Transcription
'The Sleeping Giant Is Finally Awake' Dumfries Is Growing- for Better or Worse
Speakers praised the beautiful sunny day and hummed on about the history of Dumfries last Sunday at the town's 240th anniversary celebration at Merchant Park, but few references were made to town leaders' underlying concerns about the Dumfries of today and the future.
once a rival port of New York City, Dumfries suffered a near-fatal blow in the mid-18th century when runoff from the nearby tobacco fields silted in Quantico Creek and shut down the port.
Today the little town-which survived mainly on the strength of the farms and nearby Quantico Marine Base after it arrived in 1917-is trying to catch up with a recent surge in population while planning for an expected burst of development.
Earlier this month, the Town council approved a new 4 percent tax on restaurant meals and a 4 percent tax on hotel and motel room charges, intended to bring in $200,000 more in revenue for the financially strapped town.
There is other evidence of Dumfries' coming of age, and all the good and bad that goes with it: The council is hiring its first town manager, the state is turning over to the town responsibility for its own roads, and the small police department is grappling with a dramatic increase in drug-related crimes, town officials say.
"The sleeping giant is finally awake.... We are becoming completely urbanized," Dumfries Mayor Robert McClanahan said in an interview. But many town residents "don't really realize what's going on in this town.... except when [the problems] hit them on their own doorsteps.
Though he is paid as a part-time mayor, McClanahan said his duties have expanded into a full-time job, and many of those responsibilities will be turned over to the new town manager.
Several Saturdays ago, the Dumfries Police department conducted the largest drug raid in the towns history, in which 17 people were arrested.Transcriber
Rachel HughesLanguage
English
