Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections for May 30, 2023

On May 29, 1836, the United States Senate ratified the Treaty of New Echota, which required the movement of all Cherokee out of Georgia and led to the “Trail of Tears.”

On May 30, 1922, Chief Justice of the United States William H. Taft dedicated the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. Inside the memorial is a seated statue of Lincoln by Daniel Chester French carved from 175 tons of Georgia white marble.

French also created the statue of Jame Oglethorpe that stands in Chippewa Square in Savannah and a seated statue of Samuel Spencer considered to be a prototype of the Lincoln carving. Samuel Spencer was the first President of Southern Railway and was originally located at the rail station in downtown Atlanta before moving to the Southern Railway passenger station in Buckhead in the 1970s and is currently at 1200 Peachtree Street in front of Norfolk Southern.

On May 29, 1942, Adolf Hitler ordered all Jews in Nazi-occupied Paris to wear a yellow Star of David on their coats.

On May 29, 1953, Edmund Hillary of New Zealand and Tenzing Norgay, a Nepalese Sherpa, became the first to summit Mount Everest.

On May 28, Tenzing and Hillary set out, setting up high camp at 27,900 feet. After a freezing, sleepless night, the pair plodded on, reaching the South Summit by 9 a.m. and a steep rocky step, some 40 feet high, about an hour later. Wedging himself in a crack in the face, Hillary inched himself up what was thereafter known as the Hillary Step. Hillary threw down a rope, and Norgay followed. At about 11:30 a.m., the climbers arrived at the top of the world.

News of the success was rushed by runner from the expedition’s base camp to the radio post at Namche Bazar, and then sent by coded message to London, where Queen Elizabeth II learned of the achievement on June 1, the eve of her coronation. The next day, the news broke around the world. Later that year, Hillary and Hunt were knighted by the queen. Norgay, because he was not a citizen of a Commonwealth nation, received the lesser British Empire Medal.

In Gwinnett County, a dispute has arisen over language to describe the county’s history, according to the Gwinnett Daily Post.

Ruth Abram said Gwinnett County Community Services Director Tina Fleming had one request during their one meeting to discuss The Promised Land in south Gwinnett.

Fleming did not want it called a plantation when discussing the part of its history where it had slaves working its land because “people here don’t like the term,” said Abram, who is a historian and a descendant of Promised Land founder Thomas Maguire that the county hired to compile the property’s history.

Instead, according to Abram, Fleming wanted the Promised Land called a “farm” when discussing its pre-Civil War history.

“If Fleming’s view prevailed, the interpretation of the Promised Land would substitute ‘plantation’ for ‘farm.’ ” Abram said. “It follows it would also substitute ‘slave’ or ‘enslaved’ for ‘servant,’ as has been done at many of the plantations turned into historic sites.”

Abram is blasting Fleming in letters to county officials as well as comments she made to the Daily Post. She is not only accusing the community services director of trying to downplay the history of slavery but also alleging Fleming interfered with her efforts to do research on the Promised Land’s history.

Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections

Columbus ranks in the top 100 cities for naked gardening, according to the Ledger-Enquirer.

According to a recent study by Lawnstarter, Columbus is ranked 92nd best US city for naked gardening.

In fact, Georgia takes the list by storm, as Atlanta is ranked the third best city for the nude activity, Augusta is ranked 73rd, Savannah is 90th and Macon is 66th.

The study first gathered the places where naked gardening is safe and legal, examined nudist population sizes, indecent exposure laws and gardener-friendliness as well as weather and sex offender lists.

These topics were then assigned to one of the four categories: (1) Nude Gardener-Friendliness,(2) Local Interest, (3) Weather Forecast and (4) Safety.

Plan to give it a try? Here are tips for first-time nude gardeners:

1.) Wear sunscreen — everywhere! Remember, some of these body parts have never seen the sun, so they are very vulnerable. This is true for all skin tones and races.

2.) Make sure you aren’t using any chemicals (like weed killer) that might come in contact with your body. If you need gloves to handle your gardening chemicals, it might not be a good time to go nude.

3.) Bring a towel or blanket. Crouching down over your plot of land to dig out beans is fine, but most of us naturally sit down when our legs get tired — it’s an automatic behavior we don’t think about. Think proactively, and put something down on the ground that will be kind to your behind.

No word on whether naked gardening is responsible for Columbus having STD rates among the highest in the nation. FWIW, Atlanta is #3 in the nation.

Tourism was expected to return to pre-Covid levels over Memorial Day weekend, according to the Capitol Beat News Service via the Macon Telegraph.

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport expects to handle about 2.1 million passengers during the Memorial Day holiday period, which began Thursday and extends through next Wednesday. That’s up from roughly 2 million travelers during the same period last year.

Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines expects to fly nearly 2.8 million passengers over the Memorial Day weekend, a 17% increase over 2022. The anticipated average of 500,000 passengers a day is expected to exceed the pre-pandemic holiday weekend travel volume logged in 2019.

“It’s going to be record travel for leisure this summer,” said Jim Sprouse, executive director of the Georgia Hotel & Lodging Association. “Looking back to 2019, we’re flirting with those numbers again and exceeding them in some cases.”

Tourism industry officials credited Gov. Brian Kemp’s decision not to shut down the state during the pandemic for keeping visitation numbers up, particularly among leisure travelers.

“Because Georgia remained open for business during the pandemic, Atlanta had a leg up on the competition when convention business began to return,” said William Pate, president and CEO of the Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau (ACVB). “The sales team at Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau had a spectacular year in 2022, and lead volume is the highest it has been since the pandemic started.”

The ACVB reported preliminary hotel occupancy numbers for the city of Atlanta last month at 70%, the highest since February 2020, the month before COVID-19 struck Georgia in force. Hotel occupancy ended 2022 at 60%, a 50% increase over the end of the previous year.

One tourism segment that exploded during the pandemic was visitation to state parks. During a period when public health officials advised people not to gather in indoor spaces, visitors to state parks could enjoy camping and social distancing at the same time.

Berrien County will reopen their canning plant, according to WALB.

According to a Facebook post by the plant, the facilities at the plant will be open to the public through the Berrien County school system’s agricultural education department. The facilities will blanche, process, can and peel a variety of vegetables and fruit, according to the post.

The plant asks that people call ahead for an appointment for large quantities.

The plant is open on Monday from 7:30 a.m.-noon, Tuesday 7:30 a.m.-noon and 2-6 p.m. and Thursday from 7:30 a.m.-noon at Berrien High School.

Jesup City Council member Raymond House II died, according to WSAV.

The city says Commissioner Raymond House II was found dead in his home Saturday morning by a close friend.

House was first elected to represent District 5 in Jesup in 1995.

Tybee Island Mayor Shirley Sessions will not run for reelection, according to WSAV.

Sessions has been the Mayor of Tybee Island for four years. One of her achievements includes being the first woman elected to the seat in the town’s history.

Plant Vogtle’s Reactor #3 reached 100 percent generating capacity, according to WTOC.

Georgia Power announced Monday that Unit 3 at Plant Vogtle has reached its full output of 1,100 megawatts of electricity. That’s enough to power an estimated 500,000 homes and businesses. The power will be sent to Georgia and other states.

Operators are conducting further testing to prove they can run the reactor in ways required for regular operations, Georgia Power CEO Kim Greene in a statement, calling the achievement “an exciting milestone.”

“It tells us we’re close to finishing the unit safely and bringing it online to power Georgia homes and businesses with reliable, emissions-free energy for decades to come,” she said.

The fourth reactor has finished a key testing phase and operators expect to start loading radioactive fuel between July and October, aiming for the reactor to reach commercial operation between December and March 2024.

From the Augusta Chronicle:

This has been a longtime coming as the expansion project to add Units 3 and 4 was first authorized in 2009 and has been hit with multiple delays and cost overruns since. The initial plan was to bring Unit 3 online in 2016 and Unit 4 the year after. Unit 3 began producing electricity in April. U.S. Rep. Jeff Duncan said last month that Unit 4 should be online in December. It has cost more than double the projected $14 billion.

Georgia Power spokesman John Kraft said in his Monday news release that the new units are essential to the company’s commitment to delivering energy to its 2.7 million customers. Southern Nuclear will operate the new units on behalf of the co-owners: Georgia Power, Oglethorpe Power, MEAG Power and Dalton Utilities.

Tybee Island is changing their method of marking turtle nests to better protect them, according to WTOC.

They are now just marking the nests with a single wooden stake, rather than multiple stakes and caution tape to make them less noticeable to potential predators.

They’re also adding a metal screen over top of them.

They say this will help better protect the eggs making it harder for them to be dug up by other animals, such as coyote.

Of course, making them less noticeable means they’re asking you to be extra aware of the nests while on the beach.

Columbus City Council may seek the return of land dedicated to railroad operations for more than 176 years, according to the Ledger-Enquirer.

Columbus city leaders say they’ve made a crucial and historic move toward reclaiming about 80 acres of prime in-town real estate that railroads have been using for around 175 years. But their next step is yet to be determined, they say.

City councilors passed a resolution last week declaring that dating back to 1847, the city allowed railroads to use its public land on the condition the property would revert back to the city when those uses ceased.

The city says it never deeded the railroads the East Commons property roughly bordered by Sixth Avenue and 10th Avenue from Linwood Boulevard to 10th Street, so it retained ownership. Now the conditions under which it gave the railroads use of that area — to build passenger depots or freight warehouses — have ceased and the railroad and parcels should revert to Columbus, the city claims.

Though the resolution claims Columbus owns the land, it does not tell Norfolk Southern to vacate the property, or threaten any legal action.

“I think right now it’s just another step,” said Mayor Skip Henderson. He said it was “a step toward having a dialogue with the railroad,” and not an ultimatum.

Rome City Commissioners will discuss an attempt to settle a lawsuit between the city and Dalton Utilities over water quality, according to the Rome News Tribune.

The most recent settlement offer concerns Dalton Utilities, which “agreed in principle” to settle a lawsuit brought against it by the city of Rome over what have been called “forever chemicals” in the Oostanaula River, the utility board chairman, Joe Yarbrough, said.

“Earlier this week, Dalton Utilities agreed in principle to settle the Rome case,” Yarbrough told the Dalton Daily Citizen on Friday. “The final paperwork and language is being worked on now. I can’t offer any other comments or details until we get that final language completed and the papers executed.”