Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections for June 1, 2021

Benjamin Franklin became Georgia’s agent in England on June 1, 1768, making him also Georgia’s first lobbyist.

On June 1, 1775, Georgia patriots sent a care package to their brethren in Massachusetts comprising 63 barrels of rice and £122 after the battles at Lexington and Concord.

The court martial of Benedict Arnold convened in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on June 1, 1779.

Arnold negotiated his defection to the British and the subversion of West Point over several months. The British already held control of New York City and believed that by taking West Point they could effectively cut off the American’s New England forces from the rest of the fledgling nation.

In August 1780, Sir Henry Clinton offered Arnold £20,000 for delivering West Point and 3,000 troops. Arnold told General Washington that West Point was adequately prepared for an attack even though he was busy making sure that that it really wasn’t. He even tried to set up General Washington’s capture as a bonus. His plan might have been successful but his message was delivered too late and Washington escaped. The West Point surrender was also foiled when an American colonel ignored Arnold’s order not to fire on an approaching British ship.

Arnold’s defection was revealed to the Americans when British officer John André, acting as a messenger, was robbed by AWOL Americans working as pirates in the woods north of New York City. The notes revealing Arnold’s traitorous agreement were stashed in his boots.

On June 1, 1942, a Polish newspaper first published information about the gassing of Jews at Nazi concentration camps in Poland.

The Beatles released Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band on June 1, 1967. The album is listed as #1 on the Rolling Stone top 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list.

Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band is the most important rock & roll album ever made, an unsurpassed adventure in concept, sound, songwriting, cover art and studio technology by the greatest rock & roll group of all time. From the title song’s regal blasts of brass and fuzz guitar to the orchestral seizure and long, dying piano chord at the end of “A Day in the Life,” the 13 tracks on Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band are the pinnacle of the Beatles’ eight years as recording artists. John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr were never more fearless and unified in their pursuit of magic and transcendence.

Issued in Britain on June 1st, 1967, and a day later in America, Sgt. Pepper is also rock’s ultimate declaration of change. For the Beatles, it was a decisive goodbye to matching suits, world tours and assembly-line record-making. “We were fed up with being Beatles,” McCartney said decades later, in Many Years From Now, Barry Miles’ McCartney biography. “We were not boys, we were men… artists rather than performers.

“It was a peak,” Lennon told Rolling Stone in 1970, describing both the album and his collaborative relationship with McCartney. “Paul and I were definitely working together,” Lennon said….

Rolling Stone should stick to writing about music.

The Savannah-Chatham County Historic Site and Monument Commission will meet Thursday and consider what to do with some remaining Confederate memorials on public display in Forsyth Park, according to the Savannah Morning News.

The group’s most recent report, which was completed last October, recommends that the busts of Bartow and McLaws be removed and placed in storage until a proper location can be found. The previous recommendation, which council approved in 2018, was to relocate the busts to Laurel Grove Cemetery.

The legality of what the city can do when it comes to removing or relocating the busts has been muddied in recent years due to state law, which tightened restrictions in 2019. The law prevents the busts from being relocated to a cemetery, mausoleum or museum.

Despite the state law at least two counties have relocated monuments in the last year. Last June, DeKalb County County Superior Court Judge Clarence Seeliger ruled that a 30-foot obelisk Confederate moment that had stood in the downtown Decatur square was a public nuisance. It was removed shortly after Seeliger’s ruling.

That same month the Athens-Clarke Commission voted to remove a Confederate memorial monument that lists the names of Athens soldiers who died fighting for the Confederacy in the Civil War. The monument was removed in August.

Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections

Erratum: I was reminded that Peter Steckel withdrew from the election for Mayor of Watkinsville, leaving Brian Brodrick the only remaining candidate. I don’t know if Steckel’s name will still appear on ballots.

Governor Brian Kemp suspended Waynesboro Mayor Gregory Carswell, according to the Augusta Chronicle.

The order cites Carswell’s indictment last December on one count of identity fraud, one count of theft by taking, one count of theft by deception and one count of forgery in the second degree. All the charges are from his arrest last year in Statesboro.

Carswell will be suspended until final disposition of the case or until his term expires, the order states.

Carswell, who took office in 2017, had turned himself in last July after being contacted by the Statesboro Police Department and was released on a $10,000 bond. He is accused of taking $11,920 from Check Into Cash, where he was employed, by fraudulently refinancing a title pawn account and creating a fictitious title pawn account.

He was fired from the pawn shop, and the case remains open. According to the executive order, Carswell voluntarily authorized his suspension after the governor’s office received a certified copy of the indictment May 17.

Governor Kemp also issued Executive Order #05.28.21.02, which contains revised guidance on COVID-19 protocols.

From the Capitol Beat News Service via the Athens Banner Herald:

Gov. Brian Kemp signed an executive order Friday prohibiting schools from requiring students or employees to wear masks.

“As hospitalizations, cases, deaths, and percent positive tests all continue to decline – and with vaccinations on the rise — Georgians deserve to fully return to normal,” Kemp said.

“With safe and effective vaccines widely available and the public well-aware of all COVID-19 mitigation measures, mandates from state and local governments are no longer needed.”

The order lifting mask mandates in Georgia schools comes as school districts are wrapping up their 2020-21 terms. Most students won’t return to the classrooms for the fall semester until early-to-mid August.

From the Gainesville Times:

Though some school districts in northeast Georgia have already eased masking mandates, this executive order will likely affect Gainesville City Schools, Superintendent Jeremy Williams said in a phone interview Friday morning before the order’s signing.

This executive order will likely affect whether students must wear masks indoors at Gainesville schools, Williams said.

“We continue to monitor anything that’s happening at the state and local level,” he said. “We’re still processing all of it as we speak to determine what will be best when we start back.”

Hall County Schools have rolled back requirements further than Gainesville City Schools as of Tuesday May 25. Hall County no longer requires masks for anyone in schools, including staff, students and visitors, Hall County Superintendent Will Schofield said Friday in a phone interview.

Because of this recent policy change, the executive order from Kemp will not affect Hall County, Schofield said.

From Fox5Atlanta:

“We’re not going to have a mask mandate for our kids,” Kemp said. “Our teachers have had the ability to get vaccinated. It certainly doesn’t keep anyone from wearing a mask.”

The actual order adjusting Georgia’s few remaining coronavirus restrictions isn’t so strongly worded.

Instead, Kemp’s order says his COVID-19 emergency declaration “does not include the authority for local school districts to rely on the Public Health State of Emergency as a basis for requiring students or workers to wear a face covering” on school campuses.

In other words, Georgia school districts can no longer claim their authority to require masks comes from the governor.

Jason Esteves, chairman of the Atlanta school board and the state Democratic Party treasurer, said his district will continue requiring masks when 11,000 students return for summer classes next week.

He said the wording of Kemp’s order clearly shows the limits of his power over local school systems.

“We actually amended the dress code to require masks,” Esteves said. “And we did it without consideration of what the governor or the political winds told us to do at the time.”

I think the Fox5 analysis is correct.

The AJC asserts that new restrictions on mail-in voting will disproportionately impact African-American voters.

Over 272,000 registered voters don’t have a driver’s license or state ID on file with election officials, meaning they’d have to submit additional documents to vote by mail under Georgia’s new voting law, state election records show.

The ID requirements disproportionately affect Black voters, who are much less likely than white voters to have ID numbers matched to their voter registrations, according to election data.

Voters who lack a driver’s license or state ID number linked to their registrations will have to verify their identities to vote absentee. Georgia’s voting law requires them to provide a utility bill, bank statement or other form of ID in future elections.

Overall, about 3.5% of Georgia’s 7.8 million registered voters are missing a driver’s license or state ID number, according to records obtained from the secretary of state’s office under Georgia’s open records law.

More than half are Black. Most live in large, Democratic-leaning counties. Some are homeless or poor. And roughly 80,000 of them actually may have IDs but their information isn’t yet matched to election data, an issue state election officials are working to correct.

The secretary of state’s office plans to soon update voter registration records to include more ID numbers based on information provided by the Department of Driver Services. Rough estimates indicate that 80,000 of the 272,000 voters currently listed as lacking ID will have an ID number added to their registrations.

But that doesn’t mean Black turnout will decline because of more stringent ID requirements, said Trey Hood, a University of Georgia political science professor who published research on the effects of Georgia’s photo ID law for in-person voting that went into effect in 2008.

“The effects of these laws, at least from my research, are very, very small,” Hood said. “People make adjustments if they don’t have an ID. They can get a free ID or get another kind of ID, and they vote.”

Free voter ID cards are available to registered voters at county election offices and through the Department of Driver Services.

Gwinnett County Commissioner Kirkland Carden (D) wants to politicize education to score points for his reelection teach Asian-American History, according to the Gwinnett Daily Post.

Carden issued a proclamation calling for that inclusion during the county commission’s May 25 public hearing.

“It’s time we put a renewed focus on enhancing our knowledge of history,” Carden said. “Too often, the history of the AAPI community has been overlooked and under appreciated.”

Carden has a key reason to pay attention to the issue: his district includes Duluth and Suwanee, which have two largest Korean-American communities in Georgia. He said there are several Asian-Americans that students could learn about, including Patsy Takemoto Mink, who was the first Asian-American woman elected to Congress, and Filipino-American labor leader Larry Dulay Itliong, who led the Delano Grape Strike in 1965.

“Sadly, our nation is facing a significant increase in acts of hate, violence and discrimination toward Asian-Americans,” Carden said. “It will take all of us to work together to defeat this recent wave of hate and bring our community together. I truly believe if more people learned about the accomplishments and the contributions of the AAPI community to our community … it would help combat the foreignization and otherization that takes place toward our Asian-American community.”

I note there was no discussion of Democratic President Franklin Delano Roosevelt sending American citizens of Japanese heritage to concentration camps. I guess there aren’t enough Japanese-American voters in the district.

State Rep. Katie Dempsey (R-Rome) will Chair a House Study Committee on Childhood Lead Exposure, according to the Rome News Tribune.

The appointment was made Friday by Speaker David Ralston, R-Blue Ridge. Other members are Rep. Karla Drenner, D-Avondale Estates; Rep. Matthew Gambill, R-Cartersville; Rep. Mesha Mainor, D-Atlanta; and Rep. Mark Newton, R-Augusta.

Dempsey, R-Rome, heads the House human services budget subcommittee and has long advocated for ways to head off societal problems rooted in childhood illness, deprivation or trauma.

She sponsored House Resolution 52, which created the study committee this past session. Initially, she had hoped for a joint committee with Senate participation as well. However, she said it’s been a difficult year with COVID-19 meeting restrictions combined with the creation of other study committees.

Hall County Commissioner Shelly Echols will run for the Senate District 49 seat being vacated by State Senator Butch Miller, according to the Gainesville Times.

“The 49th Senate district, that district has a long history of effective and strong leaders,” Echols said in a phone interview. “And with my background of being a wife and a mom, and a small biz owner and now as a county commissioner, I think I have a unique perspective that I can take to the Gold Dome.”

During her tenure on the county commission, Echols said she focused on keeping taxes low, putting county employees first with updated policies and a pay raise, and supporting law enforcement and first responders.

She has served on the commission since 2018, when she defeated Scott Gibbs for the District 3 seat. That was the first time she had run for public office.

Echols said she is not a single-issue candidate, but in her May 26 morning campaign announcement she stressed her commitment to, “champion pro-life policies, protect our Second Amendment rights, fight for less government, and never cave to the radical left and their cancel culture.”

“While I’ve been on the county commission, we’ve given pay raises to our first responders — and that includes our sheriff’s deputies,” Echols told The Times. “But I think the encouragement, the moral support, the appreciation — all of those things are even more important than financially supporting their paychecks.

“On a state level, I’m not opposed to passing legislation that police departments can’t be unfunded. That it’s a necessary thing to protect the citizens of the state.”

Georgia Revenue Commissioner David Curry, who previously was elected Henry County Tax Commissioner, will run for the Tenth District Congressional seat being vacated by Rep. Jody Hice, according to the AJC.

Georgia Revenue Commissioner David Curry will get into the contest to replace Hice, citing a “recent alarming leftward shift.” In a statement, the Republican also warned of the perils of communism and societies that “treat criminals better than our police.”

“We reward – even encourage – people to be on the public dole rather than honoring and rewarding ingenuity, risk and a hard day’s work,” he said. “These values aren’t us.”

Other contenders include Mike Collins, who narrowly lost to Hice in 2014; wealthy demolition man Matt Richards; former U.S. Rep. Paul Broun and state Rep. Timothy Barr.

Gov. Brian Kemp tapped Curry to be the state revenue commissioner in May 2019.

Gwinnett County’s new noise ordinance also limits hours for fireworks, according to the Gwinnett Daily Post.

The county has a new noise ordinance going into effect Tuesday that changes how officials will determine whether a noise can be considered a violation of the ordinance. The ordinance was adopted May 18.

“To balance the needs of both residents and businesses in our county, staff has completely rewritten the Noise Control Ordinance,” Deputy County Attorney Theresa Cox told commissioners on May 18. “Like the (previous) ordinance, the (new) ordinance uses the plainly audible standard for determining wether a sound is a violation.”

Under Gwinnett’s new noise ordinance, officials will use location, time of day and the distance from which the noise can be plainly audible to determine whether residents are in violation. The only exemptions for fireworks are those days that are exempt under state law.

That means the ordinance does not apply to fireworks that are set off between 10 a.m and 11:59 p.m. on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day, on the last Saturday and Sunday in May (i.e. the Saturday and Sunday immediately preceding Memorial Day), July 3 and July 4 and Labor Day. There is also an exemption from midnight until 1 a.m. on New Year’s Day.

Augusta Commissioners are considering spending some federal aid on a new homeless shelter, according to the Ledger-Enquirer.

Plans are in the works but details not finalized for Augusta to build, repurpose or acquire and operate a homeless shelter using American Rescue Plan funds.

The item was a last-minute add to an Augusta Commission committee agenda last Tuesday. Approximately $3.5 million in federal HOME funds headed to Augusta Housing and Community Development would be used for a “non-congregate” shelter, meaning each resident or family would have a separate room and bathroom in a compact community of units.

The HOME funds allocated in the rescue plan are separate from the large amounts Augusta is poised to receive directly from the plan. On Wednesday, officials put that number at $84.25 million, with a first payment in by May 15.

A budget recommendation included with the agenda item showed $522,480 for staff to gather data, conduct studies and prepare plans of action plus their salaries, supplies and equipment. The shelter itself is allocated $2.2 million. A remaining $760,721 would go to affordable housing activities such as homelessness prevention among at-risk populations, including veterans.

The Muscogee County Board of Education previewed its FY 2022 budget, according to the Ledger-Enquirer.

The property tax millage rate would remain the same, no employees would be furloughed, and the pay scale would increase.

Those nuggets of news are among the expected highlights when the Muscogee County School District finalizes its fiscal year 2022 budget.

The administration is scheduled to present the board its tentative FY 2022 budget during the June 7 work session and called meeting, when the board also will vote on the tentative millage rate for property taxes.

Final adoption of the budget and the millage rate is set for the June 21 meeting.

Savannah City Council adopted a resolution aimed at eliminating single-use plastics from county operations, according to the Savannah Morning News.

“(T)he City of Savannah shall phase out purchasing of single use plastics and expanded polystyrene foam where practicable and transition to acceptable packaging and products by one year from the date of this resolution within City of Savannah buildings,” the resolution reads in part.

>Mayor Van Johnson said City Manager Michael Brown is being tasked with identifying where single use plastics can be eliminated and creating a timeline to implement the resolution.

“There are some areas in which we are aspiring but we’re just not gonna be there yet,” Johnson said, citing printer cartridges as an example.

“The technology is just not there yet; we still need to print stuff,” he said. “But I think that there are a variety of ways that we can be leaders in this and a variety of ways we look at our own operations.”

Some parents of Savannah-Chatham County public schools students want a COVID grade bump for students, according to the Savannah Morning News.

When she saw her daughter’s grades last December and how much they had fallen, she said, “It was like [the grades from] another kid. It was like I didn’t know who this person was. And, we realized that we had all not been paying attention, and she had just gone through all of the things teenagers are going through right now which is loneliness, [and] alienation.”

She believes the school district should consider the effect the pandemic has had on students’ emotional well-being, which affects their motivation to do schoolwork and ultimately grades. For a student such as Batchelor’s daughter who is used to earning A’s to be suddenly failing, the additional emotional toll creates the downward spiral and a lack of motivation.

Batchelor addressed the school board with her concerns at its regular meeting on March 3, just before the end of the third-quarter grading period, asking for leniency in fourth quarter grading.

She reminded the school board about last year when, just as the effects of COVID-19 were being felt, the fourth quarter was all but considered optional and students’ grades from the previous three quarters were averaged for a fourth quarter grade. Batchelor added that as more colleges and universities drop SAT and ACT scores for admission, high school grades are more important than ever.

Holly Adams, who has a rising senior at Islands High School, is not in favor of dropping the lowest grade and averaging the other three because she said it wouldn’t be fair to students, such as her son, who have high scores. Adams recalled students last year were told if they “did everything” in the fourth quarter, which was virtual, they would earn an extra seven points. She added students who were in the low 90s would suddenly have a 97, or an A grade. Her son, who was already scoring 98 in all of his classes, would get only two points up to 100.

Statesboro City Council will consider a referendum to allow liquor stores, according to the Statesboro Herald.

City Council may vote Tuesday to place a referendum on the Nov. 2 ballot to allow liquor stores in Statesboro. It’s on the agenda for the 9 a.m. regular meeting.

Because the office of mayor is up for election, a citywide election would have to occur on that date anyway, unless Mayor Jonathan McCollar emerges unopposed from the Aug. 16-20 candidate qualifying period. The council seats in District 1, where Phil Boyum is the incumbent, and District 4, where incumbent John Riggs is not seeking re-election, are also up for election.

A brief resolution that would initiate the referendum “to authorize the issuance of licenses for the package sale of distilled spirits” is included in Tuesday’s agenda packet. Bringing a referendum to legalize liquor stores in this way was impossible until May 4, when Gov. Brian Kemp signed Georgia Senate Bill 145 into law. Previously, a referendum for this purpose could only be initiated through a petition signed by at least 35% of the registered and qualified voters in a city or county.

Muscogee County Board of Education member Mark Cantrell  has been hospitalized, according to the Ledger-Enquirer.

Oyster harvesting season in Georgia closes for the summer today, according to WTOC.

Recreational and commercial harvesting of oysters in Georgia is set to end Tuesday and remain closed until the fall. The Georgia Department of Natural Resources announced the closure. The agency says the closure is in line with its plan to control a naturally occurring bacteria found in filter-feeding shellfish.

People will still be allowed to harvest clams in approved shellfish harvesting areas. Oyster harvesting is set to reopen on Oct. 1.