Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections for September 9, 2024

The Continental Congress renamed their new nation the United States of America, from the previously used “United Colonies” on September 9, 1776.

On September 9, 1933, WSB Radio in Atlanta was upgraded to broadcasting via 50,000 watt transmitter. The first broadcast included Will Rogers and a letter from President Roosevelt.

On September 9, 1939, an audience at the Fox Theater in Riverside, California watched a preview of Gone With the Wind.

The first actual computer bug was identified on September 9, 1947, when Grace Hopper removed a moth from an electrical relay in the Harvard Mark II computer. Hopper received her Ph.D. in Mathematics from Yale in 1934 and attained the rank of Rear Admiral, Lower Half in the United Stated Navy. USS Hopper (DDG-70) was named after her.

On September 9, 1954, Marvin Griffin won the Democratic Primary election over Melvin Thompson. Below is a photo of the monument to Gov. Griffin in Bainbridge.

Elvis Presley first appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show on September 9, 1956.

Happy 80th birthday to former Congressman John Linder. Linder served in the State House from 1974-1980 and 1982-90. In 1990 he ran unsuccessfully for Congress against incumbent Democrat Ben Jones; in 1992, after redistricting, Linder was elected to Congress from the 7th District and served until his retirement after the 2010 election.

Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections

September 17, 2024 is “National Voter Registration Day,” and October 7, 2024 is the last day to register to vote to be eligible for the November 5 General Elections and any ensuing runoff elections, according to WSAV.

According to the latest U.S. Census Bureau figures, only about 2% of Macon-Bibb’s voting age population is not registered to vote.

The Bureau estimates about 118,504 of the county’s 156,197 residents are aged 18 and over. The Macon-Bibb Board of Elections reported 115,996 active and inactive voters at its August meeting..

“The good problem that we have is we have a ton of Bibb County already registered,” Macon-Bibb County Elections Supervisor Tom Gillon said. “I suspect the driver’s license bureau, the ability to register that way, really drove the numbers up.”

In case the estimated 2,500 eligible citizens decide to register, the local elections office plans to post signs about National Voter Registration Day and be ready in case there is an influx of people coming in to register on Sept. 17. A QR code on the poster links to the nationalvoterregistrationday.org website which allows people to register online.

Gillon pointed out that anyone who is six months past their 17th birthday can register to vote.

“Obviously, you can’t vote until you’re 18, but anyone who’s capable of being registered, we want them to do that,” he said.

For this year’s advanced voting, Gillon confirmed that handicapped and elderly voters will be able cast ballots at the Macon-Bibb County Courthouse Annex, which will have polls set up in the old Sears garden center which has curbside access.

“The hale and hearty young voters can make the pilgrimage back to our office, here. And we may be able to have the (absentee) ballot box in the annex lobby,” Gillon said.

Georgia’s new election law prohibits absentee ballot boxes outside. They must be inside an elections office, continually monitored by staff and under camera surveillance.

The Macon-Bibb Board of Elections’ attorney is expected to confirm whether the new courtroom facility would satisfy the requirements of the law. Poll workers will be stationed at the annex during voting hours of 8:30 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. on the weekdays and from 8:30 a.m. until 5 p.m. for Saturday voting on Oct.19 and 26.

The local board of elections has the option of scheduling Sunday voting during this election cycle.

For voters who cannot make it to the polls, the last day to request an absentee ballot is Oct. 26.

In the more than five weeks leading up to early voting, the board of elections staff continues to double-check voting districts after some ballot confusion in the nonpartisan election and general primary. The quick turnaround after the court mandated redistricting earlier this year led to some errors.

Glynn County schools tightened security after a potential online threat, according to The Brunswick News.

Police presence around Glynn County schools was elevated Friday after a possible threat was made toward local schools following a school shooting on Wednesday in Barrow County.

Glynn County Schools Police Chief Johnny Davis said a vague threat was made Friday morning via the Snapchat app that referred to a school that started with the letter B. Davis said the post was not detailed and that police could not confirm to which school it was referring or if the school was in Glynn County or another county.

“We have to take everything seriously,” Davis said.

No schools were on lockdown as of Friday at around 10:30 a.m., but the school police had asked the Brunswick and Glynn County police departments and the Glynn County Sheriff’s Office for increased patrols and presence around all schools.

There were at least five extra police cars outside Brunswick High School as some parents began lining up to check out their students following the threat.

Davis said his officers undergo active shooter training every year prior to the beginning of the school year and that they have protocols in place to respond if necessary. It’s a response he prays they will never have to execute, Davis added.

Davis said parents and students should know that making any sort of threat toward individuals or a school is a felony offense and they will be prosecuted.

“The message I want to put out is that we need to educate the parents and the students,” Davis said. “They have to realize if they make a threat in the school system toward another student or a school, it’s a terroristic threat, which is a felony.”

Glynn County schools were not alone on high alert. Brantley County schools issued a statement Friday that said officials there became aware of the message and took precautions.

Atlanta news outlets reported that at least six teens were arrested across metro Atlanta for making threats against schools.

In Northeast Georgia, Franklin County schools closed Friday in response to a threat.

Jeff Davis County public schools also increased security today, according to WTOC.

Jeff Davis County schools will have extra law enforcement present on campus Monday.

School officials posted on social media Sunday morning that district officials met with Jeff Davis County Sheriff Preston Bohannon regarding a social media post that began circulating late Saturday evening into early Sunday morning.

Officials say the individual responsible for the post has been identified and questioned by law enforcement.

According to the Jeff Davis County Sheriff’s Office, the student identified admitted responsibility for the Snapchat post.

As a precaution, there will be an increased law enforcement presence on campus Monday.

They say at this time, there is no credible threat to Jeff Davis County schools for Monday. However, law enforcement will continue to investigate the situation to ensure the safety of our students and staff.

From WSAV:

The JDCSO said investigators met with school board officials on Sunday and discussed the status of the investigation and the decision was made by school officials to remove the student from the school system and banish the student from school property and functions until further notice.

Once the investigation is completed, charges will be filed with the appropriate court, according to the JDCSO.

The JDCSO said they want to assure students and parents that any and all threats of violence directed to the Jeff Davis County School System are being thoroughly investigated and responsible parties will be prosecuted.

From WALB:

School districts across South Georgia have been made aware of the social media hoax going around of possible threats concerning schools.

Dougherty County School District release[d] this statement,

“The district is aware of a threat circulating around the state on social media. It appears that the schools mentioned were extracted from a list of Title 1 schools listed on the GaDOE website. Although we believe this to be a hoax, out of an abundance of caution, we are placing all schools on a soft lockdown posture until the posts are investigated thoroughly. The safety and security of our students, employees and guests is our number one priority.”

Mitchell County School District [said], “District officials have been made aware of social media posts containing rumors of possible threats to our schools. We are working closely with local law enforcement, including the police and sheriff’s departments, to ensure that all relevant information is shared and acted upon. The safety of our students and staff remains our top priority, and we are implementing additional security measures as a precaution. Law enforcement is actively investigating the situation, and we urge anyone with information to report it to them immediately. Thank you for your cooperation and commitment to the safety of our community.”

Tift County Schools shared several Facebook posts assuring parents that they are a safety first district, by implementing badge access for all school buildings. All Tift County schools are equipped with the Centegix CrisisAlert system and System Security Officer (SSO) will be at every school campus.

Atkinson County schools spoke about a report of an armed student at a dance hosted by student parents, according to WALB.

The school system said that on Monday extra school counselors and social workers will be available to provide assistance as needed. There will also be extra security measures implemented to further ensure the safety of everyone on campus.

“While we deeply appreciate the efforts of parents who have volunteered and expressed interest in hosting events for our students, please be aware that all future school-related events will be held on the campus of Atkinson County High School, with proper security and staff present,” the post said.

The school system said it is working with the Pearson Police Department and the Atkinson County Sheriff’s Office during the investigation and will keep parents and students informed on any further updates.

From the initial report by WALB:

At around 11:13 p.m. on Saturday, the Pearson Police Department posted to Facebook that an officer and an Atkinson County Sheriff’s deputy were posted in the Dollar General parking lot when they were approached by a juvenile who said there was someone inside “The Venue” with a gun and wearing a mask.

According to police, witnesses on the scene were able to provide a description of the suspect. Officers then made contact with a male on the scene who matched the description.

During the contact, police say the suspect first denied being involved, but later spontaneously admitted to having a ski mask. He denied having a gun.

Officers did not find a firearm on the suspect, but they did find a ski mask.

The suspect was arrested and taken to the Atkinson County Jail.

“We want to remind everyone that this is still an ongoing investigation and anyone with kids who attended the dance tonight and saw anything are strongly encouraged to contact Tri-County 911. Any details, no matter how small they may seem, may be important,” the police department said in the post.

Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr (R-Cobb County) opined that Governor Brian Kemp lacks the power to unilaterally remove members of the State Elections Board, according to the Capitol Beat News Service via the Ledger-Enquirer.

Georgians do not have the authority to demand that the governor convene an administrative hearing to take up accusations against members of state boards, Attorney General Chris Carr wrote in a legal opinion issued Friday.

Gov. Brian Kemp asked for the legal opinion late last month after Georgia Democrats called on the Republican governor to remove three GOP members of the State Election Board for approving changes to state election laws they said could disrupt the November elections.

The five-member board adopted a series of controversial rules changes last month that, among other things, would empower local election officials to delay or refuse to certify election results. Democrats say that could sow chaos and uncertainty following the Nov. 5 elections and let former President Donald Trump capture Georgia’s 16 electoral votes, even if Vice President Kamala Harris has won more of the state’s popular vote..

Kemp asked Carr for his opinion on whether the phrase “upon charges being filed” in state law means a citizen can present information about a state board member that might constitute formal charges.

“It is my official opinion that … the phrase … does not mean that a citizen can simply submit information to the governor and trigger the hearing process contemplated,” Carr wrote.

Max Flugrath, communications director for Fair Fight, a voting rights organization founded by two-time Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, criticized Carr’s opinion Friday.

“The AG’s opinion leaves a gaping hole where accountability should lie,” Flugrath said. “If the grave, substantive, detailed, and ‘formal’ complaint filed by a former election official is not enough to trigger Gov. Kemp’s legal duty to hold a hearing on the pro-Trump Election Board members’ alleged illegal and unethical actions, the only reasonable conclusion is that the General Assembly wrote a worthless law.”

Democratic state legislators are calling for a Special Session of the Georgia General Assembly to consider new gun restrictions, according to the Capitol Beat News Service via the Albany Herald.

Georgia House Democrats have urged Gov. Brian Kemp to call a special session of the General Assembly to take up gun safety legislation following Wednesday’s school shooting in Barrow County that left four dead and injured nine others.

Democratic lawmakers introduced a series of bills during the 2023-24 legislative term either encouraging or requiring Georgians to lock their firearms and store them in a secure location, but none made any headway.

“Not one bill had a hearing. Not one had a chance to make it through to the governor’s desk,” House Minority Leader James Beverly, D-Macon, said during a news conference at the state Capitol. “These bills would address the health care crisis of the gun epidemic. … But we can’t even begin to have these conversations.”

The House did pass one gun safety measure during this year’s legislative session, a Republican-backed measure offering tax credits to Georgians who buy firearm storage devices such as trigger locks or gun safes.

After passing the House 162-3 in late February, House Bill 971 cleared the Senate Finance Committee. But it failed to reach the Senate floor for a vote.

House Democrats said failing to pass any of the safe firearm storage bills before the General Assembly during the last two years was a missed opportunity on the part of majority Republicans that could have prevented Wednesday’s tragedy.

“We had the policy tools to prevent this from happening,” Rep. Saira Draper, D-Atlanta, said. “Inaction will mean more shootings, more devastation, more deaths. … Every day that goes by is a day we’re telling the people of Georgia we’re beholden to the gun lobby.”

Emotion boiled over during Friday’s news conference, with a couple of parents in the audience saying they’re afraid to send their children to school, citing emails from school administrators warning of threats of further violence.

Rep. Michelle Au, D-Johns Creek, said the 78 House Democrats need the support of just 13 Republican lawmakers to pass gun safety legislation.

The partisan crowd assembled on the Capitol steps behind the speakers erupted in a chant of “Vote Them Out!” aimed at Republican House members running for re-election in November.

 

The Harris-Walz campaign “Reproductive Freedom” bus tour stopped in Macon, according to the Macon Telegraph.

The Kamala Harris campaign stopped in Macon Friday as part of a bus tour focused on abortion rights across Georgia.

Harris herself wasn’t in town, but a slate of speakers including State Rep. Miriam Paris, U.S. Rep. Nikema Williams and former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms appeared to support the campaign and abortion rights.

“The only way to stop (Donald Trump) and his extreme, anti-reproductive freedom agenda is to vote this November,” Williams said. “Harris trusts women to make decisions about their own health care.”

Georgia is set to be a major battleground in November. After going for Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, Georgia solidified its status as a swing state that’s seen as a toss-up as the election nears.

Additionally, Georgia has already seen abortion rights take center stage in politics. In 2019, Gov. Brian Kemp signed into law a bill that would ban most abortions at six weeks, when fetal cardiac activity can be detected. The bill was struck down by a federal court that cited Roe v. Wade, a Supreme Court decision protecting abortion.

Harris has made abortion rights a centerpiece of her bid for president, often bringing it up at rallies and during media appearances.

Georgia has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the nation, with 33.9 deaths per 100,000 live births between 2018 and 2021, according to data compiled by the National Center for Health Statistics. The CDC said the national average is 32.9 deaths per 100,000 births.

The National Library of Medicine has found that “hostile abortion legislation” often worsens prenatal care and mortality rates for women of color, women living in poverty and immigrant women.

About 42% of people living in Macon-Bibb County identify as Black, according to data from the U.S. Census. Around 20% of people in the county live in poverty.

From WALB:

The bus made stops in Atlanta, Macon, and Savannah. The tour was joined by several local leaders such as U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff, former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, and reproductive rights storytellers Callie Beale Harper, Candace Hardnett, and Julia Adele Callahan.

According to the press release, the tour highlighted the “extreme abortion ban” enacted following the overturning of Roe v. Wade in 2022.

“For years and years, maternal mortality in the state of Georgia has been among the worst in the entire nation. The lack of prenatal health care in the state of Georgia, the lack of respect by Georgia’s state leaders for pregnant women in the state of Georgia has already taken countless lives and caused untold suffering for women in our state,” said U.S. Senator Ossoff. “Then Donald Trump overturned Roe v. Wade and our state passed an extreme abortion ban. This is not about Democrats or Republicans, it’s about real human lives and it’s about the health of pregnant women in Georgia.”

 

 

Dalton Board of Education members are considering how to move forward setting a property tax millage rate without a certified tax digest, according to the Dalton Daily Citizen News.

The fiscal year began July 1.

According to the meeting agenda, the board members will “discuss setting a millage rate” and “schedule the Taxpayer Bill of Rights meetings.”

During the board’s Aug. 12 meeting, Chair Matt Evans said the board members would not vote on a property tax rate for fiscal year 2025 until the school system received a certified tax digest from the Whitfield County assessors office. They have not received that.

According to Whitfield County Board of Commissioners Chairman Jevin Jensen, members of the Board of Commissioners are expected to vote Monday to authorize County Attorney Robert Smalley to file a temporary collection order with Superior Court, which would be an “official request of the judge to approve Whitfield County’s use of the 2023 digest for property taxes this year instead of the problematic 2024 digest.” It is not clear which judge would hear the request.

The Dalton City Council will hold a called meeting at 8 a.m. Tuesday at City Hall to vote on a petition for a temporary tax collection order and an executive session, closed to the public and the media, to discuss potential litigation.

Whitfield County Tax Commissioner Danny Sane sent a letter to members of the county Board of Assessors and other officials explaining concerns about the proposed tax digest for this year.

“Even though the average values of our commercial and industrial properties had increased, the assessors had dramatically reduced more than 800 of our commercial and industrial accounts by more than $50,000,” Sane wrote in the letter. “Some of the decreases were in the millions!”

“This decrease in specific commercial and industrial property was coming at a time when over 7,000 homes had been increased by more than 50%,” he wrote. “I knew immediately what this meant. It meant that there was about to be a dramatic shift in Whitfield County’s tax burden from business and industry to homeowners.”

“Once we have the discussion on setting a millage rate, we’ll schedule the Taxpayer Bill of Rights meetings because legally we’re required to advertise those for so many weeks (in advance),” [Director of Communications Kendra] Pannell said. “(The rate) won’t be finalized until we go through the Bill of Rights and we have all of those meetings open to the public.”

More on the County Commission discussions from the Dalton Daily Citizen News:

Members of the Whitfield County Board of Commissioners are set to vote Monday to authorize County Attorney Robert Smalley to file a temporary collection order with Superior Court.

“This is an official request of the judge to approve Whitfield County’s use of the 2023 digest for property taxes this year instead of the problematic 2024 digest,” said board Chairman Jevin Jensen.

It is not clear which judge would hear the request.

Earlier this week, Judge Walter J. Matthews, a senior judge from the Superior Court of Floyd County, filed an order granting a writ of mandamus requested by the county Board of Assessors to require county Tax Commissioner Danny Sane to sign the 2024 tax digest. Matthews presided over a hearing on the request last week because the judges of Whitfield County Superior Court were presiding over trials.

Under state law the tax commissioner must sign the tax digest, certifying that it is accurate, and send it to the state Department of Revenue. Sane said he cannot in good conscience sign the proposed tax digest for this year. If he doesn’t sign the tax digest then the local governments potentially would not be able to collect property taxes.

Sane had previously sent a letter to the members of the Board of Assessors and other officials explaining his concerns.

In an August statement to the Dalton Daily Citizen, Interim Chairman of the Board of Assessors Gail Noles noted that in 2023 the board “agreed in good faith to not increase property values except where absolutely necessary to allow time for legislative changes to take place and increase the cap on the elderly homestead exemption value from $150,000 to $250,000.”

“While the real estate market and sales prices continue to climb across the region, we are constantly trying to find the best approach to achieve compliance in a timely manner while also taking into account all of the wishes of the different arms of our local government, and of the citizens of Whitfield County,” she said. “However, the fact of the matter is that the current real estate market is outpacing assessed property values by a significant amount and we simply have no choice but to continue to set property values at a compliant level.”

“In March of 2024, elected officials met with our former chairman and requested a set percentage increase and our board agreed to accept those limits,” she said. “At the time, our values were already set for submission, and the reduction of property value increases to a set overall limit in a short amount of time created a few unexpected consequences.”

“We are aware of those anomalies and are working directly with specific property areas to correct them,” she said. “Even with these issues, we have established a digest that maintains uniformity and a lack of bias which is a vast improvement from the 2023 digest. By creating a compliant digest, and staying within compliance, we can ensure that situations like this don’t occur in the future, which is our goal for 2025 and beyond.”

United States Senator Raphael Warnock (D-Atlanta) wants more gun restrictions, according to USA Today via the Savannah Morning News.

During an appearance on NBC News’ Meet the Press, U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., said the shooting in Winder shows “we’re all sitting ducks.”

“We can do better than this,” he said. “This is a tragic form of American exceptionalism. This doesn’t happen all over the world.”

In no other country that is not at war do you see such routine, random violence. It has become a tragic part of the “everyday lives of people,” Warnock said.

“Fourteen-year-olds don’t need AR-15s,” Warnock said. “We need to get these military-style weapons off the streets.”

Why Congress cannot pass comprehensive gun reform? Warnock said politicians “beholden” to gun lobbyists are to blame.

“The gun lobby lines its pockets with the blood of our children,” he said.

Eugene Yu, a Republican candidate for Congress in Georgia, offered condolences for Irimie at her service. Speaking to USA TODAY outside the church, Yu said gun control had “nothing to do” with the shooting last week because “a gun itself” doesn’t kill. Responsibility falls on the shooter’s parents, he said.

“If your daughter or your son is crazy, you know you cannot control him, you’re not going to go out there and buy a gun to give it to him, right?” Yu said.

Schools should ramp up security measures and law enforcement should get more funding, he said.

“Whenever this kind of tragedy comes up, there must be 10,000 different reasons out there,” Yu said. “But we just as the public have to be aware, and each individual family, the school, the local law enforcement, they all have to work together.”

The mother of the 14-year-old boy charged with killing the four people at the high school said she alerted the school counselor the morning of the shooting that there was an “extreme emergency” and her son needed to be found, the Washington Post reported Saturday. The call log obtained by the Post shows Marcee Gray, the suspect’s mother, made a 10-minute phone call to the school about half an hour before the shooting is believed to have started.

“I was the one that notified the school counselor at the high school,” Gray said in a text message to her sister, Annie Brown, according to a screenshot of the conversation obtained by the Post. “I told them it was an extreme emergency and for them to go immediately and find (my son) to check on him.”

From USA Today via the Savannah Morning News:

There’s only so much law enforcement can do to stop a crime like a mass shooting from occurring in advance, said Adam Winkler, a law professor and gun policy expert at UCLA.

“We have to be realistic about what you can accomplish in a society that has over 400 million guns and they’re very easy to obtain,” Winkler said.

The notion that the shooting suspect was on the FBI’s “radar” for over a year is a misunderstanding of how law enforcement operates, according to Katherine Schweit, a former FBI agent who created the FBI’s active shooter program.

“Because somebody interacts with law enforcement doesn’t give law enforcement the authority – federal, state or local or tribal – to constantly go back into somebody’s personal life and check on them and check on them,” Schweit said.

The FBI alerted local law enforcement about threats to commit a school shooting made on the online platform Discord. They traced the account that made the threats to an address where Colin Gray and his son previously lived and had since moved from in Jefferson, Georgia.

The FBI in Atlanta said in a statement that the county alerted schools so they could monitor the student, but that there was no probable cause for law enforcement on any level to take further action.

“If there is nothing that indicates that there’s probable cause to believe a crime is occurring or can or will be occurring, the law enforcement officer can’t, for instance, arrest an individual or confiscate weapons that might be in somebody’s home and lawfully owned,” Schweit said.

The May 2023 investigation illustrates some of the constraints law enforcement faces when investigating threats.

“That is what law enforcement – hundreds of thousands of law enforcement – deal with every day is having to evaluate: How serious is this threat, how serious is this situation on the street? And they have to make a determination, and then they have to keep moving,” Schweit said. “You can’t just arrest everybody, because we don’t live in that kind of a country, and we don’t want to live in that kind of a country.”

Meanwhile, some prosecutors are seeking to hold parents accountable when their children commit violent crimes with guns connected to the parents.

Colin Gray’s charges are only the second time in the U.S. that the parent of a mass school shooter has been criminally charged for deaths allegedly caused by their child. Just months ago, Jennifer and James Crumbley were each sentenced to 10 to 15 years in prison for involuntary manslaughter in the mass shooting their son committed at his Michigan high school.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Statesboro will host the first two of three required public meetings to discuss a proposed property tax millage rate increase, according to the Statesboro Herald.

Statesboro’s mayor and council will hold the first two of three required hearings Tuesday, Sept. 10, at 12 noon and then 6 p.m. on an advertised 24.56% proposed increase in city property tax. The council by a 4-0 vote in June adopted a budget that factored in a probable one-mill increase in the tax rate, from 8.125 to 9.125 mills, but actually setting the millage is a separate process to be completed before Oct. 1.

That 1-mill rate hike by itself would be a 12.3% increase, but it follows a roughly equal inflationary rise in the value of taxable property within the city limits as determined by the Bulloch County Board of Tax Assessors staff. Under the state law known as the Georgia Property Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights, local governing boards such as city councils, county commissions and school boards must roll back their millage rates to compensate fully for inflation in assessed real estate values or declare a tax increase and hold three hearings.

In this case, City Council would have had to change its millage rate in the opposite direction, lowering it to 7.326 mills, the “rollback rate” determined by the assessors’ office as sufficient to offset inflation in the tax digest values, to avoid the hearings. The announced increase of 24.56% is the difference between the 7.326-mill rollback rate and the proposed rate of 9.125 mills.

On average, the resulting tax on a home with a 2024 fair market value of $200,000 and the standard homestead exemption will be $140.32 higher than last year’s tax. The average tax on a $200,000 non-homestead property will be $143.92. These are “on average” because the property value inflation part varies with neighborhood and building type.

Chatham County Commissioners heard a report on the damages inflicted by Hurricane Debby, according to the Savannah Morning News.

Tropical Storm Debby has passed, the Ogeechee River has crested, and flood waters have receded. Given the Coastal Empire has made it through the worst of August’s natural disasters, the Chatham County Board of Commissioners received an update from Chatham Emergency Management Agency on the impacts of the storm and flooding.

This installment of On Our Radar will recap the impacts to Chatham County by the numbers. Commissioners also approved a budget for recovery costs from the storm, which are expected to cost the county about $960,000.

CEMA and the Federal Emergency Management Agency conducted their first damage assessments of Chatham County on Aug. 15. By the time all of the agencies’ assessments were done, the groups conducted over 15,000 assessments, according to a report given by CEMA Director Dennis Jones.

From those assessments about 256 homes had reportable damage, with 75 of those being listed as destroyed or having major damage. Destroyed homes were those with water above the roofline or over 18 inches of water in essential living space for multiple days.

Multiple commissioners lauded Jones and CEMA for their work during the disaster.

“(CEMA) takes on that leadership role, and y’all do it well,” said District 7 Commissioner Dean Kicklighter.

District 6 Commissioner Aaron “ADot” Whitely was one of those commissioners, but did offer up one request. Whitely requested the county look into more mass communication options to ensure residents receive emergency management notifications.

Whitely said not everyone uses social media and mentioned other potential measures such as PA systems or increased use of radio.

From the Associated Press via the Valdosta Daily Times:

“I’m not going to referee or second-guess what happened with the authorities the other night,” U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock, a Georgia Democrat, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday. “I applaud our first responders. When others are running away from danger, they run toward the danger in order to do the best they can.”

Gwinnett County launched a microtransit pilot program, according to AccessWDUN.

Microtransit is an on- demand shared-ride service that aims to improve mobility for residents and businesses in the area. The project was created in collaboration with the Gateway85 Community Improvement District and the city of Norcross.

Ride Gwinnett currently operates microtransit services in Snellville and Lawrenceville. The new pilot officially begins operation on Monday and will provide microtransit service for areas of Norcross and the Gateway85 Community Improvement District.

“Microtransit is a flexible and convenient transportation option that represents a significant step forward in Gwinnett County’s efforts to achieve mobility for all,” Gwinnett County Board of Commissioners Chairwoman Nicole Love Hendrickson, said.  “Our collaboration with the Gateway85 Community Improvement District and the city of Norcross to add the service in this area is a prime example of the power of partnership in delivering exceptional services that enhance connectivity and accessibility for our residents, businesses and visitors.”

Customers will be able to select pickup and drop off locations, choose pick up times, and specify the number of riders through the Ride Gwinnett App.

“It is incredible that we have been able to partner with the city of Norcross and Gwinnett County to launch the new on-demand microtransit pilot program, which will be a game-changer for our district,”  Emory Morsberger, executive director of Gateway85 Community Improvement District, said. “This service will provide a reliable and affordable transportation option for our community, helping employees get to their jobs and ensuring that transit-dependent residents can easily move around the area, all for just $3. We are committed to improving accessibility and enhancing the quality of life for everyone in our district.”

Service will be available Monday through Saturday from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m., excluding holidays. Payments can be made through the app or with exact change.

The program is funded 44% each by Gwinnett County and Gateway85 CID, with the city of Norcross covering the remainder.

Gwinnett County is missing an opportunity if they don’t immediately rebrand their microtransit program as “Guber.”

 

Grady County Administrator Buddy Johnson resigned his position and started a new job as Brooks County Administrator, according to WALB.

 

 

 

The Savannah Morning News published a voters guide for the November 5, 2024 General Elections.

With several newly-drawn districts for state and federal legislative seats, voters should check their My Voter Page to view the most up-to-date information about their registration status, polling locations, and elected officials.