Our unelected Hamilton County Chief Operating Officer came clean about the real reason we gave our Health Department to Erlanger: “creepy couches in the women’s restrooms.”
When asked by our elected county commissioners why the Health Department was given to Erlanger without commissioner input, our unelected county mayor told the commissioners that “couches in the 300 sq foot women’s restrooms were creepy.”
Hamilton County taxpayers just lost our $10 million Hamilton County Health Department building because of “creepy couches”.
I’ve got breaking news for our Hamilton County COO David Roddy. Women’s bathrooms can be swanky. Some have couches. Most are carpeted and clean. They are different from the bathrooms Chief Roddy is used to at the Hamilton County Police Department.
If County Mayor Wamp did authorize the transfer of our Hamilton County Health Department to Erlanger because of its “creepy couches” in the women’s restrooms, the Tivoli should be really concerned. Its women’s bathrooms are the most opulent in Chattanooga. And they contain couches, creepy or not.
Instead of being focused on the Hamilton County Health Department’s women’s restrooms, how about the mayor’s office talking about the health services our community is going to lose in this transition. And which doctor has decided which health department services should be discontinued or privatized? Talk about the actual cost of the new building. Talk about the location of this new building. We remain in the dark because our mayor continues to thwart the Sunshine Law.
Since the mayor’s proposed new location of our Health Department is historic Engel Stadium, County Mayor Wamp can use its old stadium seats, instead of couches, in the new women’s restrooms, whenever and however that occurs.
C. Mark Warren