Over the weekend, still another couple of buildings on Pine Bluff's main drag collapsed, leaving still more rubble blocking Main Street, endangering public safety and generally contributing to the mess that the storied old river city has become in its failing old age.
The scene along the town's Main Street today, with the remains of historic structures scattered here and there, could be a snapshot of London during the Blitz, or maybe of Berlin circa 1945--a collection of ruins. With the Red Army and the rest of the occupying forces expected at any moment.
It's tempting to stick a crude sign atop this latest mound of dust and debris in Pine Bluff's downtown. It would read: Here Lies Pine Bluff, a Great Little Town in its Day.
Happily, Pine Bluff now has a reform-minded mayor, Debe Hollingsworth, who's all for treating an emergency like an emergency. She called a special meeting of the city council the other day in order to take $240,000 out of the city's reserves and use it--now--to clean up this latest mess, and danger, on Main Street.
Unhappily, Pine Bluff still has a divided city council full of the apathetic types who have been the bane of local government for years, and they refused to read the mayor's proposed ordinance a couple more times--a requisite for passing local legislation--and make it law.
The aginners offered the usual reasons, or rather excuses, for doing nothing to solve a pressing problem: It would cost too much, why not run down the absentee owners instead, and other rationales for doing pretty much nothing. And so Main Street, like local government in Pine Bluff, remains blocked.
Looking over the sad history of too many once thriving cities in Arkansas that have become ghost towns, one reason for their decay becomes obvious: apathy aggravated by the kind of local "leaders" who fail to lead.
Editorial on 02/28/2015