Monday’s city council meeting addressed two of the biggest issues facing local leaders, but the way those issues were handled still left many questions avoided and unanswered.

A zoning ruling before the meeting technically permits tattoo shops to open their doors within city limits, but the rules are so specific and restrictive that none are likely to ever do so. The council ruled that tattoo shops can exist, but only in areas zoned I-1 (light industrial) and at least 500 feet away from churches, schools, recreation areas, libraries, government buildings, or property intended for residential use. A site south of town on Hwy. 27 in the former Teddy D’s barber shop building which had been the proposed future location for such a business doesn’t meet that standard since it’s located in front of a subdivision and across the highway from LaFayette Church of God. Entrepreneurial tattooists would do well to set up shop outside the city limits so they can be free of the city council’s repressive and ever-changing zoning standards.

During the actual meeting, the topic of licensing beer and wine sales in the city was brought back up by Wayne Winters, whose persistence pushed the issue to a public vote (sort of) back in November. Winters’ position (and the position of The Underground) is that voting for legalization of all alcohol (including hard liquor) within the city limits didn’t give citizens a chance to decide about selling beer and wine. Twins Pizza owner Key Koukos spoke about business lost to Chickamauga and Ft. Oglethorpe restaurants that sell beer. (He recently lost my business to any restaurant whose servers can take a drink order in under fifteen minutes.)

As predicted here on Monday, the council dismissed all topics related to beer sales, saying the people of LaFayette already had their say on the issue in November’s vote, even though the vote didn’t specifically address beer and wine alone. Mayor Florence noted that any further action regarding beer, wine, or alcohol would be held “later next year” if at all – squelching any possibility of seeing beer or wine sold in restaurants before the November 2010 election. Winters, who says the meeting “sucked,” is expected to continue his campaign until he either gets a straight vote for beer and wine or gets banned from attending council meetings.

The meeting’s most heated topic of discussion was about November’s council-sanctioned cemetery cleanup/desecration. After listening to several speakers with relatives in the city cemetery, the council presented a workable plan to better manage the burial ground’s future. That plan includes forming a new cemetery committee comprised of the mayor, two councilmen, the city manager, and seven residents who serve at nonprofit groups or have relatives buried in the cemetery.

According to Florence the new committee already met for several hours to clarify and revise cemetery rules, adding several compromises to allow items other than flowers to be left on graves. Cemetery clean ups will be held on three set days each year and will be conducted by community organizations such as the Boy Scouts or (probably) Sons of Confederate Veterans. Overall the plan makes sense and achieves a good balance of keeping the graveyard clean and limiting tacky or bulky items while still allowing grieving families to put appropriate mementoes on their loved ones’ graves.

However the true test will be in how the new rules are implemented and enforced. The old cemetery rules, while not as flexible, were not in themselves terrible and didn’t directly lead up to November’s incident. The problem in November came from a lack of communication and from how the council’s orders were interpreted by city officials and their employees. Concerns about the chain of command within LaFayette Public Works were not addressed, and no questions were answered about who within the city government (or council itself) was responsible for what happened. Until that mess is figured out, the possibility for cemetery mismanagement will remain.

As part of the new cemetery rules, the council voted to knock down the ugly and disorganized cemetery storage building. (That was strongly suggested here on the Underground a month ago, and we’ll gladly take credit for the decision if we can get away with it.) Hopefully the city will take care of that clean up task itself instead of leaving it up to the Boy Scouts.