Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections for September 21, 2016

On September 21, 1863, the federal Army of the Cumberland retreated to Chattanooga after its defeat at Chickamauga.

Bert Lance resigned as Director of the Office of Management and Budget under President Jimmy Carter on September 21, 1977. After a jury acquitted him on ten federal charges in 1980, Lance served as Chair of the Democratic Party of Georgia from 1982 to 1985.

General Colin Powell was confirmed by the Senate Armed Services Committee as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on September 21, 1989. Powell served as National Security Advisor to President Ronald Reagan before being appointed Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff by President George H.W. Bush; in 2000, Powell was nominated by President George W. Bush as Secretary of State, the first African-American to hold that post.

On September 21, 2011, R.E.M. announced on their website that they were quitting as a band.

Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections

Your absentee ballot may be on it’s way in the mail this week, as County elections boards can now send them out.

Voters in Georgia can request an absentee ballot by submitting a written application to the local county registrar or by logging onto the Secretary of State office’s “My Voter Page (MVP)” to print the application and mail the completed form to the local registrar.

“Through MVP, requesting an absentee ballot has never been easier in Georgia,” Secretary of State Brian Kemp said. “I was proud to bring this new innovation to our state, along with other helpful web-based platforms such as the online voter registration system and the ‘GA SOS’ smartphone app. Georgia is a national leader in utilizing technologies to educate citizens about elections, voting, and the importance of participation in the electoral process for all levels of government.”

Kemp said voters should request absentee ballots to vote by mail in the Nov. 8 election well in advance of the Nov. 4 deadline, officials said. Uniformed military voters are only required to submit one absentee ballot application to receive absentee ballots for an entire election cycle. Currently, there are more than 6.4 million registered voters in Georgia.

Click here for the MVP webpage, where you can sign in and request a mail-in absentee ballot.

Gasoline supplies in Georgia should start returning to normal over the next few days as fuel starts flowing in a bypass around the Colonial Pipeline leak that caused current shortages.

Colonial Pipeline said Tuesday it had finished construction of the 500-foot bypass at the work site near Birmingham and was testing the system. Fuel deliveries through the 3-foot-diameter line will start Wednesday barring any problems, it said.

The leak and resulting disruptions in supply have bedeviled motorists for days in metro Atlanta and other parts of the South. Sporadic outages have meant longer than usual lines at some stores in the region and dry pumps at others.

State Senator Renee Unterman spoke to WMAZ about the Safe Harbor Amendment, which is on the November ballot as Constitutional Amendment #2.

“It’s an amendment that creates a permanent indelible fund that sets up money for children who have been sexually exploited, specifically sex trafficking of children,” said Unterman.

She says kids as young as 9-years-old are victims of sex trafficking.

“It’s actually yours and my kids,” said Unterman. “These are kids that go to the mall, these are kids that go into chat rooms and they get picked up at the four-way stop sign right outside their house and unfortunately they’re picked up for very bad reasons.”

If passed, she says this amendment could bring millions of dollars to the state’s Department of Human Resources and the Department of Public Health.

“The money is brought in from adult entertainment establishments where they pay a certain fee and it’s estimated between a million to two million dollars,” said Unterman.

State Rep. Heath Clark (R-Warner Robins) received an award from the Association County Commissioners of Georgia for introducing and passing House Bill 772, which fixed an issue with advance voting.

Last year July 4 fell on an early voting Saturday and state law required that the polls open. Poll workers had to sit there all day with very few people voting.

Commission Chairman Tommy Stalnaker asked Clark to get a bill passed that would fix the problem and Clark got it done. It was the first bill he got passed.

Clark said it came “down to the wire” to get it passed in time in the Senate.

Previously, early voting was held on the second Saturday before an election. Under the new law if a holiday falls on that Saturday or the following Sunday or Monday, then early voting will fall to the third Saturday before the election.

The Association County Commissioners of Georgia backed the law, and a representative of the organization came to Tuesday’s commission meeting to present Clark with groups Legislative Service Award for his efforts to get the bill passed. Only six of the awards were given out this year.

House Speaker David Ralston appointed Savannah attorney James Kreyenbuhl to the Georgia State Ethics Government Transparency and Campaign Finance Commission.

A seat on the Georgia Court of Appeals has 79 lawyers nominated for the bench with the possibility of other openings on the Court of Appeals if Gov. Deal appoints one or more of the sitting judges to openings on the Georgia Supreme Court.

Chief Judge Gregory Fowler of the Chatham County State Court was recognized by the Council of Accountability Court Judges, receiving a 2016 STAR Award.

David Wood, the DUI court administrator who nominated Fowler, has been with the court since it started in May 2003. In that time, 1,207 people have graduated with a recidivist rate of 7.9 percent, compared to the 32 percent national rate, he said.

Classes run between 130-180 participants at a time and the current class is 148, Wood said.
“We’re always accepting new people,” Wood said.

Fowler “refuses to allow participants to give up on their sobriety,” Wood said. “Judge Fowler understood, even before DUI Court existed, that jail alone would not help the addict become sober and that the addict need not hit rock bottom to succeed.”

Opportunity School District

The Butts County Board of Education adopted a resolution opposing the Opportunity School District amendment.

In a statement last week, the Butts County School System blasted the plan.

“I don’t think there is a citizen of Georgia who disagrees with the governor that we need to fight to give every student in our state the best education possible,” Butts County School Superintendent Robert “Buddy” Costley said in the statement. “But the governor is apparently misleading our state in allowing this question to be posed to the voters without being transparent about what this question really means. This appears to be more about money and power than it is any real chance to help students and communities. He wants to take away the voices of the local taxpayers and voters because he doesn’t trust them, and he believes the best way to turn around schools is run them from the bureaucracy in Atlanta, a bureaucracy that knows nothing about our people and our community.”

Deal spoke Sept. 8 at the Georgia Education Leadership Institute Conference, lashing out at those who oppose the plan, Costley said. “The governor basically ridiculed locally elected board members in his speech for expressing concerns about the proposed amendment’s effect on the communities the voters elected them to serve, and he almost literally told the superintendents in the state to keep ‘their mouths shut,’” Costley said.

Costley said he has been talking to local organizations about the upcoming vote, including the Butts County Republican Party.

“Some of them were quite surprised,” Costley said. “I guarantee you local taxpayers want control over their own tax money.”

Three reservoirs on the upper Savannah River are in the Drought 2 status and boaters are warned to be cautious.

Because of the drought level, rocks and tree stumps, normally deep underwater, will be closer to the surface, some just out of sight, according to Corps officials.

These obstructions form a particular hazard in coves and along the shoreline. Boaters should use the main channel whenever possible.