in question (the tiny building across from Studio 180). I personally don't think that's a good idea, but it's not my call. I think we need to tear down the old buildings in town and try to look toward the future like the city is doing with their 20 year plan for Hwy 52W.

I hate a raise in property tax as much as the next person, especially since now I have to pay it. And I know, time after time, we have had to fight to keep the tax from being raised, and the Council has responded. I just want to be honest here, since I give those on the Council a hard time ever so often, and admit that Portland has done a pretty good job of keeping the property tax low and not raising it.

I am having trouble remembering the last time property taxes were raised. I think it was two mayors ago which would put it the neighborhood of 6-10 years. The rate has actually gone down during that time as well. I think the Mayor and Council need cudos for that.

However, in politics, there are those that love to spend money. And believe me I know it. I spent four years playing the bad guy having to shoot down great ideas because we could not afford them without raising property taxes. But overall, this Council has done a good job of not doing so, and that is in large part because of the people of Portland being vocal in their opposition to such things.

Ya got to admit, at least they are asking for the public's input. Often times the government just does it and to heck with what the public wants.

Has anyone seen the new poll on the portland website. Should the City provide adequate civic meeting places and Library space? Here's the option's....

No. No matter what.
Yes. Increase property tax to fund it.
Yes. If other services could be cut to fund it.
Need more information.

It would seem all this town want's to do is raise the property tax every time they want something.

Portland people need a bill to vote on like other city's have that says the city can't raise Property tax's unless the voters vote to raise their taxes. This make's the leaders work harder to get new Business's to come to town so the city can generate the tax money they need for these types of projects. It's easy to say let's just raise the property tax's.

We need someone that knows how to get something put on the voter's Ballot before it's to late.

Thanks ACE I knew that I would get an answer on here. Do you or anyone else know what if anything is gonig in that building. It looks like it would be good for a barber shop or a small diner.

The owners of El Moro sold the door and window from their old location to the owners of the little blue building. They received MANY inquires as to whether or not they were moving. They had to ask the new owners to remove the logo from the door. El Moro is happy where they are!

Does anyone know if El Moro is moving into the little blue building across from extreme fitness. I know that some of the windows have El Moro logo's or something on them. The front glass door did have El Moro on it a while back but now it is a plain glass door. I've just been trying to Figure this one out and wondered if anyone knew.

Thanks Tim, I appreciate the suggestion. What I might do is just go the other way and turn left so that I come out by the police station. The only time that I have trouble is is usually on Sundays when I am going to church. My church is located on Hwy 52. I don't mind going the long way if it will save me from hurting myself or someone else.

Wow, this turned "catty" quickly! I agree with Jessica and Hello...whatever it is, parking lot or road, it is very dangerous and confusing...it is just an "odd" little intersection that could definitely be improved upon...whatever your take on this subject, no need to wish ill will on someone else -- like having a cop pull them over! Come on people!

If you have problems getting the parking problem taken care of, you can always get to N. Russell by cutting across on C.L. Powell off of Davis. I advoided the intersection of Victor Reiter and N. Russell like the plague when I live on N. Russell for the very reason you are mentioning. If you are worried about getting hit there, the other intersection may work better for you depending on where you are trying to get to.

Thank you Jessica. "Right and Not a Road" seem to have definate problems with people stating their problems. Fist off "Not a Road" I believe that is part of the road. That's why there is a stop sign and an arrow. If that is part of the parking lot, why is it attatched to the road? It sure looks like a part of the road to me. And, one more thing, I do not have too much time on my hands, good Lord, get a grip. I just don't want to pull out in front of someone that happens to be traveling down Russell St. B/c I can't see around the cars that are parked, I pull right out in front of them causing a wreck. That is hardly having too much time on my hands. That is just trying to be cautious!!. And for you "Right" I do not cut across parking lots. It is illegal, and can be dangerous.

Once again, thank you Jessica

Not a road,
How is worrying about crashing into someone else's car having too much time on someone's hands? Do you just go around town taking chances of slamming into people? I surely would hope not.I come from Russel every Sunday morning to head to my church and quite a few times have been almost t-boned because someone in a huge SUV has parked so far out in the ROAD that anyone coming from VR can only take a chance by pulling out into the possible traffic.Granted there IS a parking lot there,however, when your vehicle is far too large to fit in the spot all the way, folks need not park there..I mean it is just like at any other parking lot, you can not be out in the road. I don't think the preacher would have much say in this situation,exactly what would you suggest he do? This is a road safety issue that needs to be addressed by the police...

You are correct! I think the police should be notified so that they can patrol that road and pull "hello" over when he/she cuts across the church parking lot. That's still illegal isn't it? :>)

That is not part of the road actually. It is part of the parking lot. And simply calling the preacher if it is that big of a deal to you since you must have free time on hands would be the best bet.

I would think that double parking issue should interest the police dept. That's who I would call.

Debra, Thanks for asking, and Yes I will gladly update it weekly to keep it out front, I went to the monthly because some complained that the weekly one was over riding other topics of interest, but I have on occasions brought it forward when it starts getting burried so it stays closer to the top. I'll try to keep it dated so it will remain out front.

Ok, I know that I have complained about this subject once before and I need to tell someone about it. So, this past Sunday morning, The Church of Christ located on Russell St., people were double parked. You know how Victor Reiter makes a Y when it meets Russell St? Well one side of the Y (closest to the church) was completely blocked by several people double parking. Isn't this illegal? Blocking roads? Does anyone know who I could talk to about this? I hate to be a tattle-tale, but when you are trying to pull out of Victor Reiter, you have to pull really far up to see past the cars to see if anything is coming before you can pull out.

Judy, Would it be possible for you to move the FRONT PAGE threads to the top every week? Some times they get buried 3 or 4 threads down. I wish we had kept it where you started a new thread every week. Thanks

This has been a topic that brought quite a bit of heat in the past, partly due to topics being deleted that were some what still active, less than 6 months old and receiving comments. It was brought to the administrator of the blog Charlie who in the end determined that the blog was in some ways considered history from within Portland, a diary of thoughts if you will, and didn't feel they should be deleted.

I was and still am against deleting posts that are current (any topic that received a comment within the past 90 days) Much of the blog is old posts that have had no activity, the way it is set up is any new post and most of the current ones will be on the main page of the blog, once they roll off the front page they are filtered into the categories they were originally assigned, at that time you will access them thru the links to the right of the page. So if you are using links to read posts chances are they are not real current.

Until such time the administrators change this, we (blog authors) are asked not to delete any topic we start. It is only the author that can delete a post/topic they start which in turn removes all comments that were posted with it. I hope this explains a little bit.

Thats not a bad idea some of it is a little old. Me as a new poster have been reading a lot of stuff thats really old.. Current Events would be nice to see.

Someone should Clean the Blog up and remove some of the old stuff that no one has commented on for 6 months or 1 year. The blog should be Kept up to date and removing old stuff might be a good idea.

What do others think.