Readers comment on the Gainesville VA hospital and proposed zoning changes

Shameless grandstanding

Florida’s U.S. senator, Marco Rubio, is a cipher. Invisible in our part of the state, and frequently in the Senate, he continually has one of the worst attendance records in that body. His July 5 column was a crass example of political posturing.

Rubio used the unfortunate death, two years ago, of a veteran denied care at the Gainesville VA, due to procedural mistakes, to criticize that facility, take a swipe at President Joe Biden, overstate his own commitment to veterans and imply that he favors strong government action to address institutional problems.

To be sure, that individual’s death was heartbreaking. While nothing will bring him back, I am certain the staff at Malcolm Randall have addressed this mistake by thoroughly investigating, and then providing hours of in-services and corrective action. Given their impressive record of quality care, Rubio’s column, questioning the “knowledge, competence and dedication” of staff on this one failure is shameless grandstanding.

Rubio calls for more governmental oversight, reform and new legislation — curious rhetoric from an acolyte of limited government. What it really means is he’s seeking re-election against a strong candidate and couldn’t resist a cheap shot against an exceptional provider of health care for thousands of local vets to promote himself.

Greg McGann, Gainesville 

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No accountability

Despite public opposition, the City Commission is poised to permanently change the single-family neighborhood zoning throughout the city to multi-family zoning in order to incentivize developers to construct apartment units in those neighborhoods. It is difficult to discern exactly why this re-zoning is being so relentlessly driven by Mayor Lauren Poe and commissioners Adrian Hayes-Santos, David Arreola and Reina Saco.

Mayor Poe has asserted that our current single-family zoning is a remnant of old segregationist policies that we should correct by doing away with single-family zoning. But many Black neighborhood leaders are also fighting to protect their neighborhoods and oppose the zoning change.

The commissioners also claim, without any evidence, that the re-zoning will protect our environment by allowing more people to live in Gainesville, thereby reducing urban sprawl. But subdivisions and apartments are already going up in the county and along the major roads leading into Gainesville.

These four commissioners claim that re-zoning will result in the construction of more affordable housing but there is no data to support this idea, which has been rejected by experts. And, as we have seen all over town, developers are unwilling to sacrifice profits to provide low-cost housing.

Frustrated residents trying to stop the re-zoning may only have the ballot box as their last recourse. However, Poe, Hayes-Santos and Saco are not seeking re-election and will not be held accountable on voting day. When the commission votes on the zoning changes, it will be a packed meeting with a lot of disgruntled residents seeking answers.

Gary Appelson, Gainesville

Do no harm

It’s clear Gainesville needs affordable housing for the patient residents who’ve been promised it for decades and for the massive influx of people destined to move here in the next few years. But I don’t want the City Commission to rush a vote ending single-family zoning simply because, at this moment, they have the votes to pass it.

Why are they in such a frantic hurry? Genuinely altruistic commissioners would have sought broader consensus, but they did the exact opposite by limiting public input at meetings and by not holding sufficient and well-advertised forums.

Multiplex zoning would be the most complex, transformational, consequential, potentially devastating and — most importantly — irreversible land use plan Gainesville has ever considered and deserves more cautious deliberation than we’ve had thus far.

Increasing density and avoiding sprawl must be balanced by keeping our city from devolving into a wasteland of unrecognizable residential neighborhoods destroyed by incongruous multiplex buildings brought to us by indifferent out-of-town developers and overly agreeable commissioners.

Doctors all pledge, in the Hippocratic Oath, to do no harm. Pity, elected officials aren’t required to do the same. This may be Gainesville’s tsunami moment.

George Papadi, Gainesville 

Pure folly

I would like to thank Jackie Davis for her thoughtful column against abolishing single-family zoning citywide.

I'm old enough to remember what the student ghetto was like. Front yards stuffed with cars, abandoned furniture and bicycles and trash, lots of trash strewn about. Not knowing who your neighbors are semester after semester.

Any move toward sensible infill begins with efficient and reliable public transportation and roads safe for pedestrians and cyclists alike. Without that, urban in-fill is pure folly.

Removing single-family zoning protection for home owners is not the solution for affordable housing. Getting people into their own homes and protecting their property value is.

Stephen Bottomly, Gainesville

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This article originally appeared on The Gainesville Sun: Letter on the Gainesville VA hospital and proposed zoning changes