Sorry, if any community that is or was part of Roanoke Rapids deserves an apology and medal it is that community.
For years, residents in Brandy Creek lived quietly out in the county and then the Roanoke Rapids Theatre and the Music and Entertainment District slapped them in their faces, sucker punched them like a bully.
With no say in the matter, the thief that is annexation stole their identity and their money away.
We've stood on this soap box before, essentially preaching the same thing, only to hear the cries of those who have lived in the proper city limits for years and their argument that since Brandy Creek, regardless of circumstances, was part of the city limits it should have to ante up like everyone else.
We're extremely sorry for those residents who live in the proper city limits and hate they may be faced with a tax increase. We wholeheartedly believe it was wrong the way the whole thing panned out and the boil it has become. For city council to do this without hearing the community out until after the fact was a bad deal from the start.
Still, however, there is a vast difference between residents who have lived in the city all their lives and residents who were kidnapped into its limits against their will and without warning.
Yes, those living in the city limits have faced tax increases, but those living in Brandy Creek saw theirs simply skyrocket while receiving essentially nothing for it save a few new street lights, fire and police protection, trash collection and little else, things they already had, minus the new street lights.
Begging for a paved road on Maria Avenue got them nowhere and to this day the gravel road remains a potholed mess and you have to constantly dodge them unless you just like putting that kind of stress on yourself and your car.
Sorry, but we feel for the residents and applaud their moxie and fortitude to get themselves out of a situation that they never should have had to fight for to begin with.
We admire the University of North Carolina Center for Civil Rights' decision to step in and help get them out of the muck and mire this issue has become.
This doesn't mean we don't sympathize with residents who could be facing high property taxes next year, because we do. We just feel, as UNC has pointed out, the taxes encumbered by the folks in Brandy Creek were assessed incorrectly and we urge the county commissioners and Roanoke Rapids City Council, as well as the Weldon City Schools Board of Education, to pay them back what was so greedily taken from them in the first place — Editor
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They deserve all of their money put yourself in their shoes wouldn't you want your money back, maybe you were one of Beale"s "Good Ole Boy's"
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