Cobb Police said Saturday morning that a portion of Paper Mill Road will be closed “for several hours” due to downed power lines.
Police said in a social media posting around 10 a.m. that the closure is along Paper Mill between Thunderbird Drive and River Ridge Chase, near Sope Creek.
Police said a vehicle crashed into a utility pole, and crews are on the scene to make repairs.
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The Sterling Estates senior residential facility on Lower Roswell Road is a mix of the main assisted living building and separate cottage buildings at the front of the property.
On Tuesday Sterling Estates will go before the Cobb Board of Commissioners to request a site plan change to construct two new cottage buildings.
The agenda item (you can read it and see the site plan here) states that the two proposed buildings, with three independent living units each, would be built in the back of the property.
“The applicant’s facility has a waiting list and the applicant would like to build two more single family cottages in the rear that would each have three units per cottage,” said the agenda item.
A stipulation letter from Sterling Estates attorney Garvis Sams said his client “been a good neighbor to the Kings Cove neighborhood and have complied with all the buffering and lake protection requirements.”
There are currently six rental cottage buildings at Sterling Estates, which opened with two in 2010. Four more cottage buildings were approved in 2014
The zoning hearing starts at 9 a.m. Tuesday in the second floor board room of the Cobb government building (100 Cherokee St., downtown Marietta).
The hearing also will be live-streamed on the county’s website, cable TV channel (Channel 24 on Comcast) and Youtube page. Visit cobbcounty.org/CobbTV for other streaming options.
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Ten students from East Cobb high schools have received appointments to military service academies for the 2022-2023 academic year.
U.S. Rep. Lucy McBath announced the appointments of the Class of 2026 from the 6th District, which includes East Cobb, North Fulton and some of DeKalb and Gwinnett counties.
Students interested in attending the academies are nominated by their member of Congress.
“These talented and driven young people are the future of the United States of America,” McBath said in a release issued by her office.
“I want each family of these service academy appointees to know that I am exceedingly proud of how their children will represent our community as they prepare to serve our nation.”
Many of the East Cobb students heading to service academies played varsity sports in high school.
They include Wheeler’s Zyan Hall, who won a state wrestling championship as a senior, and Bridgette O’Shaughnessy of Lassiter, who competed in swimming and softball.
Pope’s Brianna Dempsey played volleyball and was the president of the Service Club and Honor Society, and Hannah Ograbisz of Walton was a swimmer and graduated from the International Spanish Academy.
U.S. Air Force Academy
Brianna Dempsey, Pope
Greta Hans, Walton
Joseph Stellmach, Pope
Luke Sudul, Pope
Zyan Hall, Wheeler
U.S. Merchant Marine Academy
Caden Pierce, Lassiter
U.S. Naval Academy Preparatory School
Zyan Hall Wheeler
U.S. Naval Academy
Hannah Ograbisz, Walton
Danilo Viciana, Lassiter
U.S. Military Academy
William Greenway, Johnson Ferry Christian Academy
Bridgette O’Shaughnessy Lassiter
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For the first time, Cobb County government is observing Juneteenth, and all offices, including courts and library branches, will be closed on Monday.
June 19 is the designated day for Juneteenth, marking the in 1865 when Union troops freed the last American slaves held in Confederate states.
Cobb commissioners voted last year to begin the holiday starting in 2022. The day off for Cobb employees will cost around $300,000; Cobb currently has 12 official paid holidays every year.
Celebratory events take place all weekend (see the flyer for more information), highlighted by the Cobb NAACP’s cultural festival that takes place all day Saturday at Glover Park on the Marietta Square.
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Scott Halperin, a longtime Legal Aid attorney and public defender in metro Atlanta jurisdictions, has been named the new Circuit Defender for Cobb Superior Court.
Cobb government announced in a release Thursday that Halperin was chosen unanimously by Cobb Superior judges, in consultation with the chief judges in Cobb Magistrate, State, and Juvenile courts, to serve as the lead defender.
Halperin has been the Circuit Defender’s lead advocate in Cobb Juvenile Court since 2020 and will succeed Randall Harris, who is retiring after 15 years in the position.
The Circuit Defender contracts with private attorneys to represent qualifying defendants in the Cobb court system.
A Georgia State University law graduate, Halperin has served as a public defender for Roswell, Sandy Springs and Doraville. In private practice, he represented defendants in criminal and juvenile courts.
“I want to express sincerest gratitude to Randy Harris for his steadfast dedication this office and its mission,” Cobb Chief Judge Rob Leonard said in a statement. “I’m proud to say that Cobb offers the best indigent defense services in the state. That is due in large part to Randy’s leadership and can only improve with Scott Halperin at the helm.”
Of Halperin, Leonard said that “he has a heart for serving the indigent. He also has the respect of the bar and the bench, and he understands the importance of maintaining the independence of the office.”
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The following East Cobb food scores for the week of June 13 have been compiled by the Cobb & Douglas Department of Public Health. Click the link under each listing for inspection details:
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Cobb Commission Chairwoman Lisa Cupid has scheduled town hall meetings in June and July in each of the four commission districts entitled “All-In-Cobb: Cobb forward together.”
The title has been how she’s referenced state of the county addresses she’s given, and in her weekly newsletter Cupid said she’s planning “o share some highlights of what is going on in our county and to hear from citizens about how we can move forward together.”
The timing of the town halls comes after three Cityhood referendums, including one in East Cobb, failed in May, and before Cupid presents her fiscal year 2023 budget.
The two town hall meetings in East Cobb will be June 30 at the Tim D. Lee Senior Center (3332 Sandy Plains Road) in District 3 and July 20 at the Sewell Mill Library and Cultural Center (2051 Lower Roswell Road) in District 2.
In remarks this week to the Cobb Chamber of Commerce, she reiterated themes of her initial speech, including diversity issues, a proposed 30-year transit tax that’s been pushed back for consideration in 2024 and proposed pay raises for county employees.
Cupid referenced the Cityhood votes in a recent newsletter by saying that “this should be the start of new dialogue. The town halls, forums, and conversations gave us a great opportunity to hear from residents. Now is the time to consider how we can strengthen county services, create communities with a better ‘sense of place,’ and capture the heightened level of engagement these votes encouraged.
“Residents made it clear they want a role in land use, zoning, and parks programs. Hopefully, this sparks increased community engagement with commissioners and staff when it comes to amendments to our Comprehensive Plan and participation in zoning meetings. In the weeks and months ahead you can also get involved in the county’s transition to a Unified Development Code among other matters like waste collection.”
All the town hall meetings will be from 6:30-8 p.m. and are free and open to the public.
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
The Delta Community Credit Union has announced an investment of $17,500 in three metro-Atlanta non-profit organizations that focus on educational and empowerment objectives for youths.
It’s part of the financial institution’s 2022 Philanthropic Fund program
The organizations include Cool Girls, Inc., which received a $7,500 grant to education, advocacy and material resources for economically disadvantaged girls.
Other recipients are 21st Leaders, which helps low-income students with leadership and entrepreneurship lessons and STEM learning programs; and the East Lake Foundation, which helps students attending the Drew Charter School in Atlanta.
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Mt. Bethel Christian Academy is inviting the public to a groundbreaking ceremony for its new athletic complex at the school’s north campus.
The event takes place on Wednesday, June 29 at 7 p.m at the Upper School campus (2509 Post Oak Tritt Road).
That’s where the academy’s high school is located, and the facility will include turf football, soccer and lacrosse activities and a fieldhouse, spectator seating, campus improvements and parking expansion (previous ECN coverage here).
A release sent by Academy said the new facility “is the start of what we trust will be a period of tremendous growth and energy that will dramatically impact every division of the school.”
Enrollment last year at the school was nearly 700 students total.
Mt. Bethel Christian Academy began in 1998 with K-5 classes on Lower Roswell Road, adjacent to Mt. Bethel United Methodist Church.
The school expanded to high school grades in 2014 after Mt. Bethel purchased land from the Marcus Jewish Community Center on Post Oak Tritt Road near Holly Springs Road.
Mt. Bethel Christian began a football program in the 2021-2022 school year for fifth and sixth grade students, and will have two teams in the 2022-2023 school year for fourth-through-eighth grade students.
The new field and the growth of the football program “go hand-in-hand, as the school plans for Junior Varsity and Varsity football teams in the near future,” the Mt. Bethel Christian release states.
MBCA is a member of the Georgia High School Association and has teams in other sports competing in the Class A private schools division.
An attempt to build an athletic complex at the Upper School campus was withdrawn in 2019 after community opposition surfaced, and nearby residents expressed concerns about a renewed application last year.
But the site plan was changed in several areas, buffers were added and stipulations include limiting the scope of lighting and the hours for a public address and sound system to operate.
Cobb commissioners unanimously approved the request in March.
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As Cobb County, metro Atlanta and much of North Georgia continues to experience extreme weather, the National Weather Service is extending its heat advisories for the area.
The NWS office in Peachtree City is issuing a heat advisory from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Wednesday, the third day in a row for such notices.
Cobb temperatures reached into the mid-90s on Tuesday, and combined with humidity levels near 60 percent, the NWS calculated the heat index between 105-110.
The local forecast for Wednesday also calls for highs in the high 90s, with a 30 percent chance of rain during the day. The chance of rain will taper off Thursday and Friday to 20 percent.
Temperatures will remain that way, with similar humidity levels, for at least the next week.
Friday’s high is expected to be in the high 90s, and next week will offer little relief, as temperatures could reach 100.
The NWS says that in order to beat the heat, people should try to limit outdoor activities and stay out of the sun during the heat advisory periods, drink plenty of fluids, and not to leave children and pets unattended in vehicles.
“This is especially true during warm or hot weather when car interiors can reach lethal temperatures in a matter of minutes,” the advisory states.
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Two ‘jewel box’ buildings for restaurant and retail space (front and back center) flank a stage and public plaza (center) proposed for The Avenue East Cobb.
North American Properties has filed site plan changes for The Avenue East Cobb that includes expanded restaurant and retail space and a live music stage and public plaza.
The Atlanta-based commercial real estate firm will go before the Cobb Board of Commissioners next week with a conceptual plan that has been months in the making.
As East Cobb Newsreported in April, the transformation of the 23-year-old retail center on Roswell Road near Johnson Ferry Road is being eyed with making it a destination space for shopping, dining and entertainment.
According to filings with the Cobb Zoning Office, NAP wants to construct two “jewel box” buildings for outdoor patio dining and small retail in the back side of the center’s current parking lot, which would become an area for optional valet service.
A permanent stage would be built for concerts in front of the current Bravura wedding fashion store, which would demolished for a public plaza with seating.
That’s what NAP has been calling its Central Boulevard, adjacent to the Kale Me Crazy and Stockyard Burgers & Bones restaurants.
The Avenue has been holding weekly live music and other events in a makeshift stage there for several months, not long after it entered into a joint partnership with PGIM to manage the 23,000-square foot retail center.
According to the Cobb zoning filing (you can read it here) “the applicant believes these amendments will help to keep The Avenue successful for years to come.”
NAP developed the massive Avalon mixed-use project in Alpharetta and more recently overhauled Atlantic Station and Colony Square in midtown Atlanta.
NAP officials told East Cobb News in a recent interview that while The Avenue East Cobb is a project on a smaller scale, “everyone feels it has all this potential to be tapped into.”
A number of musical, recreational and entertainment events is geared toward “everyone who comes here.”
Brittni Johnson, a spokeswoman for NAP, told East Cobb News Tuesday that she “cannot disclose the jewel box occupants at this time but [NAP officials] are planning to have a leasing update ready to share soon.”
Shops and stores in that part of the center include Michael’s, Williams-Sonoma, Pottery Barn, Banana Republic and Gap. Johnson said Bravura, a wedding fashion store, will be relocating to Old Milton Parkway in Alpharetta.
The valet and concierge service will be optional, Johnson said, saying it’s designed for shoppers and patrons who choose to have that convenience.
She said there’s not a figure yet on the capacity for the plaza since that’s still in code review. But she said furniture will be added, “and it will be available for use when it’s not activated for events (i.e., eating lunch or mingling with friends).”
Like the plazas at Avalon and Colony Square, she said, “it is really meant to serve as a community gathering space—or as we like to call it the property’s ‘living room.’ ”
Since NAP’s plans don’t require rezoning, they don’t have to go before the Cobb Planning Commission. Site plan changes are listed as “Other Business” items on the agenda of the Cobb Board of Commissioners zoning hearing.
That hearing starts next Tuesday at 9 a.m., and you can view the full agenda by clicking here.
A concert and events stage area will include a public plaza and an optional valet and concierge service.
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New turn lanes would be created at Lower Roswell Road and Woodlawn Drive.
As the long-delayed Lower Roswell Road transportation project gets closer to getting underway, some East Cobb residents are speaking out against it.
Land acquisitions are continuing for the $9 million Cobb DOT project, which would stretch from Davidson Road and Woodlawn Drive, and include the construction of a median and turn lanes.
The project (fact sheet; location map) also would provide a connection for bicycle lanes in the community and provide sidewalks.
But it’s been more than a decade since first being proposed, and is being funded with money from Cobb government’s 2011 Special-Purpose Local-Option Sales Tax (SPLOST).
The county held open houses in 2012 and 2013 and accepted virtual comments in early 2022 before commissioners approved the project’s conceptual plan last year.
“You should declare it infeasible,” East Cobb resident Craig Harfoot told members of the Cobb Board of Commissioners Tuesday during a public comment session. “You haven’t done anything [with the money].”
Engineering work began in 2012 and right-of-way proceedings began in 2019. Cobb DOT is hoping to start construction early next year, and anticipates taking two years to completion.
But some residents said Tuesday that the project should be scuttled because they claim it’s unwanted and a waste of money.
“It’s so unpopular that two former commissioners chose not to do it in 15 years,” said Jan Barton, referencing Joe Lee Thompson and Bob Ott.
Her remarks included other complaints about county spending—including outside consultants and a proposed new position for a diversity and equity officer—as well as recent zoning decisions in East Cobb.
Others who live in the vicinity echoed her comments.
“It hasn’t gotten off the ground because nobody really wants this,” said Larry Savage, a former candidate for Cobb Commission Chairman. “Nobody’s defending this.”
Savage said the Lower Roswell Road project really isn’t about safety and operational improvements but accommodating a bike and trail plan policy.
For a larger view of the Lower Roswell Road traffic project concept map, click here.
He said that since commissioners approved the Complete Streets Concept in 2009, it’s been lucrative for project developers to incorporate multi-use trails in what are billed as transportation improvements.
“Bike trails are a recreational amenity, a good amenity,” Savage said. “But this project is not a safety and operational improvements project.”
Some of the delays were prompted by concerns from business owners along Lower Roswell between Johnson Ferry Road and Davidson Road.
That stretch of the project calls for the construction of a median, with some businesses fearing access would be cut off.
Referring to the Tijuana Joe’s restaurant on the southeast corner of Johnson Ferry and Lower Roswell, Savage it could lose its business.
Harfoot referenced the Papa John’s restaurant and the new Bagel 101 Café on the northeast corner, saying “they won’t have any parking.”
Rob Miller, owner of the Bagel 101 Café, told East Cobb News he hasn’t heard of any complaints thus far, but “I hear the project will make parking in our center even less then it already is and it’s tough to get in and out on the weekends.”
Commissioners didn’t respond to the public commenters, who said there was a community meeting recently with commissioners Jerica Richardson and JoAnn Birrell.
Cobb DOT has said that traffic volume and safety precipitated the project and proposed the median because the crash history in that area is above average (42 on Lower Roswell between Johnson Ferry and Davidson from 2016-18).
The agency estimated daily average traffic volumes along Lower Roswell to be nearly 37,000 on either side of Johnson Ferry in 2015, and projects that number to grow to 37,000 in 2025 and more than 45,000 by 2035.
“For Cobb DOT, this is a long one,” Cobb DOT engineer Karyn Matthews told East Cobb News last summer, referncing the delays, “but we wanted to get the right concept for the community.”
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The Honorary Commanders Association, a cooperative effort involving Cobb Chamber, Dobbins Air Reserve Base (ARB), General Lucius D. Clay National Guard Center, Georgia National Guard, Coast Guard, National Defense Force and the Navy and Marine Corps, is seeking nominations for members of its 2023 class.
The Honorary Commanders Association annually selects community and business leaders and pairs them with military personnel in a yearlong program designed to give leaders an opportunity to learn about military activities, their impact on the economy and the various aspects of the national defense system.
Created by the Cobb Chamber in 1983, the association has grown over the years to include units of our nation’s Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, Georgia National Guard, Coast Guard and National Defense Force. Each program covers a branch of service and includes a behind-the-scenes tour of local and regional military assets.
The deadline for nominations is July 12. Fill out the nomination form at https://bit.ly/3O0I6JI. The Honorary Commanders Association is sponsored by Marriott Atlanta Northwest Galleria, Blue Sky Exhibits, Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta and Hawthorne Global Aviation Services.
For more information about Honorary Commanders Association, contact Joel Blockton at 770-859-2348 or jblockton@cobbchamber.org.
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WorkSource Cobb/CobbWorks offers a variety of training programs, workshops and on-site recruitments for numerous companies. Discover what is being offered in your area and take advantage of what your local career center offers to help you prepare for your next career.
Webinar: Perfecting your job searching skills Brushing up on your job search skills could land you a career that aligns with your work experience, education and lifestyle. Join the Job Search Techniques webinar, 9-10:30 a.m., Tuesday, June 14.
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Daniell Middle School in East Cobb will be getting a new principal in the coming school year, and she’s a familiar face to teachers, staff and students.
The Cobb Board of Education on Thursday approved personnel changes that including promoting Daniell assistant principal Amy Stump to principal, effective July 1.
She will succeed James Rawls, who is leaving after four years to become principal at Cooper Middle School, where he previously had been an assistant principal.
Stump previously had been an assistant principal at Dickerson Middle School.
That is the sixth change of principals at East Cobb schools this spring. Last month, new principals were appointed at Eastvalley, Powers Ferry and Rocky Mount elementary schools.
Two other principals have retired: Dr. Thomas Flugum at Pope High School and Dr. Amanda Richie at Brumby Elementary School, but their successors have not been named.
The 2022-23 school year starts on Aug. 1.
The school board also affirmed the accreditation of the 16 high schools in the Cobb school district by the Georgia Accrediting Commission.
That’s an agency that accredits only high schools in the state, and whose representatives toured Cobb high schools last year as the district was under a special review by Cognia, its main accreditor and which accredits school systems.
Cognia had instructed Cobb schools to make improvements in four areas in its findings that were released last fall, but reversed those findings in March.
Superintendent Chris Ragsdale told school board members Thursday that the GAC accreditation will not affect its accreditation with Cognia and is simply another layer of accreditation.
While Cobb had considered switching to GAC while the Cognia review was underway, Ragsdale assured board members that there were no plans to do so now. The vote to affirm the GAC accreditation was a unanimous 7-0.
GAC announced it was giving the high schools its highest designation, “accredited with quality.”
GAC was paid $3,000 to perform the accrediting process and will be paid $850 annually to continue accreditation monitoring.
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Cobb DOT crews doing maintenance on Johnson Ferry Road at Olde Towne Parkway last winter. (ECN file photo)
The Cobb Department of Transportation will ask county commissioners Tuesday for funding for outside firms to help perform routine road maintenance projects because of what it says are “critical level” staffing shortages.
According to an agenda item for Tuesday’s Board of Commissioners meeting, Cobb DOT director Drew Rensler and other county department leaders will request funding from the federal American Rescue Plan Act.
The agenda item (you can read it here) says 41 of the 94 maintenance positions in Cobb DOT are vacant, and the maintenance division has been operating with at least 40 percent vacancies for the past year.
“At this time, the Division has extended regular mowing frequencies by two weeks, and work order completion dates by one month due to shortages in current staffing levels,” the agenda item states.
“The utilization of contracted services will allow the Division to respond more efficiently in providing required maintenance operations countywide, and will prevent the back log of work orders.”
Another agenda item (you can read that here) from Rensler, Cobb Water Authority director Judy Jones and Cobb Parks and Recreation Director Michael Brantley further details staff shortages.
They include 27 percent vacancies in “critical” positions maintaining 90 Cobb parks facilities, 30 percent vacancies in the county’s fleet department, 32 percent vacancies in “critical” positions in property management and 31 percent in the water system.
“The volume of vacancies has strained the respective agencies’ abilities to maintain and operate critical infrastructure which is vital for the residents and visitors of Cobb County,” the said in their request.
The funding requests include $636,000 in outsourced salary expenses in all, with $288,000 for water, $132,000 for DOT, $123,000 for Parks, $58,500 for property management and $34,500 for fleet management.
The department heads also will be asking for “a one-time payment of $1,500 for each frontline field staff member responsible for the maintenance and operation of critical public infrastructure throughout the County.”
The bonuses would apply to employees hired before April 1, and they must stay with the county for 12 months after receiving it.
While the agenda items were posted with the full agenda (you can read that here), the Cobb DOT and other department infrastructure items were sent to news media outlets Thursday night by Cobb government spokesman Ross Cavitt.
He noted that Cobb has begun taking applications for $147 million in ARPA funds and received the second installment of $73,824,239 on Thursday.
Government agencies are among those eligible for the funding, as commissioners previously approved criteria that included county infrastructure.
Tuesday’s meeting also will include an update on the county’s agreement with the Atlanta Braves over Truist Park and The Battery and a recognition of World Elder Abuse Awareness Day.
Commissioners also will be asked to issue a proclamation on behalf of state senators Kay Kirkpatrick and Doc Rhett to Judy Boyce, the widow of former Cobb Commission Chairman Mike Boyce, in recognition of his public service.
The meeting starts at 9 a.m. Tuesday in the second floor board room of the Cobb government building (100 Cherokee St., downtown Marietta).
The hearing also will be live-streamed on the county’s website, cable TV channel (Channel 24 on Comcast) and Youtube page. Visit cobbcounty.org/CobbTV for other streaming options.
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Superintendent Chris Ragsdale responds to a question about safety issues from school board member Tre’ Hutchins.
Two weeks after a deadly school shooting in Texas, Cobb County School District Superintendent Chris Ragsdale said Thursday that the district has switched to a new crisis alert system provider.
During prepared remarks at a Cobb Board of Education work session, Ragsdale also said each of the district’s 114 school campuses will have at least one unannounced Code Red drill during the 2022-23 school year to test the new system.
He added that the Cobb district is considering recruiting and training retired military, law enforcement, and other agents to serve as armed guards of schools and wants to hire more school psychologists to help students with mental health issues.
AlertPoint, which has been Cobb’s alert system vendor for the last five years, will be replaced by Centigex, which provides alert system technology for the educational sector and other industries.
Installation of the new system began in April and will be in place in all schools by Aug. 1, when the new school year begins in the Cobb district, according to Ragsdale, but he didn’t say why the district was making the change.
In February 2021 all high schools in Cobb were put on a brief Code Red lockdown. After initially saying it was due to a false alarm, the district said the incident was a deliberate cyber attack on the AlertPoint system and called in the Cobb Police Department to help investigate.
Centigex offers something similar to AlertPoint, what is called the CrisisAlert System, which is in place in several other school districts in metro Atlanta for what Ragsdale said is a “first level of security.”
In the Centigex system, teachers and staffers are equipped with wearable badges to report emergencies electronically via the push of a button, and that “instantly” alerts administrators and responders and triggers a lockdown in seconds.
On May 24, an 18-year-old boy in Uvalde, Texas shot his grandmother, then entered Robb Elementary School and fatally shot 19 students and two teachers before he was killed by a U.S. Border Patrol officer.
Ragsdale called the tragedy an “evil act,” and said that while “there’s no quick fix” and “you cannot ban evil,” the new alert system is part of the Cobb district’s enhanced objectives “to put in place all measures necessary to ensure the safety of our students and staff. Student safety has been, and continues to be, our number one priority.”
He said he could not publicly explain some of the procedures and protocols for security reasons, but told board members the matter could be discussed in executive session.
AlertPoint was installed in 2017 in several schools and then district-wide the following year. Cobb spent $5.3 million to purchase AlertPoint, and said all teachers and staff had been trained to use it.
But a survey conducted by Watching the Funds Cobb, a citizens group tracking Cobb school district spending, said more than 80 percent of respondents said they didn’t know how to use AlertPoint and hadn’t been trained on it.
When the subject came up at the work session, Ragsdale said that AlertPoint was “fully functioning” although not every staff member had a badge.
Board member Jaha Howard told Ragsdale he wanted to have trust in the new company, and Ragsdale directed him to the Centigex website.
The Centigex CrisisAlert Syterm also is installed in several hundred districts in Florida, which mandated such systems after the Parkland High School shootings left 17 people dead in 2018.
But Charlotte-Mecklenberg Schools, the largest district in North Carolina, dropped Centigex in 2020 when some features of the system weren’t reliable or working at all.
Ragsdale said after each school’s Code Red drill, district officials will brief school administrators to improve crisis preparedness.
“That does not mean that we will show up and issue a code red without announcing it is a drill,” he said.
The idea of arming teachers, however, is something Ragsdale said he isn’t entertaining: “We’re asking teachers to do too much already.”
At the board’s Thursday night business meeting, several speakers demanding more security measures wore orange shirts saying “We Demand Safer Schools Now!”
Some were not satisfied with what Ragsdale had announced, and called for the district to resume the suspended “No Place for Hate” and other bias training programs, and to do more for students with mental health issues.
One of the speakers, parent Jenny Peterson, said “how can you fix what’s broken if you don’t identify it? Be leaders!”
The Cobb school district said it will be seeking to use money Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) Fund, passed by Congress in 2020, to help pay for some of the additional security measures.
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New Cobb school board maps push Post 6 (in turquoise) completely out of East Cobb.
The Southern Poverty Law Center and other organizations and individuals have filed a federal lawsuit challenging the redistricting of Cobb Board of Education seats.
The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for Northern Georgia in Atlanta, claims that legislators used race as “a predominant factor” in redrawing the seven school board posts, diluting black and Hispanic voting power in Cobb County.
The suit alleges that the board’s four white members “forged ahead with a secretive map-drawing process to maintain their tenuous majority over the Board’s three Black members.”
But the only defendants named are the Cobb Board of Elections and Registration and director Janine Eveler.
Cobb government spokesman Ross Cavitt told East Cobb News that Daniel White, the Cobb Elections attorney, was not aware of the lawsuit.
The suit (you can read it here) is asking the court to declare that the redrawn posts 2, 3, and 6 violate the 14th amendment of the U.S. Constitution and to order an interim redistricting plan for those three seats.
Those new lines pushed three seats entirely into the South Cobb area, including Post 6, which currently includes the Walton and Wheeler attendance zones.
The new lines, which go into effect in January, cut out the East Cobb area of that post, which solely includes the Smyrna-Vinings-Cumberland area.
Post 2 and Post 4 also are in the South Cobb area, and along with Post 6 have are represented by three black Democrats.
One of them is Charisse Davis, who was elected in 2018 to serve Post 6. She is not seeking re-election this year.
Nor did Jaha Howard of Post 2, who ran in the Democratic primary for Georgia school superintendent last month.
The new maps split East Cobb into two districts: Post 4, held by two-term Republican chairman David Chastain and that includes the Kell, Lassiter and Sprayberry clusters; and Post 5, held by Republican vice chairman David Banks, which comprises the Pope, Walton and Wheeler clusters.
Chastain is up for re-election this year and in November will face Democrat Catherine Pozniak.
“Ultimately, the Board and General Assembly enacted a redistricting plan that whitewashed the northern, eastern, and western districts by packing Black and Latinx voters into the Challenged Districts, as a last-ditch effort to limit the power of their emerging political coalition,” read the lawsuit.
“The Plan is a product of the Board’s pattern and practice over the last several years to impose policies that disproportionately and negatively impact students of color and their families.”
The lawsuit also catalogues a number of conflicts on the Cobb school board along racial lines over the last three years, and concerns from black legislators about the redistricting proposals that they may violate the federal Voting Rights Act.
“As shown in the maps [above] which reflect Black and Latinx voting age population figures by voting district utilizing 2020 census data, the majority of Cobb County’s Black and Latinx communities live in the southern half of the County, while most of the County’s white population lives in the north,” according to the lawsuit.
Other plaintiffs include the Galeo Latino Community Development Fund, the New Georgia Project Fund, the League of Women Voters of Marietta-Cobb and some Cobb school parents in those three posts.
Other legal groups involved in filing the suit include the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, the ACLU Foundation of Georgia and the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under the Law.
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