29 MAY 05: FULLER'S SOAP
Millard Fuller surrendered Saturday, in one of his quarrels with Habitat for Humanity. He'll no longer call his housing charity "Building Habitat" - since all that name really did was build a controversy.
Habitat for Humanity sued Millard Fuller over the charity name "Building Habitat." [12 May] Fuller explained Saturday he doesn't want to waste either group's money on a lawsuit. A long legal case might make the final winner "Lodging for Lawyers."
Millard Fuller held a ceremony in Americus to unveil a sign with his group's new name - the "Fuller Center" for Housing. But does he really think his legal problems will disappear? Just wait until the Fuller Brush Company finds out about this....
(There's also a Fuller Theological Seminary in southern California. Students could get confused, and think the biblical "mansions" mentioned in classes really exist in the deep South.)
Millard Fuller says he's raised almost two million dollars for his new charity. AFLAC pledged one million of that, not long after employees built a Habitat for Humanity house in Columbus. Maybe if I started a group called "Building Blogs," AFLAC will pay for my retirement.
The Habitat for Humanity office in Americus released a statement, calling the name change by Millard Fuller a "positive step." But the board probably hoped for more steps than that - such as Fuller walking all the way to Columbus, and putting his headquarters there.
Despite the name change, Habitat for Humanity warns it still considers Millard Fuller liable for damages from the "Building Habitat" name. That's the thing about these housing charities - if they can't nail something, they'll nail somebody.
Millard Fuller says he wants to provide items for Habitat for Humanity projects. But the way this is going, will Habitat accept anything the new agency offers? Will the Fuller Center wind up putting contractors on "Extreme Makeover Home Edition" out of business?
E-MAIL UPDATE: Our Saturday topic concerned the tall statue planned outside the Columbus Public Library. This message is much less philosophical than ours was:
Subject: Library's $250,000 abstract statue, the "Nothingness Statue"
AKA " Wade's Waste" and "Polleys' Folly"
The Library Committee's Art Committee secretly approved the purchase of a statue for the exterior of the Library (not the Art Museum) for $250,000 in an unpublicized Oct. 2004 meeting. The announcement of the contract was made public the last week of May 2005. The contract was purportedly signed by the School Board delegated authority, the Library's Art Committee.
The School Board should be held accountable for the expenditure, as they are the body that enabled the Committee that approved it.
Does The Muscogee County School Board have the political will to dissolve the Art Committee's authority to waste $250,000 on nothingness?
Should the statuary contract be placed on hold until the School Board has had time to review the expenditure?
Does the School Board realize that the people in this city will hold them accountable for wasting $250,000 of taxpayer money on Nothingness while only spending $1 million on books. It is additionally obscene to do that in a city that has law officers who are paid, from a separate fund, but are on food stamps. Isn't this the height of egocentric selfishness by a few rich and truly uninformed people who want to show the world that they "UNDERSTAND" art.
The Library is for the entire community rather than a tribute to the stupidity of the Art Committee's acceptance of the myth foisted on the public that abstract statuary is an accepted representation of something that is at one and the same time nebulously indefinable and representing the highest good for the greatest number.
The Nothingness Statue does not represent an ideal, a people, a nation, a loss or a sacrifice. It does not represent anything. It is a myth that is fraudulently foisted on the public. The emperor is naked!
They could have spent the money on just about anything else like a playground for handicapped children or just about a thousand other things that would serve the public good in a far greater way than a statue that provides no meaning to anything or anyone.
The School Board can delegate the authority but they cannot delegate the responsibility.
Deborah Owens
www.CityColumbus.com
I think I get Deborah's point, but she should keep one thing in mind. Jerry Seinfeld said his TV series was all about nothing -- and it not only made him millions of dollars, it's become a national favorite.
Is the $250,000 for this library statue actually coming from "taxpayer money?" After all, the library collects income in other ways. If everyone in Columbus will buy two of those big two-dollar brownies in the café, that ought to cover it....
I'm not so sure the "Nothingness Statue" fails to represent anything. Consider what used to be on the Columbus Public Library site. "Nothingness" could tell the story of the final years of Columbus Square mall.
Now let's try to make something from these other weekend items:
+ Which Columbus church pastor told his congregation in the middle of a sermon: "It was GOD who made the flowers you see here!" - only to learn after the service the flowers were silk and artificial? He's been pastor of this group about ten years, so you'd think he'd do a smell test....
+ Rigdon Road Elementary School announced all its third and fifth-grade students passed the CRCT test. As a reward, the third-graders will get new bicycles, the fifth-graders will go to Disney World this summer - and their relieved teachers will be spared the task of updating and mailing new resumes.
+ A fund-raising event in Columbus for the Children's Miracle Network featured "Hooter's girls" outside washing cars. I can't help wondering how many times police stopped at the scene - and not merely to prevent distracted drivers from crashing.
+ Atlanta police used a stun gun to force down suspected murder Carl Roland from atop a 16-story-high crane. In a way, this is disappointing - because I wanted to see Ashley Smith climb that crane and read to Roland from "The Purpose-Driven Life."
+ Instant Message to Davis Broadcasting: Did I hear the announcement right -- only four of your six Columbus radio stations are inviting me to Family Day in the Park next month? Why can't listeners to "The River 95.7" and Sports-Talk 1580 show up? Might there be a (ahem) color clash?
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