East Macon Residents Voice Concerns and Needs for the Community

MACON, Georgia (41NBC/WMGT) – Residents in East Macon are voicing their concerns and speaking out to local leaders about what needs to be done in their community.

Earlier this month, Macon City Councilwoman Elaine Lucas, along with Lonnie Miley, and Rick Hutto, held an East Side Summit where residents had the chance to share their concerns and fill out service requests for their area.

Deborah Smith was there and says the community she lives in needs some work.

“We have a lot of improvements that really need to be done over here in east Macon.” Smith said.

City Councilwoman Elaine Lucas says its her job to listen to the feedback and take action.

“From time to time, you need to go back to those folks, show them and tell them what you’ve done, let them know what services are available and also remind them that they have an avenue for getting their concerns addressed,” Lucas sai.d

And she got four pages of concerns from that meeting. They range from fixing up abandoned homes, to repairing potholes, and bringing more businesses to Gray Highway. Smith submitted a request to fix the graffitti on the wall of an old furniture store. She calls it an eye sore and wants the city to take care of it.

It is a long list of requests and concerns, but Lucas says the city is already working on it. All the service requests have been sent to the appropriate city agencies and many of them have already been taken care of.

“We think this is the ultimate in community service, in service to constituents by letting them tell you what they need and then providing the mechanism for getting things done,” Lucas said.

Residents are keeping watch and making sure their voices are heard.

“We definitely going to stay on them, let them know we put them in office and we expect them to take care of this side of town,” Smith said.

Lucas says there will be two more meetings for residents to share their thoughts with local leaders. The next one will happen in January and focus on education concerns for that area.