The Cobb Sheriff’s Office said Wednesday that an inmate has died after overdosing on heroin.
A release sent by the Sheriff’s office said James Martin, 41, of Mableton, died shortly after 9 a.m. Wednesday.
He was arrested on Friday for possession of methamphetamine and told deputies that he was a heroin addict who “had just binged the substance,” the release said, adding that he was sent to the jail’s infirmary.
On Wednesday morning, according to the release, Martin told medical staff he wasn’t feeling well and had a seizure.
Life-saving attempts included the use of Narcan, but Martin died in an ambulance en route to a hospital, the Sheriff’s office said.
“Heroin, meth, fentanyl, and other opioids have tragically taken so many lives in Cobb County, causing irreparable harm to families,” Cobb Sheriff Craig Owens said in the release.
The Sheriff’s Office said the Georgia Bureau of Investigation will be conducting an investigation of Martin’s death.
Martin is the first Cobb inmate to die this year and the seventh since Owens took office in 2021.
Three inmates died in May 2022, the last a woman who had been on suicide watch. Three other inmates died in 2021.
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!
Cobb Commissioner Jerica Richardson and Brazilian community leaders in the East Cobb area will be holding what they’re calling a “Little Brazil” community meeting next week.
The meeting takes place from 7-8 p.m. at the Vine Atlanta Church (1296 Gresham Road).
That’s been the venue for the Marietta Brazilian Festival, which started in 2011 and which is scheduled for early June.
The idea behind the community meeting is to gauge interest in the formation of a Brazilian cultural association, according to information from Richardson’s office.
Brazilian community leaders Dilla Campos of the Portuguese-language Viver magazine and Andreia Guilmet of Brazilian Wax by Andreia (with locations on Powers Ferry Road and Johnson Ferry Road) will be leading the meeting.
“Little Brazil” in Cobb is generally regarded as the area around Delk and Powers Ferry roads, and stretches into the Smyrna area.
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!
Legislation that would have reimposed the reapportionment lines for the Cobb Board of Commissioners that were approved by the Georgia legislature in 2022 won’t advance in the current session.
Cobb commission maps passed by the Georgia legislature would include most of East Cobb in District 3 (gold).
SB 236, sponsored by State. Sen. Ed Setzler, a West Cobb Republican, was tabled in the Senate on Monday, which was crossover day in the Georgia General Assembly.
Bills that didn’t pass out of their original chambers by crosover day aren’t considered for the rest of the session.
The bill (you can read it here) was introduced by Setzler after the three Democrats on the Cobb commission voted last fall to invoke a home rule challenge to redistricting lines that drew one of them, Jerica Richardson of East Cobb, out of District 2 in the middle of her term.
Setzler’s bill, co-sponsored by two Republicans, Kay Kirkpatrick and John Albers, who represent parts of East Cobb, was favorably reported out of a Senate committee last week.
Setzler agreed to revise the bill to include language that would allow Richardson to complete her term, which expires in 2024.
A companion bill by Setzler, SB 124 (you can read it here), would “restate constitutional limitations” on counties from determining redistricting lines.
But with a lengthly slate of bills on crossover day, Setzler’s bills weren’t debated or brought to a vote after being tabled.
Since January, the five-woman Cobb commission has been conducting meetings honoring a redistricting map drawn last year by former State Rep. Erick Allen, then the Cobb legislative delegation chairman, that would keep Richardson in District 2.
The two Republicans, JoAnn Birrell of District 3 in East Cobb and Keli Gambrill of West Cobb, tried to abstain from voting at the first meeting, protesting maps they said were unconstitutional.
They were ordered from the dais by Democratic chairwoman Lisa Cupid and since then have begun meetings reading their objections into the record.
Late last month, Gambrill and East Cobb resident Larry Savage filed a lawsuit in Cobb Superior Court challenging the home rule declaration.
That suit has not yet been scheduled for a hearing, according to court records.
Setzler, who was elected to the Senate last year, was the co-sponsor last year as a member of the House of three failed Cobb cityhood referendums.
He became a co-sponsor of the East Cobb legislation that was approved and signed into law. But voters in the proposed city of East Cobb defeated it with more than 73 percent saying no.
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!
East Cobb Park and other county parks were closed for six weeks in the spring of 2020.
Three years ago this coming week, spring was in the air. So were the sounds of neighborhood children happily playing nearby. My dogwood tree had finished its usual late-winter bloom, replaced by bustling green leaves.
Birds were chirping, and pollinating bees were hovering too close by on my balcony.
As I write this today, on a beautiful first Saturday afternoon in March, the same scenario applies.
But there are some notable differences.
The howling of loud cars, often racing, is constant. At times it sounds like the Indianapolis 500, 24/7.
These annoying noises have become part of the soundtracks of our lives since the COVID-19 pandemic was declared here in Georgia and elsewhere during the second week of March 2020.
A few days ago, as I pulled out of my office park, three hot rodders were zipping up Johnson Ferry Road, flooring past the Dick’s Sporting Goods store.
They had a rare empty straightaway on that busy corridor and took advantage of it, and I briefly shut my eyes, fearing a crash that fortunately didn’t happen.
COVID data reflected the vulnerability of the very old and very sick, but public health officials favored restrictions against the young and healthy for months.
Life for most of us has returned to whatever seemed normal before, as the virus has mutated into into less lethal variations. Even those who believed we could eradicate a respiratory virus—something that’s never happened before in human history—now understand that COVID-19 is not going away.
While it was a tragic killer—more than 35,000 Georgians, and nearly 2,000 in Cobb County are among those who have died—the collateral damage stemming from the COVID-19 response figures to be immeasurable, and its effects will last far longer than the danger of the illness.
As surreal as the lockdowns were—something not previously done in Western, supposedly democratic nations—what’s even more troubling now is that there’s little appetite for scrutinizing those mitigations.
Even though many of the narratives—about mask and vaccine effectiveness and natural immunity in particular—are collapsing.
I’ve been skeptical of the restrictions all along, but as a journalist I felt I owed my readers an open mind as this saga unfolded.
During the height of the pandemic, Dr. Janet Memark, director of Cobb and Douglas Public Health, periodically briefed the Cobb Board of Commissioners about COVID-19. She provided data, explained why the precautions were needed and reminded all of us to do our part.
She was trying to be helpful and informative, but her script essentially followed whatever messaging came from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, whose credibility took a major blow during this pandemic.
Not long after then-Cobb Commission Chairman Mike Boyce said he was keeping county parks open during a state of emergency, he was persuaded by public health officials to close them.
For six weeks in the glorious spring, with our public health experts knowing the outdoors were not only not dangerous but healthy to be in—the gates were locked at East Cobb Park, Mabry Park and others in Cobb County. Playgrounds were closed for a bit longer.
It was absurd then, and it’s even more ridiculous recalling it now.
Dr. Janet Memark of Cobb and Douglas Public Health briefing commissioners
Just as bizarre was an impromptu meeting of the Cobb Board of Health in the fall of 2021, called essentially to shame the Cobb County School District into reimposing a mask mandate.
On the Zoom meeting, Memark was shown in a room by herself, wearing a mask. The district didn’t budge, but remains a defendant in a federal lawsuit over the lack of a mandate.
Even though Georgia was the first state to allow a wide swath of businesses to reopen, not enough of her clientele came back right away, and she closed her doors for good during the early summer.
A hair salon owner further down on Johnson Ferry was still feeling the effects of the closures in December 2020, admitting that federal government relief loans, while welcome, were not going to be enough.
Our state and local leaders here in Georgia and Cobb weren’t nearly as heavy-handed as their counterparts elsewhere, but they should be obligated to explain how they think their actions fared.
My guess is that’s not likely to happen, and not just because they can’t defend what they’ve done. There’s an unspoken desire to move on and put this behind us, but it’s not that easy.
On a personal level, covering COVID was an experience like no other. Of the few events I attended in person during those early months, they invariably required me to submit to having a temperature gun pointed at my forehead.
I approached a masked woman and her two young masked sons about why they came. We were outdoors, but she shrieked in horror because I wasn’t wearing a face covering.
She accused me of trying to harm her children and refused to talk to me. I’ve been given plenty of no-comment brushoffs in my career, but that one’s near the top of the list.
The woman pictured here without the mask—she had no problem talking to me, although she didn’t give me a last name.
I received a harrowing phone call from a mother after Cobb schools started the 2020-21 school year virtually, her two daughters aching to get back to school with their friends. The woman cried and poured her heart out, then thanked me for the therapy session.
Others left equally agonizing messages in early 2021, trying to schedule vaccination appointments. They were elderly, and the Cobb and Douglas Public Health website had crashed, and there wasn’t a phone number to call.
I’ve never felt more helpless.
As a human being, I wasn’t faring so well the longer the hysteria continued. After a family member had fought off COVID in early 2021, I was on a social media thread with familiar people and pushed back against those demanding vaccine mandates.
A former co-worker kindly informed me that I had the blood of hundreds of thousands of dead Americans on my hands.
The church I attended, like many houses of worship, remained closed for months, and when it reopened, it was very restrictive, with no singing or fellowship, and reservations were required.
My nephew in Florida didn’t get to have his high school graduation in 2020, as the anxieties of adults trumped the once-in-a-lifetime experiences of youth. At least Cobb seniors that year got to have commencement exercises, belatedly.
Lindsey Johnson, a member of Lassiter High School’s Class of 2020, didn’t get a traditional graduation celebration.
The power of fear was on display like I’ve never experienced before, and some people will never be the same.
These memories may seem distant now, and I can understand why many don’t want to revisit such a painful time.
But they can’t be memory-holed. Too many people lost their livelihoods and their bodily autonomy over the last three years. Their kids’ schooling was disrupted, social life was flattened and community bonds were ripped apart.
We’re lucky in East Cobb to be in a community that has been able to rebound from this ordeal fairly well, but many people are still hurting, financially, emotionally and socially.
This unprecedented, disastrous response to a virus with a high recovery rate needs to be fleshed out at every level, including in Cobb and Georgia.
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 Georgia Art Education Association has named Krista Lewis of Shallowford Falls Elementary School in East Cobb its elementary art educator of the year.
Lewis, who has taught art for 21 years “is a passionate visual arts educator who selflessly encourages and supports her students and colleagues,” said Laura LaQuaglia, the supervisory of learning design and visual arts for the Cobb County School District, in a district release.
“Her commitment in the classroom and community sets her apart from her peers.”
Lewis was named to the Cobb school district’s Teacher Leader Academy in 2019 and has been involved in GAEA leadership.
She was the organization’s Youth Art Month chairwoman, promoting “the importance of recognizing the arts in schools, created opportunities for schools to promote their art programs, and streamlined how teachers accessed YAM information,” the Cobb school district release said.
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 Paper Mill Road bridge over Sope Creek is at the edge of the East Cobb portion of the Chattahoochee River NRA.
The National Park Service said this week that a record 3.5 million visitors used the Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area, which includes several area trails and facilities in East Cobb.
Those figures were right behind the Cape Cod National Seashore in Massaschusetts and Yosemite National Park in California and in 21st place overall nationally.
The 3.5 million figure is nine percent higher than in 2021, according to park officials, who said that the Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park in Marietta reported 1.5 million visitors last year.
The Chattahoochee River NRA, which was created in 1978, stretches for 48 miles between Forsyth, Gwinnett, Fulton and Cobb counties.
In East Cobb, there are the Gold Branch and Johnson Ferry units above Johnson Ferry Road, and the Sope Creek Unit trails located off Paper Mill Road.
The NPS figures didn’t break down park visits by those units. But in a social media posting Friday the Chattahoochee NRA staf said that “this many visitors each year mean parts of the park are always very crowded.
“If you crave solitude in nature, #PlanLikeAParkRanger and explore some of the northern units of the park, like Bowmans Island or the Jones Bridge.”
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 14 acres owned by Kenneth B. Clary at Post Oak Tritt and McPherson roads (inside the blue lines) is the subject of a delayed residential rezoning request. Cobb Tax Assessor’s Office
An early agenda for next Tuesday’s Cobb Planning Commission meeting shows that two cases in East Cobb that have been delayed several times in recent months are being continued again.
The summary agenda files indicated that an application by Kenneth B. Clary for a subdivision development on Post Oak Tritt Road has been continued to April.
The land is near McPherson Road (east of Tritt Elementary School) and is adjacent to the Clary Lakes neighborhood, and the case was first scheduled for a hearing in September.
The property is zoned R-30 and is designated as low-density residential in the Cobb future land use map; Clary is the landowner of what’s called a conservation tract with an appraised value of more than $2 million, according to Cobb property tax records.
There’s a small home on the property near the lake that was built in 1950.
More importantly, the land also contains the Power-Jackson Cabin, a one-room log home from the mid-1800s that’s a local and state historical landmark.
There’s nothing in the zoning filings that refers to the cabin.
In his letters seeking continuances over the fall and winter, attorney Parks Huff, who represents Clary, has made unspecified references to “some remaining issues which are scheduled to be addressed and resolved.”
The Cobb Historic Preservation Commission noted last fall that the cabin could be subject to demolition if the land is rezoned.
The five-member body appointed by Cobb commissioners has been working with Cobb Landmarks, a non-profit preservation group, and Cobb Parks “to see if preservation solutions could be discussed,” according to the minutes of a Sept. 12, 2022 preservation commission meeting.
If the cabin is torn down, the developer could be subject to a mitigation fee similar to one levied following the demolition of a Mabry Farm homestead on Wesley Chapel Road in 2018 to make room for a new subdivision.
The $7,500 paid by the developer was dedicated for historic preservation efforts in Cobb County.
Originally the Clary application sought an R-15 zoning category to build 20 homes with a single entrance from Post Oak Tritt.
That request has since been changed to R-20, which would reduce the number of homes to around 15, but a new site plan hasn’t been submitted.
Clary Lakes is zoned R-15 and according to an early site plan, part of the lake is in a federal 100-year flood zone. There also are state and county water buffers totalling 75 feet, as well as impervious setback considerations.
It’s been nearly a decade since a portion of some other Clary land across the road on Post Oak Tritt was developed by Brooks Chadwick into Hadley Walk, which has six homes on nearly 10 acres.
Those homes are currently valued at more than $1 million.
A proposal to expand the current Starbucks at Paper Mill Village into a two-story, 5,000-square foot standalone building also is being continued to April at the request of the applicant, S&B Investments.
Zoning attorney Garvis Sams said in a letter to the Cobb Zoning Staff on Tuesday that his group has met with nearby citizens groups and the shopping center over what he called “very minor tweaks” over architecture and various stipulations.
But he said his client wants more time to finalize them and to get “one hundred percent consensus.”
The Cobb Planning Commission hearing begins at 9 a.m. Tuesday in the second floor board room of the Cobb government building (100 Cherokee St., downtown Marietta), you can view the full agenda and individual case files by clicking here.
You also can watch on the county’s website and YouTube channels and on Cobb TV 23 on Comcast Cable.
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 proposal goes before the Marietta City Council next Wednesday for final action.
The mixed-use development proposed by WC Acquisitions LLC includes 7,000 square feet of amenities for the apartment building, 6,000 square feet of retail space and a 485-space parking deck that’s six and a half stories high.
The density would be high, at more than 60 units an acre, and one of the highest in the Marietta city limits.
But it’s in keeping with density at the nearby MarketPlace Terrell Mill in unincorporated Cobb and other multi-family complexes in the Powers Ferry corridor.
The application got the support of the Powers Ferry Corridor Alliance.
The Kroger at Terrell Mill and Delk roads was built in 1982, and is the southernmost tract of land in the City of Marietta in that area.
Later this year, Kroger is moving Marketplace Terrell Mill that’s in unincorporated Cobb, and WC Acquisitions Attorney Garvis Sams said the 4.8-acre site doesn’t have a retail future.
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 following food scores for the week of Feb. 27 have been compiled by the Cobb & Douglas Department of Public Health. Click the link under each listing for inspection details:
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!
From L-R: Dana Stassen, Bells Ferry ES; Gary Loveless, Hightower Trail MS; Kristy Flowers, Wheeler HS.
The Cobb Schools Foundation on Wednesday held a luncheon honoring volunteers of the year for 2023 at each of its schools.
They were treated to lunch at Jim Miller Park as they have “demonstrated superior leadership and served as a role model in collaboration and consistency towards high impact school programs or projects,” according to the foundation, a non-profit that provides financial, academic and other support to students of the Cobb County School District.
Here are the volunteers of the year at elementary schools in East Cobb:
Amy Pernicaro, Addison
Dana Stassen, Bells Ferry
Erin Ellingwood, Blackwell
Mike Marotta, Brumby
Michelle Lewis, Davis
Brooke Jarrett, East Side
Jessica Stalcup, Eastvalley
Carol Tefft, Garrison Mill
Laura Kubica, Keheley
Nikkia Velazquez, Kincaid
Kelly Wilkins, Mt. Bethel
Sara Wright, Mountain View
Meredith Wilkes, Murdock
Lauren Rose, Nicholson
Charles McCord, Powers Ferry
Amy Kraft, Rocky Mount
Donna Lipscomb, Sedalia Park
Kim Lindsay, Shallowford Falls
Lauren Lynch, Sope Creek
Ashley Rager, Timber Ridge
Maria Janos, Tritt
Middle schools:
Lisa Duke, Daniell
Erin Inan, Dickerson
Elizabeth Snow-Murphy, Dodgen
Barbara Boutaker, East Cobb
Gary Loveless, Hightower Trail
Dena Loadwick, Mabry
Gladys Francois, McCleskey
Veena Raj, Simpson
High schools:
Ray Fajay, Kell
Christine Kim, Lassiter
Beth Florence, Pope
Kristine Hampson, Sprayberry
Shannon Eiser, Walton
Kristy Flowers, Wheeler
For more on this year’s group of volunteers of the year, click here.
The three Democrats on the Cobb Board of Commissioners Tuesday voted to spend more than $500,000 to hire three separate consulting firms to help the Cobb Department of Transportation prepare for a transportation sales tax referendum in 2024.
The contracts will be for developing project lists and providing planning and engineering services, as well as conducting community outreach.
Cobb Commission Chairwoman Lisa Cupid has proposed a one-percent, 30-year sales tax for transit, but the board’s two Republican members are opposed to anything longer than five years.
What’s been called the Cobb Mobility SPLOST, or M-SPLOST, would fund mass transit services as well as traditional transportation options, including resurfacing.
The county set aside $400,000 for consulting services for the M-SLPOST referendum, but on Tuesday spending that was approved totaled $529,839:
WSP USA, Inc., $207,205
Kimley-Horn & Assciates, $192,795
CDM-Smith, Inc., $129,839
Republican commissioners JoAnn Birrell and Keli Gambrill voted against the contracts, objecting to the long-term nature of the proposed 30-year sales tax.
State law gives local governments that option, and they also could levy a five-year, one-percent tax for surface projects, which Birrell has supported.
While commending Cobb DOT director Drew Raessler and his department for their efforts, Birrell said that “all along I have said I cannot support a 30-year tax. . . . Getting anybody to get on the same page up here is a difficult task.”
The county held town halls and other public events in 2021 for a sales tax referendum targeted for 2022, but put that on hold when mayors of Cobb’s cities objected to a 30-year tax.
Gambrill asked Raessler why more outreach was necessary, and he said that it would be more targeted, especially to those in cities and community improvement districts to hear “what type of projects they would like to see.”
Cupid said that “I think we have a significant opportunity to invest in our future, at least just to ask the citizens the questions, to flesh out with the mayors what the options are.
“This isn’t a done deal yet. But hopefully we’ll get the data to support where we could potentially go, with additional help fleshing out what the [project] lists are.”
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!
A Marietta Police photo of the truck at that contained a device that was investigated by bomb technicians. The driver has been charged with making a false report of a crime.
Marietta Police on Monday provided some more information about a bomb threat Saturday that forced the evacuation of an East Cobb shopping center for several hours.
What they haven’t established yet is a reason why the owner of a pickup truck drove from his hometown in Alabama to a retail parking lot in Marietta and made the threat.
Robert Andrew Devlin, 37, of Lincoln, Ala., remains in the Cobb County Adult Detention Center on a $60,000 bond for what police said were making false reports of a pipe bomb in a truck he drove to the parking lot at East Gate Shopping Center (1808 Lower Roswell Road).
An arrest warrant for Devlin said he’s charged with a felony count of making a false report of a crime and two misdemeanor counts of making a false alarm and having a hoax device.
The warrant states that Devlin drove from his hometown to the shopping center and shortly after 8 a.m. called 911, which dispatched officers to the scene.
Marietta Police said that based on information Devlin provided to them, “officers determined the threat to be credible and immediately began evacuating the area” around the shopping center.
Other law enforcement was called, including Cobb Police and its bomb squad. Devlin was interviewed by Marietta Police and was charged as that was going on.
“Around noon, a device resembling a pipe bomb was removed from the truck and secured by the CCPD bomb technicians. The rest of the vehicle was methodically searched via robot” and the area was reopened to the public around 3 p.m., police said Monday.
The FBI and ATF were also called to the scene, and it was determined that while the device “did contain some explosive elements, it lacked other components necessary for it to be considered a fully assembled explosive device.”
Marietta Police said they’re continuing to investigate and anyone with information is asked to call Det. Robert Bollinger at 770-794-5345.
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 new Pure Barre Studio at Parkaire Landing Shopping Center (4880 Lower Roswell Road, Suite 790) is holding several grand opening events this week, after a few months of a soft opening.
The main events are this weekend—from 8 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday—and include free classes, membership specials, raffle prizes and giveaways, vendors and more.
The raffle prizes come from IceboxCryotherapy, Athelta, McCray’s Tavern, Blo Blow Dry Bar and others, and there will be local juice places in the studio and B12 shots on Saturday from wHydrate, a hydration therapy spa.
Updates are being posted on the studio’s Facebook page, and owner Jenna Scearce says that if you want to take part in a free class, you’ll need to reserve a spot by phone/text (770-283-0278) or e-mail (eastcobb@purebarre.com).
Those class times are 8:30 a.m., 9:45 a.m., 11 am. and 12:15 p.m. Saturday and Sunday and are Foundations or Classic classes “so good for newbies,” general manager Chad Stone said.
Barre is a fitness concept that incorporates ballet, yoga and Pilates into a full-body, muscle endurance workout (intro info here).
Pure Barre, which has more than 600 locations in North America. Jenna Scearce and her husband Chad operate Pure Barre locations in Roswell, Alpharetta and Milton and will be opening another in Suwanee in the fall.
The event is from 4-6 p.m. Tuesday at Tijuana Joe’s Cantina (690 Johnson Ferry Road) and is open to ECBA members, their guests and visitors.
The cost is $5 for members and $10 for guests and visitors and includes one drink ticket and appetizers. You’re asked to register in advance to get an accurate headcount.
The ECBA also has a monthly luncheon for women this week. The group is called the Professional Women of East Cobb, and they also meet at Tijuana Joe’s for lunch the first Friday of each month, from 11:30-1 p.m.
ECBA also holds a weekly open networking event every Friday from 7:30-8:30 a.m. at the IHOP (3130 Johnson Ferry Road). There’s no registration required; you pay for whatever you may eat or drink.
New Businesses
The following businesses in East Cobb were granted licenses by the Cobb Community Development Agency in recent weeks:
AM A Joy Designs, 4556 Steinhauer Road (merchandise and service broker)
Berry Good Realty Group, 2686 Jamerson Road (real estate and property management)
Blinds & Designs Ltd., 2993 Sandy Plains Road, Suite 110 (drapery and blind installation)
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!
East Cobb resident Larry Savage has refiled a lawsuit against Cobb County’s home rule legal challenge over redistricting maps for the Cobb Board of Commissioners.
His co-plaintiff in the action filed Thursday in Cobb Superior Court is Cobb Republican Commissioner Keli Gambrill.
Their suit (you can read it here) was filed against the county and the Cobb Board of Registration and Elections. The latter was the sole defendant in the initial suit filed by Savage but was withdrawn after an initial hearing before Judge Ann Harris in January.
The refiled suit seeks a writ of mandamus to order Cobb to recognize redistricting maps approved last year by the Georgia General Assembly.
Cobb commission maps passed by the Georgia legislature would include most of East Cobb in District 3 (gold).
Those maps drew current District 2 commissioner Jerica Richardson out of her East Cobb home in the middle of her term.
Instead, she and the board’s other two Democrats passed a resolution last October to recognize a redistricting map drawn by the former Cobb legislative delegation chairman that would keep Richardson in her seat.
That action included the filing of an amended map with the Georgia Secretary of State’s office, even after Gambrill and fellow GOP Commissioner JoAnn Birrell were re-elected in November according to the legislature-approved maps.
The new lawsuit continues to claim that the county is violating the Georgia Constitution, which permits only the legislature to conduct reapportionment.
The suit said that Gambrill, who represents District 1 in north and west Cobb, is a plaintiff as an individual citizen, not in her role as a commissioner.
The resolution passed by the commission Democrats, the lawsuit alleges, “was an overt misuse and abuse of the home rule authority” and described their amended map as “illegal, unconstitutional and not binding.”
The legislative map drew most of East Cobb into District 3, which Birrell has represented since 2010. Savage, a former candidate for Cobb Commission Chairman in 2012, 2016 and 2020, was drawn into the new District 3 for the 2022 election.
But the Cobb map, which the county said took effect on Jan. 1, puts him back in District 2, which includes some of East Cobb and the Cumberland-Vinings area.
“Mr. Savage has a legally protected interest in enduring his vote fairly and legally translates into representation on the BOC and that his district and the county at large is represented fairly and constitutionally,” said the lawsuit, filed by Atlanta attorney Ray S. Smith III.
Maps approved by the Cobb commission’s Democrats would keep Jerica Richardson of East Cobb in the District 2 (in pink) that she currently represents.
The lawsuit said that the Cobb Board of Commissioners “created a conflict for the BOE [Board of Elections] in carrying out its duties” to conduct and certify elections.
Gambrill and Birrell were ordered from the board’s dais at the commission’s first meeting of the year when they attempted to abstain from voting as a protest against the county maps.
Chairwoman Lisa Cupid said that was a violation of board policy. Since then, the two Republican commissioners have voted, but have begun each meeting reading formal statements of objection.
The Cobb commission Democrats have claimed in their resolution that they’re justified in invoking home rule over redistricting due to the “unprecedented” redistricting maps passed by the legislature.
Richardson, whose term expires in 2024, has contended that while the county’s action may be unprecedented, so is the legislature’s action in drawing a sitting incumbent official out of her seat.
An East Cobb resident, Debbie Fisher, has filed an ethics complaint against Richardson, saying the commissioner is engaged in a conflict of interest due to a political action committee she formed to fight the legislative maps.
State Sen. Ed Setzler, a Republican from West Cobb, has filed a bill that would specifically prohibit counties from using home rule powers over redistricting. Two co-sponsors of the bill, SB 236 (you can read it here), are his GOP colleagues Kay Kirkpatrick and John Albers, who represent parts of East Cobb.
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!
An aerial view of softball fields at Shaw Park, which opened in 1970. Photo: Cobb County government.
Cobb commissioner JoAnn Birrell will hold a community input meeting in March to generate public feedback for proposals to redevelop Shaw Park.
The town hall has been scheduled for Thursday, March 16, from 6-8 p.m. at Piedmont Church (570 Piedmont Road) and will include Cobb PARKS staff.
A total of $4 million in the current 2022 Cobb SPLOST (Special-Purpose Local-Option Sales Tax) has been budgeted for the project, but the specific redevelopment plans were left open-ended.
Shaw Park (990 Shaw Park Drive) opened in 1970 and features softball and baseball fields, batting cages, tennis and pickleball courts, playgrounds and the Northeast Cobb Community Center.
According to the 2022 SPLOST notebook, repurposing is necessary “to better meet the recreational needs and desires of the surrounding community.”
“Park design and amenities are now outdated, and the park no longer meets the recreational needs of the community.”
The 2022 SPLOST also calls for $3 million to be collected to develop Ebenezer Downs, a new passive park in the Northeast Cobb area, located on Ebenezer Road. Cobb commissioners approved a master plan in 2019.
For more information about the Shaw Park town hall e-mail jordan.wood@cobbcounty.org.
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!
On Saturday the Janice Overbeck Real Estate Team’s non-profit arm will hold its annual Texas Hold’em fundraiser to benefit the Emory ALS Center.
The public is invited to take part in the event (at the agency’s office (2249 Roswell Road) starting at 6 p.m.
There are prize packages for the top three winners. Food and drinks will be served, and there will be a raffle and silent auction.
Former Altanta Falcons player Terance Mathis returns as the celebrity guest host, and he’s bringing some of his football colleagues with him: Jerome Bettis, Jessie Tuggle, Bob Whitfield and Chuck Smith.
All of the proceeds will be distributed by JO Gives, the Overbeck non-profit, which has raised more than $250,000 for ALS research.
The suggested donation is $100 a person, but any donation amount will be accepted, and registration can be completed by clicking here.
Sponsors of the event include Perrie & Associates, Clear to Close Team at PRMG, AMLI Residential, Mansfield Cares, Trotter Roofing and Gutters, Arrow Exterminators, Amerispec Inspection Services, Integral Choice, HWA Home Warranty, and Eye Consultants of Atlanta—The Piedmont Group.
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!
Cobb Police have arrested a man they say walked into a home in East Cobb looking for a girl who rides a bus he drives for the Cobb County School District.
According to an arrest warrant, Gogineni Rayudu entered a condominium unit on Ashborough Circle, located off Delk Road near I-75, at 1:30 p.m. on Monday.
The warrant said the man claimed to be the girl’s bus driver, and that he closed the door behind him and asked to see her.
According to the warrant, the man fled the residence “upon being asked questions about why he was there.”
The girl’s mother told police that Rayudu has come to the residence three times in the last month and questioned neighbors about where her daughter lives, according to the warrant.
WSB-TV reported Wednesday that Rayudu recently began driving a bus route for Powers Ferry Elementary School, where the girl is a student.
The Cobb school district is on winter break this week.
“The date of the incident occurred when school was not in session and there was no reasonable explanation given by said accused to be there,” the warrant states.
According to a Cobb Sheriff’s Office booking report, Rayudu was taken into custody Wednesday afternoon, charged with a felony count of burglary and misdemeanor count of loiter prowl.
Rayudu, 55, whose home address is listed in the booking report at Woodberry Lane in East Cobb, was being held in the Cobb County Adult Detention Center on a bond of $22,220.
UPDATED:
Rayudu was released on bond Thursday afternoon, according to Cobb Sheriff’s Office records.
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!
A 20-year-old Woodstock man died late Wednesday night after a motorcycle he was riding on Canton Road crashed with a car, Cobb Police said.
Public Information Officer Joseph Wilson identified the victim as Daniel Kansky and said the driver of the car, Angela Jackson, 48, of Marietta, was not injured.
Wilson said the crash took place shortly before 11 p.m. Wednesday night. Jackson was driving a white 2011 Volkswagen Tiguan northbound on Canton Road, and made a left turn onto Chase Corner.
As she made the turn, Wilson said, the Volkswagen “entered the path of the Honda,” a reference to a black 2008 Honda CBR60 driven by Kansky, who was traveling south on Canton Road.
Wilson said the investigation is continuing and anyone with information is asked to call Cobb Police at 770-499-3987.
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!
