By Guest Columnist MELITA EASTERS, executive director and founding chair of Georgia’s WIN List
On Oct. 1, the 2018 mid-term election is just 37 days away. Nationally and in Georgia, women candidates have won primaries in record-setting numbers, cementing the prediction of 2018 as another “Year of the Woman.”
Atlanta’s Confederate Avenue is to be renamed United Avenue, ending years of debate over what – if anything – to do with a name that holds near mystical power. The former name may be memorialized with an historic marker – in keeping with a multi-national practice of augmenting, rather than removing, a controversial mark of history.
“Secret TRUMP Deal: $40,983 for each taxpayer,” goes the email pitch for what turns out to be an investment newsletter. Although the president has nothing to do with them, pitches like these say a lot about his political situation.
Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms accepted a $500 contribution during her run-off campaign last year from an employee of the company that plans to develop the Gulch. This contribution has been overshadowed by other aspects of the campaign to slow the mayor’s push for a Monday vote by the Atlanta City Council.
How much you say doesn’t matter as much as what you say, but Brian Kemp’s reluctance to say much at all about healthcare so far, and Stacey Abrams volubility on the issue, reflect how the two candidates approach the issue.
Pop quiz time — on some of the issues and offices at stake in Georgia elections this year.
The chair of the Atlanta City Council’s Transportation Committee says he is not happy with the way MARTA’s $2.5 billion expansion plan pits winners against losers, and he said City Hall will soon be releasing its thoughts on expansion proposals that are due for a vote by MARTA’s board on Oct. 4.
Shortly after 9/11, the expression “new normal” came into vogue. It was supposed to describe the new regimen of measures everybody was going to have to get used to as the nation adjusted to the terrorist threat. But it has become a reminder of how unevenly the impact of that day’s attack has been distributed.
After Atlanta provided the Georgia Aquarium with $80 million in financing at favorable terms in 2009 to build a dolphin exhibit, the aquarium’s revenues soared by 23 percent, compared to the year before the exhibit opened. The return on the city’s latest financial support for the aquarium – up to $7.5 million – remains to be determined.
The Georgia and Florida governor’s races have so many parallels that we can expect them to be paired in a lot of stories analyzing politics over the next couple of months. Whether the two races have a parallel outcome is another question.
Atlanta City Council President Felicia Moore unveiled Wednesday her concept to enforce legal and accountable behavior by the city’s elected officials and top officials. It is one plank in a platform of reform proposals a council committee is to discuss at a meeting Sept. 6 to address violations including those announced Wednesday by the city’s independent city auditor and ethics officer.
Democrats and civil rights groups headed off the closure of polling places in Randolph County last week, but that was only a small part of a much bigger battle over ballot access.
Just as Georgia Power’s credit was downgraded this month for financial losses related to Plant Vogtle, Moody’s Investors Service has downgraded the rating of bonds issued by the South Carolina Public Service Authority for an aborted nuclear plant in the Palmetto State. But that’s just part of the story.
Last week Secretary of State Brian Kemp refused to step down to avoid any conflict of interest in the upcoming election, and a federal court mulled a suit demanding the state go back to paper ballots, now. It’s a far cry from 16 years ago, when we were talking about a future in which voting would be as easy as going to the mall.
Amid all the other big news swirling around President Donald Trump’s former attorney, Michael Cohen, the revelation that a Chattanooga developer offered him $10 million to secure government loans for his late-life project didn’t attract much national attention. But it’s a story for our times.
The political class is already stocking up popcorn for the study in contrasts that is this year’s Georgia governor’s race. Unfortunately, the race is also likely to mark a milestone in the politics of dark money electioneering, which for the average voter means endless waves of scary black-and-white attack ads paid for by organizations with fuzzy names.
The passage of a $192 million bond referendum in Miami last year established that taxpayers are willing to shoulder debt to ward off rising sea levels. A group that helped fund that campaign is connected to a digital company that now offers free science-based predictions on rising sea levels along Georgia’s coast.
After both parties (mostly) picked their candidate teams this week, Democrats were quick to make a pitch as the party of jobs in a business-friendly Georgia. And Republicans talked about jobs too, but the GOP kicked off its unified campaigning with a rally heavy on conservative values.
Goodness knows we have enough political entertainment here in Georgia, with one of our legislators biting a fake penis and yanking down his britches on TV, and dueling endorsements from the president and the governor. But something important has been happening in Birmingham.
It’s a open seat, the race is neck to neck and lots of money is being spent by both campaigns. By all rights, we should be expecting a healthy turnout next week in the runoff election to pick the Republican candidate for governor. A sharp drop in turnout could be a warning sign voters are tiring of the race to be “craziest.”
