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By David Pendered

A call for campaign finance reform in Atlanta has resulted in Mayor Kasim Reed saying contracts awarded this autumn for the world’s busiest airport will be clean.

Common Cause of Georgia has issued a report contending that lucrative airport contracts usually go to benefactors of city politicians. The way to stop that, Common Cause says, is stop airport vendors and their agents from pouring money into campaigns.

About four hours after Common Cause met with reporters on the north steps of City Hall, Reed’s office released a 912-word statement. The headline: “Mayor Kasim Reed Expresses Confidence in Hartsfield-Jackson Airport Management.”

One key paragraph reverses a previous decision by the city’s Procurement Department concerning secret issues.

By David Pendered

The complete breadth of the campaign finance reform Common Cause is seeking from Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed became clear at the group’s media conference this morning.

If enacted, all companies that do business with Atlanta would be limited to a contribution limit of $250 over the course of four years for each candidate and office holder, according to Common Cause of Georgia.

The push for campaign finance reform by Common Cause is timed to coincide with the city’s pending award of contracts for all the food and beverage concessionaires at Atlanta’s airport. The amount of space up for grabs in contracts that will last at least a decade is about 191,000 square feet, which is equal in size to almost two average Wal-Mart stores.

By David Pendered

Common Cause of Georgia plans to stand before Atlanta City Hall Wednesday to call upon Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and the Atlanta City Council to reform campaign finance rules as the city prepares to issue lucrative concessions contracts at the airport.

“Our purpose is to publicly call for action to enact campaign finance reform as outlined in the report,” said Kirwin Swint, a political science professor at Kennesaw State University who wrote the white paper on the topic for Common Cause.

The white paper contends that campaign contributors have a history of winning airport contracts. That practice should stop, according to the good government group.

By David Pendered

Common Cause of Georgia has called upon Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed to reform campaign finance rules as the city prepares to issue lucrative concessions contracts at the airport.

Common Cause contends that campaign contributors have a history of winning airport contracts. That practice should stop, according to a white paper by the good government group.

Reed issued a lengthy response that concludes: “It’s time to stop resurrecting ghosts from the past and focus on the present and the future.”

Read the mayor’s full response at the end of this story.

By David Pendered

A group formed to educate voters about the 2012 transportation sales tax referendum met Friday to review its progress and to meet the three consultants who will coordinate a campaign fund raising effort.

The First Friday Transportation Forum includes representatives of interests ranging from banks to developers, paving contractors to apartment owners, the Georgia Conservancy to the AARP. Their common interests include improving transportation mobility and raising public awareness of the penny sales tax referendum next summer.

The fund raising consultants are Kristin Oblander, Candice Franklin and Rebecca Cummiskey. The three are veterans of political campaigns including:

By David Pendered

Local governments across the nation have yet to fall off the cliff and plunge into default, as predicted in September by superstar analyst Meredith Whitney.

That said, the near- and long-term fiscal future for local governments in metro Atlanta is grim, according to a panel of finance and fiscal experts who met Thursday at Georgia State University.

“Overall, we had these real-world people make presentations and their general conclusion is that it’s not going to get any easier,” said Dr. Michael Bell, a former CFO for DeKalb County and Atlanta who’s now a GSU professor of practice in the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies.

By David Pendered

Metro Atlanta voters today can see the full list of transportation projects that their local elected officials will consider for inclusion on the sales tax referendum in 2012.

The list of projects was released this morning to the Atlanta Region Transportation Roundtable from the state Department of Transportation. The roundtable is comprised of elected officials from the 10 metro counties that are to vote on the penny sales tax in July 2012.

The roundtable is to cull the list of $29.8 billion worth of projects to an amount of about $8 billion, which is the amount the penny sales tax for transportation is expected to generate over the course of a decade in a 10-county metro area.