By Susan Keith
Keith represents ward 2 on the Selma City Council.

In order for any city to be successful and to retain its success, the three most crucial issues its government must focus on are education, public safety, and quality of life. Since the city of Selma is, by law, a completely separate entity from our board of education, the city can, and should, be a partner with the BOE. We have no business in the day-to-day operations.

Public Safety has commanded much of our attention in the past eight years. We continue to examine ways to make our city safer and make our citizens feel genuinely secure. Great strides have been made. Our new chief of police, our district attorney, and our sheriff are all working with other agencies, and each other, to provide as much protection possible, and focus teams to target drug, gang, and violent crime.

The Public Safety Committee continues to work within the community and with law enforcement to improve services. Drainage issues, street cave-ins, pavement erosion, broken pipes and other infrastructural issues are on our minds daily. It is going to take a lot of planning, a lot of layered funding, someone with a lot of knowledge, and a lot of people who aren’t afraid of hard work to rectify the situation. Mayor Melton and the city council are working to identify and implement real solutions. We also have quality of life infrastructure that is in need. What is quality of life? It’s those things that we see and do that give us joy — joie de vivre. Things that make us say “that’s what I’m talking about — that’s why I want to live in Selma, Alabama!” Citizens can help in this area the most. Clean streets, garbage being picked up, grass mowed, and property that has been horribly neglected are safety issues and take priority in the aesthetic funding stream.

Selma has some very nice playgrounds all over town. We need to make an effort to protect the equipment, not abuse, or allow older kids to abuse, it. It costs nothing to take care of what has been given for our enjoyment.  The tennis and basketball courts need regular maintenance, as the courts are beginning to get dangerous due to cracks and other weather damage. The restrooms at the stadiums and the tennis courts are terrible, some unusable. This is going to take serious money to fix, yet needs to be done. Each tournament or track meet that we don’t have is revenue lost that could go back into the recreation department, not to mention the enjoyment people get from playing tennis, basketball and walking.

If we have community leaders come to the forefront and help with their areas of interests, we can effect a real and meaningful change in Selma. With our population down, our tax base down and people not always doing what they are supposed to do, it is becoming increasingly hard to meet all the requirements. Let’s work together to tackle the “solutions in work clothes.” It takes all of us to make Selma be her best!