The halls of Johnson Ferry Baptist Church were bursting with people of all ages on Saturday, and especially children and their parents, at the church’s Annual Christmas Party.
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As early voting in the U.S. Senate runoff has concluded, more than 150,000 votes have been cast in Cobb in person and via absentee ballot.
Tuesday’s conclusion to the race between Democratic U.S. Sen Raphael Warnock and Republican Herschel Walker will take place at regular voting precincts throughout Cobb and the state. Voters who are returning absentee ballots face a Tuesday 7 p.m. deadline to return them.
Cobb Elections agreed to the extension after being sued over delays in mailing some absentee ballots due to the Thanksgiving holiday last week.
Voters who received their absentee ballots on or before Nov. 26 will have the same deadline as military and overseas voters, next Friday, Dec. 9.
Through Friday, a total of 146,705 people voted in person in Cobb, according to Cobb Elections. That’s roughly a third of the county’s registered voters and included 29,798 votes on Friday, a single-day record for early voting.
At the East Cobb Government Service Center, 15,996 voted early, and 17,495 voted early at the Tim D. Lee Senior Center.
More than 20,000 people have voted each day of early voting since Monday.
A total of 24,053 absentee ballots have been requested by Cobb voters, with 9,709 returned and 6,237 accepted.
In a social media posting Saturday morning, Gabriel Sterling, the chief operating officer for the Georgia Secretary of State’s office, said more than 1.8 million votes were cast across the state in early voting and absentee voting.
He said that represents 26.4 active voters in Georgia, and that 60 percent of absentee ballots have been returned and accepted.
The Secretary of State’s office has a Ballot Trax service voters can use to follow the status of their absentee ballots.
Absentee ballots can be returned in Cobb in-person Monday and Tuesday at the Cobb Elections office (995 Roswell Street, Marietta.).
On Monday the hours are from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. and on Tuesday the hours are voting hours—7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
There will be no other absentee ballot drop boxes at any of the regular voting precincts.
All absentee ballots not subject to Friday’s court order must be received by the Cobb Elections office by 7 p.m. Tuesday.
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The annual Stuff-A-Bus program will be rolling out throughout Cobb County in mid-December to collect holiday gifts for needy children.
The Cobb Christmas program includes various community partners in conducting the drive, which takes place from Dec. 13-15.
Citizens are asked to bring unwrapped toys for children ages 3-13 at the locations, dates and times indicated on the flyer.
The Cobb Linc bus will be collecting the toys to be distributed to around 1,000 children. Start shopping now and drop off your toy donations at any businesses listed on the flyer.
The two East Cobb stops on the schedule take place on Tuesday, Dec. 13.
The bus will stop at the Northeast Cobb YMCA (3010 Johnson Ferry Road) from 10:30 a.m. to 11 a.m. and at the Wellstar East Cobb Health Park (3747 Roswell Road) from 11:30 a.m. to 12 p.m.
For more information on the Stuff-A-Bus program, click here.
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Just as in the general election, the Cobb Board of Elections and Registration is being sued over delays in sending out absentee ballots for the U.S. Senate runoff.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, the ACLU of Georgia and the law firm Dechert LLP have filed an emergency lawsuit in Cobb Superior Court on behalf of three voters who either have not received absentee ballots before Tuesday’s runoff election concludes or are just now getting them.
Cobb Elections Director Janine Eveler said this week that 3,442 absentee ballots did not go out until Monday instead of last Wednesday, the day before the two-day county Thanksgiving holiday, when they were listed as having been mailed out.
The runoff between Democratic U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock and Republican Herschel Walker has an 11-day window for absentee ballots to be requested, returned and received, and on four of those days no ballots were mailed.
UPDATED:
Cobb Elections has agreed to extend the deadline for those who did not receive an absentee ballot by Nov. 26. Those voters will have until next next Friday, Dec. 9, to have their absentee ballots postmarked and mailed.
A hearing took place Friday before Cobb Superior Court Judge Kellie Hill, who signed a consent decree as she did last month.
Cobb Elections contended during the hearing that all absentee ballots requested for the runoff met the legal deadlines for being mailed, and that they weren’t picked up in the mail until Monday, Nov. 28, due to the holiday.
ORIGINAL STORY:
Absentee ballots from voters not subject to Friday’s agreement must be received by the Cobb Elections office by 7 p.m. Tuesday. Absentee ballot drop boxes are available at some early voting locations, including the East Cobb Government Service Center, by 7 p.m. Friday, the last day of early voting.
Another plaintiff in the lawsuit is the Cobb County Democracy Center, which bills itself as a voter advocacy organization.
The suit sought to extend the deadline for those who haven’t received their ballots to Dec. 9, when military and overseas ballots are due.
The suit also wants to allow those voters who haven’t received the absentee ballots by 2 p.m. Friday to use a federal absentee write-in ballot.
A similar suit in the general election resulted in a consent decree allowing absentee voters extra time to return their ballots. That was after Cobb Elections admitted to a “human error” in delaying the mailing of around 1,000 absentee ballots.
In a release Friday morning, the SPLC, ACLU and Dechert also want Cobb Elections to deliver absentee ballots to homebound voters and for the county to notify voters of the changes.
They say the problems are due to a new state voting law, SB 202, which reduced the time for absentee ballots to be requested and returned from the 2020 elections.
One of the plaintiffs is working out of state is not available to vote in person, according to the lawsuit (you can read it here).
She said she inquired on Tuesday about the status of her ballot, but was told she would have to wait for it to be mailed, vote early or vote in person.
County elections offices have three business days to mail an absentee ballot upon receipt of an application.
Another plaintiff said he requested his ballot on Nov. 16 but received it on Thursday, with the mailing date showing Nov. 26, last Saturday.
That plaintiff, David Medof of East Cobb, said in an affidavit attached to the lawsuit that he’s a student attending college outside the county. He said he does not have a car and is studying for final exams.
Medof said he completed and returned his ballot immediately on Thursday, “but I am still concerned that my ballot will not arrive by 7:00pm on election day in time to be counted.”
The lawsuit also claims that Cobb is slower to process returned absentee ballots, with around 20 percent of those turned in by Nov. 21, compared to nearly 30 percent in Fulton and 27 percent in DeKalb.
After today, the only location to drop off an absentee ballot in person is Tuesday, between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m., at the Cobb Elections office (995 Roswell St., Marietta).
Those voters casting ballots in person will go their usual precincts, which do not have absentee ballot dropoff availability.
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But the application calls for only 128 parking spaces; a minimum of 158 are required for the CAC (commercial activity center) and NAC (neighborhood activity center) categories being sought.
The new site plan includes an above-ground retention pond at the Canton-Piedmont intersection.
But the biggest concern for the Cobb Zoning Office is the limited amount of space for emergency vehicles. The staff analysis (you can read it here) recommends approval pending those and other issues being addressed.
The continuance comes after a community meeting this week involving Lidl, the Canton Road Neighbors civic group, Commissioner JoAnn Birrell and Planning Commissioner Deborah Dance.
This is Lidl’s third attempt to build a store in the Northeast Cobb area; a store at Woodlawn Square opened in the former Fresh Market space in September 2020.
In the Paper Mill Village Starbucks case, the applicant, S & B Investments, is requesting the continuance to February.
Attorney Garvis Sams said in a letter that the building’s architecture and configuration on the site are being changed.
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The newly formed Grace Resurrection Methodist Church is holding services at the former Lutheran Church of the Incarnation.
After leaving Mt. Bethel Church over its dispute with the North Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church, some former members have been meeting in recent months for picnics and other gatherings, including worship services.
Some expressed a desire to form their own church, and over the summer began the process of starting what is now called Grace Resurrection Methodist Church.
They met at the tiny New Providence Baptist Church on Providence Road, as what was called the Mt. Bethel Resurrection Church Exploratory Committee was taking shape.
The leadership has included Rev. Randy Mickler, who was Mt. Bethel’s pastor for nearly 30 years, and Dr. Rev. Steven Usry, who had been appointed to the role of senior pastor at Mt. Bethel at the start of the controversy.
With attendance heading into triple figures at New Providence, they were running out of room to worship.
Rev. Dr. Steven Usry delivers the sermon at the new home of Grace Resurrection Methodist Church. Photos courtesy Donna Lachance.
So the exploratory committee set out for larger, more permanent space. On Nov. 20, the first worship service of Grace Resurrection took place at that new venue, the former Lutheran Church of the Incarnation, which closed this summer.
More than 100 people attended, and the newly formed Grace Resurrection choir sang.
Among those in the pews was Donna Lachance.
“It just felt like coming home after a long dry spell,” she said.
She was a longtime Mt. Bethel member and church employee who was among the more vocal opponents of the church’s move to separate from the United Methodist Church.
Disaffected members stayed connected by starting the Friends of Mt. Bethel group, which had more than 600 names on its e-mail list until being shuttered last month.
“My husband and I have already started attending Roswell UMC, but we strongly support this initiative, and will attend periodically at the very least,” Lachance said about Grace Resurrection.
Even as the litigation between Mt. Bethel and the North Georgia Conference continued, she was hopeful the denomination would stand its ground and at least allow the church membership a vote on disaffiliation.
The mediated settlement in Cobb Superior Court required Mt. Bethel to pay $13.1 million to leave the UMC. Former North Georgia Bishop Sue-Haupert Johnson, whose reassignment of Mt. Bethel senior pastor Jody Ray in April 2021 triggered the controversy, met with Friends of Mt. Bethel members, some of whom told her they feel like they don’t have a church home.
(Haupert-Johnson was appointed the UMC’s Bishop of Virginia earlier this month.)
Grace Resurrection, which registered as a domestic non-profit religious organization in late October, has covered the former Lutheran church’s signage and included its name on the marquee.
Grace Resurrection is occupying the former Incarnation facility at 1200 Indian Hills Parkway that is now owned by the Southeastern Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America.
There’s one Sunday service, at 11 a.m.
In response to an interview request from East Cobb News, Grace Resurrection sent out a brief press release saying that weekly attendance has averaged around 200 people.
It quoted a member saying that “rather than scatter or dropout altogether, we wanted to continue worshiping together and expand our welcome to new members. Now an excellent centralized location is available to us.”
The release said that interim clergy are leading services and that “Sunday School classes and other fellowship gatherings are forming.”
A second Sunday service, mission projects and a youth program also are being planned.
“The church has come together in unity, faith and love and is excited to provide a kind, welcoming and Christ-centered worship experience for people across the East Cobb community,” the release said.
Lachance said that while wishes her friends Grace Resurrection “the best, and will likely visit from time to time,” she is joining Roswell UMC, with established mission and youth programs “for our grandkids.”
She said that many former members of the Friends of Mt. Bethel were involved in the formation of Grace Resurrection, but so were others.
“But the leadership team of Friends of Mt. Bethel UMC made a group decision to close down that organization and that name. It existed for a time and a purpose, and that time and purpose have passed,” she said.
During Advent, Grace Resurrection is offering Sunday School classes at 9:30 a.m. A Christmas concert will take place Dec. 11 at 5:30 p.m. and a Candlelight Christmas Eve service is scheduled for Dec. 24 at 5 p.m.
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The first full weekend of Christmas events may be the busiest of all in the 2022 holiday season in East Cobb.
There are three full days—and nights—of festivities, starting bright and early on Friday morning.
That’s when the Apple Annie Arts and Crafts Show starts at the Catholic Church of St. Ann (4905 Roswell Road), and all on one floor in the church’s expansive new parish hall.
More than 100 artisanal vendors will be selling their wares, and there will be food and other refreshments. Hours are 9-6 Friday and 9-2 Saturday, and overflow parking and shuttle service will be provided at the Episcopal Church of St. Peter and St. Paul (1795 Johnson Ferry Road).
The choruses from Dickerson Middle School are featured Friday from 6-7:30 p.m. in Caroling at The Avenue East Cobb(4475 Roswell Road), one of the retail center’s many holiday events.
Saturday afternoon includes more family holiday celebrations and entertainment.
From 12-2 p.m., it’s the Johnson Ferry Christmas Party (955 Johnson Ferry Road), a festival with more than 20 venues including inflatables, trains, food, live music, crafts and more. The host is Johnson Ferry Baptist Church, an East Cobb News sponsor.
Music-lovers will enjoy the Cobb New Horizons Christmas Concert from 2-4 p.m. at the Lassiter High School Concert Hall (2601 Shallowford Road). It’s free, and the musicians are seniors with musical experience.
This year is the 30th anniversary of the Bethlehem Walk at Mountain View United Methodist Church (2300 Jamerson Road), and the interactive display of Jesus’ birth takes place from Saturday-Monday from 7-9:30 p.m. each night.
After walking through the streets of Bethlehem, attendees can enjoy refreshments, including hot cider. The event is free but donations are accepted.
At the very end of the weekend, and as the sun goes down, Holiday Lights will be going on at East Cobb Park (3322 Roswell Road).
Live music including Dodgen Pops and a visit from Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus will be featured at the event sponsored by the Friends for the East Cobb Park, which will be selling hot chocolate and cookies.
You can find all of our calendar listings in one handy place on our site. If you have events to share with the public, please e-mail: calendar@eastcobbnews.com and we will post them here.
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