After previously being staged in multiple venues at the Catholic Church of St. Ann, the 2022 Apple Annie Arts and Crafts Show will be held in one place—the church’s new parish hall.
The 41st annual show takes place Friday, Dec. 2 from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Saturday, Dec. 3 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Parish Life Center at St. Ann (4905 Roswell Road).
It’s organized by the St. Ann’s Council of Catholic Women as a fundraiser for the parish and local charities.
More than 100 artisans will be selling handmade crafts including holiday décor, woodworking, painting, jewelry, stained glass, fabric crafts, and more.
The St. Ann preschool also will be selling baked goods and the Apple Annie Café in the new parish hall will be serving soups, sandwiches and beverages.
There will be raffle prizes, including a handmade quilt.
Admission is $5 for ages 13 and older and is valid both days. Strollers are not permitted.
Parking is available at the church and at The Episcopal Church of St. Peter and St. Paul (1795 Johnson Ferry Road), with free shuttle service.
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The final weekend before Halloween is upon us, as many schools, churches and other organizations are holding their own trunk or treat events.
Two of the larger gatherings include the Lassiter Craft Fair, now in its 37th year, to benefit the high school’s marching band program.
It’s the first of many long-standing fall and holiday craft shows in the East Cobb area, featuring dozens of local vendors selling homemade crafts, home decor and other items. Concessions, baked goods and raffle tickets also will be available.
The fair takes place all throughout the school (2601 Shallowford Road) on Saturday 10-5 and Sunday 11-4.
On Saturday, The Avenue East Cobb (4475 Roswell Road) is inviting costumed kids for the Boo Bash, a Halloween celebration with face painting and balloon art station, a costume party and plenty of trick or treating.
The event takes place from 1-3 in the front lot near Tin Lizzy’s and includes a Halloween show on the main stage presented by East Cobb Church.
The entertainment portion of the event, starting at 2 p.m., is subject to postponement due to the possibility of inclement weather.
A cancellation notice would be posted on The Avenue’s Instagram page.
You can find 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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After leaving home to attend college, teach and become an educational administrator, Catherine Pozniak has returned to her Northeast Cobb roots to put that background to local use.
When she moved back to her family home in 2020 following the death of her father, she said she hadn’t thought about running for elected office.
But the effect of the COVID-19 response on schools and eventful developments in the Cobb County School District where she graduated prompted her run for the Post 4 seat on the Cobb Board of Education.
Pozniak, 43, is an educational consultant and Democrat who’s challenging two-term Republican incumbent David Chastain for the post that represents her alma mater, Sprayberry High School, as well as the Kell and some of the Lassiter clusters.
“This is an important moment in time in education,” Pozniak said in a recent East Cobb News interview. “This is an opportunity now to build something better than what is there now.”
You can visit Pozniak’s campaign website by clicking here; East Cobb News has interviewed Chastain and will be posting his profile shortly.
In addition to addressing what she says are lagging test scores and curriculum issues—especially for grade-school reading—Pozniak also said she is running on behalf of parents, students and other stakeholders who feel they’re not being heard by the current board majority.
“My opponent is saying that things are good enough,” Pozniak said. “But for so many families and students, they are not good enough.”
Although she is a first-time candidate in the political world, her candidacy quickly caught notice. Neither she nor Chastain had a primary opponent, but over the summer, she outraised him with more $20,000 in contributions.
He held a fundraiser at the Atlanta Country Club and both are reporting having raised around $45,000 each.
With Republicans holding a 4-3 majority, party control of the school board is on the line, and the highly-watched contest has led to mutual and even third-party mudslinging.
Republican legislators also have said that if Pozniak is elected and Democrats gain control of the school board, Superintendent Chris Ragsdale will be replaced and Cobb schools will indoctrinate students in social and cultural issues instead of basic academics.
Despite the charged rhetoric, Pozniak said she’s been encouraged with what’s she seen, heard and learned on the campaign trail.
“I’m optimistic about the involvement from the community on both sides,” she said. “People get how important the school system is. It’s pretty remarkable how a school board race is getting this kind of attention.”
Pozniak, a 1997 Sprayberry graduate, earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Sydney in Australia, a master’s from Cambridge University in Britain and an educational leadership doctorate degree from Harvard.
She taught on a Native American reservation in South Dakota and was an assistant secretary in the Louisiana Department of Education. She currently consults on educational fiscal policy for Watershed Advisors.
Her priorities include improving the Cobb school district’s literacy curriculum, which she says “is lowly rated and not founded in the science of reading.”
She said she wasn’t pushing for a particular curriculum to replace it, but hears from teachers “who say they’re frustrated” and that “kids aren’t reading proficiently.”
As a school board member, she said it would be one of her primary responsibilities to help set academic expectations for the Cobb district, the second-largest in Georgia.
Pozniak also has been critical of Cobb’s algebra curriculum and noted the Cobb school district’s 50.5 percent score in that portion of the Georgia Milestones end-of-course test.
“That’s even lousy for high school students in Post 4,” she said, arguing that Cobb needs a comprehensive math curriculum.
On the subject of the senior tax exemption for schools, Pozniak said she doesn’t favor revisiting that—Chastain has been adamant that it should not be touched—and said it’s a matter for the legislature to take up.
On fiscal issues, Pozniak said the Cobb school district is not as transparent as it should be. She said that not all contracts are made publicly available before board meetings or even voted on.
“Except for SPLOST [construction and maintenance projects whose contracts are required to be disclosed by law], you really don’t see that in Cobb. It’s really an opaque system.”
“That’s a $2.9 million contract,” she said. “To not have it come up for approval, it’s stunning. There’s no oversight.”
Chastain, the current chairman, Pozniak said, “has been part of how we got to this point. There’s an erosion of transparency and accountability and he hasn’t taken any measures to change that.”
Pozniak has tried to steer clear of cultural wedge issues that have flared up recently on school boards across the country.
She called the clamor over Critical Race Theory—the teaching of which the Cobb school board banned last year—as “political theatre” and said that’s not a concern she’s hearing from parents.
“It’s not about issues that are hot-button issues,” she said. “It’s about what is going on in the schools and the students’ experiences there.”
As for diversity, equity and inclusion issues that also have been raised in schools, including Cobb, Pozniak said she understands “why the partisan narrative gets the play that it does.
“But not until recently was this an issue. It’s just where we are.”
She said the opportunity she sees this year “is to get educators on board” to help address learning issues in the wake of COVID-19 disruptions.
“I have a crossover of bipartisan support,” she said, “parents of kids with dyslexia, special-education students. These are very frustrated parents who are looking for something better.”
Pozniak has been accused of taking campaign contributions from outsiders. Her biggest donation, $3,000, is from Democrats for Educational Equity.
There’s not much publicly available information, but it’s a Washington, D.C. political action committee that “is dedicated to helping to elect a new generation of leaders, who will bring their shared experiences for the goal of educationalequity,” according to information Pozniak provided at the request of East Cobb News.
She said that “I am one of many educators that Democrats for Educational Equity supports, but being an educator is not a requirement.”
Pozniak said most of her other campaign donors are from those oriented around education issues or people she knows.
“If they’re not a friend, they’re a friend of a friend.” she said.
“They know what I’m trying to accomplish,” Pozniak said, adding that a number of local contributors, including educators, are doing so anonymously.
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The following food scores for the week of Oct. 24 have been compiled by the Cobb & Douglas Department of Public Health. Click the link under each listing for inspection details:
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The current Cobb Commission map (at left) shows District 2 in pink; a redrawn map (at right) placed most of East Cobb in District 3, shown in yellow.
Cobb commissioners voted along partisan lines Tuesday to submit an unprecedented home rule resolution over commissioner redistricting to the state in a dispute that’s expected to be decided by the courts.
The 3-2 vote was the second of a required two votes to invoke home rule provisions. The board’s three Democrats voted in favor, and the two Republicans were opposed.
During reapportionment earlier this year, District 2 commissioner Jerica Richardson, a first-term Democrat who represents some of East Cobb, was drawn into the new District 3 with incumbent Republican commissioner JoAnn Birrell.
Richardson said never before has the Georgia legislature redrawn a county commission incumbent into another district during the middle of a term, and called that an example of state overreach into local matters that home rule is designed to prevent.
Cobb Republican lawmakers ignored a map drawn by State Rep. Eric Allen, the county’s Democratic legislative delegation chairman, that would have left the current lines relatively unchanged, and instead pushed through a map that put most of East Cobb into District 3.
That’s the justification Richardson and her Democratic colleagues gave for making a home rule challenge that Birrell and other Republicans said flouts the Georgia Constitution.
The resolution, which includes reverting the commission district maps to those drawn by Allen, starting Jan. 1, 2023, does not have any bearing on 2022 general elections.
Legislatures in Georgia have the duty to conduct reapportionment.
In its legal challenge, Cobb will be asserting that the state pre-empted the county’s home rule powers, a claim that hasn’t been tested regarding redistricting.
Commissioner Jerica Richardson
“The electoral district lines established by HB 1256 [Allen’s map, which was not voted on], satisfy the traditional redistricting principles of compactness, contiguity, respect for political boundaries, preserving communities of interest, and protection to incumbents,” the Cobb resolution states.
“I love my district—it’s a true slice of America,” Richardson said in prepared remarks before the vote. “Local government is the operational arm that comes the closest to the community.”
She said that the “historic precedent” of the home rule challenge isn’t just about how her district was redrawn, but preventing the legislature from enacting similar measures that would trample on local home rule.
“This is about the balance of power between all 159 counties and the state,” Richardson said.
Richardson moved to a home off Post Oak Tritt Road in 2021 from an apartment in the Delk Road area, which remains in the new District 2.
She has until Dec. 31 to move into District 2 if she wants to seek re-election in 2024, and some public speakers at Tuesday’s meeting suggested that she do that.
Commissioner JoAnn Birrell
Birrell, who is seeking re-election this year to a fourth term in the new District 3, repeated previous comments that while she thought what happened to Richardson was unfair, the home rule resolution is “politically motivated” and said “this board has no power or authority over the legislature.”
She said the county should take up the issue with the legislature during the 2023 session.
Keli Gambrill, the other Republican commissioner, stressed that “this is not personal. It’s about the rule of law and we can’t be making things up as we go along.”
Richardson’s mother Valerie spoke emotionally on her daughter’s behalf, saying she was “appalled that this election can be null and void after two years.”
She said GOP legislators not only ignored Allen’s map but did not consult with commissioners before having their own drawn up.
“Did they think [Jerica Richardson] would move back to her old apartment or just cry?” Valerie Richardson said. She also referenced previous District 2 commissioner Bob Ott, saying that if he were still in office, “this would not have happened.”
Valerie Richardson also referenced the Civil Rights movement, and asked “Do we have to wait another 100 years to fix this wrong? You have the authority to fix this now.”
Cobb Republican Party Chairwoman Salleigh Grubbs said that while she likes Richardson, the maps approved by the legislature were signed into law early this year and wondered why Democratic commissioners didn’t issue a home rule challenge then.
“This was an apparently calculated plan by Commissioner Richardson,” Grubbs said. “She chose to move in 2021, knowing that redistricting was coming.”
A home rule challenge, Grubbs added, is “not fair to the citizens of Cobb County.” She wanted Richardson to recuse herself due to a “major conflict of interest,” which would have resulted in a tie vote.
Richardson not only didn’t recuse herself, she seconded the motion to adopt the resolution.
South Cobb Commissioner Monique Sheffield, a Democrat, took issue with those who suggested Richardson move, saying it’s code for “you don’t belong, go back to where you belong. . . . She has a right to live anywhere in her district.
“When there was flooding in East Cobb [in September 2021], it was Commissioner Richardson, not the state, holding town halls and advocating on your behalf.”
The board’s other Democrat, Chairwoman Lisa Cupid, in acknowledging the Cobb resolution as “a novel question of law,” said that “this is not something that we can just move past . . . this is not something that we can just take lying down.”
Cobb County Attorney William Rowling said during the discussion that the Allen map would be filed with the Georgia Secretary of State’s Office, where it’s expected to be challenged by the state Attorney General’s office.
In March, after the Republican maps were adopted, Richardson vowed that “I will not step down.”
On Wednesday, she wrote a message on her Facebook page saying that due to the resolution, “on January 1, I will continue to work on behalf of my constituents and no longer be forced to resign 2 years before the end of my term. I appreciate all that came out to have their voices heard and the support for defending local control. It was a beautiful showing of our Cobb community.
“We still have much work to do and must stay committed to doing the good works daily. We cannot forget that the tenets of a republic must be defended, and not taken for granted. The only guarantee is that we will always defend our community regardless of what is yet to come. In the meantime, it’s full steam ahead on the issues that matter to you: infrastructure, economy and workforce, quality of life, and breaking the walls of division.”
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Not long after we posted today that Mt. Bethel Church is dropping its sponsorship of a Boy Scout troop due to rising insurance costs, we learned of more changes afoot for other church-related activities.
Teachers and parents of the Mt. Bethel Day Care Center (615 Woodlawn Drive) were notified last week it would be closing as of Dec. 16, saying labor shortages and rising costs, including insurance liability, were among the reasons.
Mt. Bethel Church is selling that property and three other pieces of land it owns: a community center next door, and two parcels across Lower Roswell Road.
One of the day care parents has started a Go Fund Me account to financially assist the 12 staff members who will be out of jobs. That fundraiser has netted more than $1,500 out of a goal of $10,000.
Samantha Black, a spokeswoman for Mt. Bethel Church, said the decision to close the day care—which has 28 children from 22 families—came as part of a broad evaluation of services, activities and properties by church leadership as it adjusts to being an independent church.
“It was becoming too difficult to continue operating a day care at the standards we expect,” she said. While deciding to sell the other properties were easier calls, she said, “closing a day care was tough. It has had a great history for 22 years.”
She said 60 percent of the families of the children enrolled in the day care have found other arrangements, and existing pre-school and day care services on the main Mt. Bethel campus on Lower Roswell Road remain available.
The staff members will be receiving what Black said were “generous” severance benefits through the end of the year.
Mt. Bethel Church separated from the United Methodist Church this summer following a court settlement that stemmed from a disputed reappointment of Senior Pastor Rev. Dr. Jody Ray in 2021.
In the settlement, Mt. Bethel paid the North Georgia Conference of the UMC $13.1 million. During their legal dispute, the Conference estimated the value of the Mt. Bethel properties at more than $35 million.
In the consent decree (you can read it here), Mt. Bethel was allowed to keep eight parcels that it could sell without restrictions.
Those properties are currently appraised by Cobb County at nearly $1.5 million. The properties being sold are appraised collectively at $771,670.
The church is prevented from selling eight other parcels, including the main church campus and parking lot, for seven and a half years without giving the UMC and its North Georgia Conference the right of first refusal to purchase them.
The appraised value of the restricted properties is $1.085 million, according to Cobb Tax Assessor’s Office records.
The day care is located on 0.967 acres appraised at $317,220, according to current Cobb property tax records.
Those records show Mt. Bethel paid more than $965,000 in 2002 for the land and 6,156-square-foot building that was completed in 1990.
The community center adjacent to the day care sits on 1.2 acres at 4608 Lower Roswell Road and has an appraised value of $145,270.
Across the street, two properties are being put up for sale that are next to the post office branch.
A former homesite known as the Cagle House (4525 Lower Roswell Road) has an appraised value of $124,860 on 0.9 acres.
Next to that, at 4505 Lower Roswell Road, is a vacant lot of 0.8 acres appraised at $184,320.
Black said the Cagle House has been used for Mt. Bethel’s Backpack Blessings program that will relocate to the main campus.
The other properties that Mt. Bethel holds free and clear are two homes on Fairfield Drive that have served as parsonages and another that houses a special-needs program.
Those are not being sold, nor is the Mt. Bethel Cemetery on Johnson Ferry Road next to the Zaxby’s, Black said.
Those four properties combined are appraised at $671,850.
Ferrell Coppedge, Mt. Bethel’s lay leader, said in a statement Black provided to East Cobb News that “now that Mt. Bethel is out from under the Trust Clause of the UMC, we have newfound freedom to take a fresh look at our ministry priorities and how our assets and properties can best support them. Proceeds from the sale of Mt. Bethel’s properties can be redeployed for vital ministry.
“Most of these properties were originally bought for their potential to house a high school, not to support active ministry of the church,” Coppedge said. “As part of responsible stewardship, our committees, our leadership council and our pastors will continue to evaluate how Mt. Bethel’s assets can best support the ministry of the church.”
The Mt. Bethel Christian Academy campus on Post Oak Tritt was not subject to the terms of the lawsuit. That 33.4-acre parcel near the intersection of Holly Springs Road, which conducts high school classes and worship services, is appraised at $7.3 million.
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Saturday was to have been the 50th birthday celebration for Boy Scout Troop 1011, which was chartered at Mt. Bethel United Methodist Church and has met there ever since.
But the anniversary event was postponed after church leadership decided not to renew its charter with the Boy Scouts of America.
Mt. Bethel Church—renamed after it left the United Methodist Church in a contentious dispute that ended in a court settlement this summer—said the change was being made due to increasing insurance costs.
A spokeswoman for the church said that Mt. Bethel and the troop are working on “a mutual agreement” for the scouts to continue to meet at Mt. Bethel while a new charter organization is brought on board.
“Mt. Bethel and Troop 1011 have a long, fruitful relationship and Mt. Bethel recognizes the value of the troop and acknowledges its history,” Samantha Black said in a statement on behalf of the church. “We have enjoyed a great relationship and the Troop continues to meet on the Mt. Bethel campus.”
The Boy Scouts of America requires troops to be chartered by organizations that must provide insurance for their events and activities.
They’re typically churches and other community organizations that allow troops to meet on their premises.
They also can be third parties. The new chartering organization for Troop 1011 will be the Rotary Club of East Cobb, according to Bob Ott, the troop’s charter representative.
He’s a Mt. Bethel Church member and a former Cobb commissioner who said the timing of the change had nothing to with the church’s new status as an independent church.
“This is totally related to this being the time every year when chartering is done by the Boy Scouts,” he said, adding that he was speaking on behalf of the troop.
Troop 1011, he said, “isn’t being kicked out” and that the charter change will enable the church and the troop to continue “a great partnership.”
Ott said that property and gear belonging to the scouts remain on the Mt. Bethel campus.
East Cobb News has left a message with the Rotary Club of East Cobb seeking comment.
In Mt. Bethel’s legal settlement in Cobb Superior Court, it was required to pay $13.1 million to the North Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church.
The dispute centered around the Conference’s reassignment of Rev. Dr. Jody Ray, the senior pastor, in the spring of 2021.
Mt. Bethel is among the Methodist churches that in recent years have expressed theological concerns on a number of issues, including ordaining gay clergy and performing same-sex marriages.
Both are currently banned by the UMC, but that is expected to change.
UMC delegates were to have voted on a set of protocols to allow conservative congregations to leave in 2020, but its global conference has been delayed several times due to COVID-19 restrictions and has been rescheduled for 2024.
Since then, the Boy Scouts also have accepted openly gay scout leaders.
Ott said the issue of gays in the Boy Scouts had no bearing on Mt. Bethel’s decision not to be Troop 1011’s chartering organization.
Troop 1011’s 50th anniversary celebration, initially set for McFarlane Nature Park on Paper Mill Road, is being postponed until it completes the chartering process with the Rotary Club.
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Two Republican legislators from Cobb are accusing a Democratic candidate for a seat on the Cobb Board of Education of improperly claiming a senior exemption from school taxes.
State Reps. Ginny Ehrhart of West Cobb and John Carson of Northeast Cobb are alleging that Catherine Pozniak is violating state law for claiming a homestead exemption from paying school property taxes in 2021.
“Ms. Pozniak stole from the students of the Cobb Public School system by failing to pay duly owed school property taxes,” Ehrhart said in a press release over the weekend. “What’s worse, she illegally used the senior tax exemption of a deceased individual to claim a fraudulent homestead exemption. This action is inexcusable. No one should commit such a violation, and most certainly not someone running for the Cobb School Board.”
Ehrhart wants the Cobb Solicitor’s office to conduct an investigation.
Pozniak is challenging Republican incumbent David Chastain for the seat in Post 4, which includes the Kell, Lassiter and Sprayberry clusters in what has become an increasingly bitter campaign.
She responded by saying that “for Mr. Chastain and his political cronies to retaliate with a smear campaign launched on a family tragedy is beyond reprehensible.”
In Cobb County, homeowners aged 62 and older can claim an exemption from school property taxes if they are the official homeowner as of Jan. 1 of a given year.
Pozniak, a Sprayberry graduate, is listed on Cobb property tax records as the owner of a home that previously belonged to her father, who died in April 2020.
Those records indicate that a senior exemption was reflected on 2020 and 2021 tax bills with Edward Pozniak listed as the property owner.
The 2021 bill was issued on May 13, according to tax records.
A Cobb real estate deed dated June 9, 2021 listed Catherine Pozniak as the executor of her father’s estate and having granted ownership of the home to herself and her sister and then to Catherine Pozniak as the sole owner of the home where she now lives.
Her 2022 tax bill includes $3,019 in school taxes.
In a statement to East Cobb News, Pozniak said that “our family has ample documentation to show that we settled Dad’s affairs with honesty and integrity, just as he lived his life.”
State Rep. Ginny Ehrhart
She said the transfer of property took longer than expected due to his death occurring at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and that the Cobb Tax Commissioners’ office didn’t know of the ownership change when the 2021 bill was issued.
Pozniak said that “when I asked to pay for the exemption, the tax commissioner’s office said that they can’t bill a new owner for a previous owner’s exemptions.”
Senior exemptions are automatically renewed unless there is a change in the ownership of the property.
Ehrhart and Carson were sponsors of redistricting bills for Cobb commission districts and school board posts that sidestepped maps drawn up by the county’s Democratic-led legislative delegation.
The school board lines were drawn at the behest of the board’s Republican majority by attorneys at Taylor English Duma. Its affiliated company, Taylor English Decisions, a lobbying and political consulting firm, is run by Ehrhart’s husband, former legislator Earl Ehrhart.
His campaign responded by calling it “baseless and politics at its worst.” On social media, Chastain denigrated Harvard, where Pozniak earned a doctorate in educational leadership.
In her statement Monday, Pozniak said that “with two weeks left in this race, David Chastain has already stooped to mining my father’s obituary and weaponizing the details of his death and his estate to launch personal attacks because Mr. Chastain has nothing to say about the fact that half of Cobb’s 3rd graders can’t read and half of Cobb’s students can’t pass algebra.
“My father served this country for 25 years in the Army, signed-up for two tours in Vietnam, and was a Bronze Star recipient. Mr. Chastain cannot trample on the reputation and memory of a decorated Vietnam Veteran to deflect from his own failures as a leader.”
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The addresses include ZIP Codes; subdivision names and high school districts are in parenthesis:
Oct. 3
5446 Tally Green Drive, 30068 (Tally Green, Walton): Mario Martinez Dubreuil and Francesca Massari Figari to Steven LoCoco and Zahra Ali Alley-Baktoo; $550,000
527 Smithstone Trace, 30067 (Smithstone, Wheeler): Yutaka Nishida to Janak and Parbati Baral; $440,000
476 Old Chelsea Circle, 30067 (Paper Mill Manor, Wheeler): Billy Mayberry to Janice and Clifford Branch; $665,000
3144 Willow Grove Circle, 30062 (Timberlea Farms, Wheeler): Allan Bowman to Primary Home Advisors LLC; $298,000; Primary Home Advisors LLC to Cottage On a Hill LLC; $315,000
Oct. 5
1250 Riversound Drive, 30068 (River Sound, Walton): Cary and John Carman to Cody and Rebecca Shoniber; $775,000
2268 Sparrow Ridge Drive, 30066 (Sparrow Ridge, Lassiter): Obie Fernandez to Pablo and Deborah Bontti; $200,000
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Record turnout for the first week of early voting in Georgia for the 2022 general election included a record number of voters in Cobb County casting ballots.
According to Cobb Elections, 51,779 early votes have been cast in person during the first week, pending Saturday’s results.
Friday’s total of 11,388 was the highest individual day thus far, with 12 days of early voting continuing through Nov. 4.
Cobb Elections also has accepted 3,862 absentee ballots, after issuing 26,237 absentee ballots by request. Voters had until Friday to request an absentee ballot.
There are 13 early voting locations in Cobb, and the two in the East Cobb area have had the highest turnout.
A total of 7,109 votes have been cast at the East Cobb Government Service Center (4400 Lower Roswell Road) and 6,868 at the Tim D. Lee Senior Center (3332 Sandy Plains Road).
Another 6,357 votes have been cast at the Smyrna Community Center.
During early voting, voters can go to any location in the county to cast their ballots.
Nearly 730,000 voters have voted this week across the state, according to the Georgia Secretary of State’s Office.
That’s ahead of the record pace of the 2020 elections. With a presidential race on the ballot, a little less than 500,000 early votes were cast two years ago for the general elections.
This year Georgians are selecting all statewide constitutional officers (governor, secretary of state, etc.) as well as deciding a U.S. Senate race, all 14 U.S. House seats and all state legislative seats.
In Cobb, there’s only one countywide race, for Cobb solicitor. In East Cobb, contested races include District 3 Commissioner, Post 4 Cobb school board and several legislative and Congressional offices (see our early voting guide for more).
Early voting continues Monday at the East Cobb Government Service Center and the Tim D. Lee Senior Center.
Hour are 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday-Friday and 8-5 next Saturday, Oct. 29. There also will be early voting on Sunday, Oct. 30, from 12-4 p.m. at the new Cobb Elections office at 995 Roswell Street.
The Cobb Elections office and the Cobb government GIS office also are teaming up again with an estimated wait-time map for early voting, with updates provided at each location by the polling managers.
Absentee ballots may be dropped off at drop boxes at designated drop box locations, including the East Cobb Government Service Center during early voting hours only.
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Craig Chapin and Cindy Cooperman of the Committee for East Cobb Cityhood at a March forum.
The Committee for East Cobb Cityhood has been fined $5,000 for failing to file a required campaign finance disclosure form before the May 24 referendum.
The Georgia Government Transparency and Campaign Finance Commission issued a fine of $4,875 in September, after imposing a late reporting fee of $125 on May 9.
Ballot committees are required by law to submit full disclosures before a referendum; the East Cobb Cityhood group maintained it wasn’t obligated as a 501 (c)(4) organization.
A complaint was filed by Bob Lax, a leader of the anti-cityhood East Cobb Alliance.
The cityhood referendum was soundly defeated with 73 percent of the vote against incorporating a population of 60,000 people along the Johnson Ferry Road corridor.
According to the state ethics agency, the East Cobb Cityhood group reported raising $112,525 and spending $64,338.
It was the only ballot committee involved in Cobb cityhood referendums that did not file a report. The East Cobb Alliance report filed on May 9 showed total contributions nearing $30,000.
The largest contributor to the East Cobb Cityhood committee was Owen Brown, founder of the Retail Planning Corp., a commercial real estate firm, and who is one of the group’s founders.
He contributed $20,000, and several others contributed $5,000 or more, some of them corporate executives.
Nearly $49,000 of the cityhood group’s expenses were for political consulting services and billboard ads.
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What’s been a highly charged campaign for a Northeast Cobb seat on the Cobb Board of Education from the start got even more contentious this week.
The battle between Republican incumbent David Chastain and Democratic first-time candidate Catherine Pozniak for Post 4 has been waged over the Cobb County School District’s accreditation review, test scores and the endorsements of educators’ groups, among other issues.
In her latest attack, Pozniak filed an official complaint about Chastain’s campaign contributions.
That was after he took shots at an Ivy League university Pozniak attended in an off-handed comment congratulating victories by local sports teams.
What’s at stake is party control of the Cobb school board. Chastain, the current board chairman whose Post 4 area includes the Kell, Lassiter and Sprayberry attendance zones, is seeking a third term.
He’s part of a 4-3 GOP majority on a board that has been divided along partisan lines in recent years on a number of issues.
Pozniak, who graduated from Sprayberry High School and returned to Georgia two years ago, has been leading in campaign fundraising until recently.
The newly drawn Post 4 boundaries as approved by the Georgia legislature. For a larger view, click here.
Filings for both candidates on Sept. 30 indicate they have raised roughly $45,000 each.
In her complaint, Pozniak accused Chastain of violating state laws by accepting contributions in excess of state individual limits.
They include $5,500 from State Rep. Ginny Ehrhart, a Republican from West Cobb who sponsored a bill redistricting lines for the Cobb school board favored by the board’s GOP members and bypassing a map recommended by the Democratic-led Cobb legislative delegation.
The GOP maps pushed Post 6, which currently includes the Walton and Wheeler attendance zones, fully into the Cumberland area, covering East Cobb with Chastain’s Post 4 and Post 5, held by Republican vice chairman David Banks.
Attorney Jonathan Crumly, whose firm Taylor English Duma redrew the school board lines the Republicans approved, is cited in Pozniak’s complaint as having contributed $4,000 to Chastain’s campaign.
The individual limit under Georgia campaign finance law is $3,000.
“The donors that gave David Chastain campaign contributions in excess of the campaign contribution limits are not just any donors. They are donors who benefitted from a no-bid contract David Chastain authorized as a member of the Cobb County Board of Education to draw a map that is not even the responsibility of the school board,” Pozniak said in a release issued by her campaign on Wednesday.
“David Chastain’s disregard for campaign finance laws raises serious questions about his leadership and conduct as Chairman of the Cobb County Board of Education, which oversees the district’s $1.5 billion budget.”
Chastain, who filed an amended campaign report in August splitting those contributions in two, between the primary and general elections, said it was an error that was corrected and heatedly denied violating state campaign laws.
In a press release his campaign issued Thursday, he said Pozniak has availed herself of the same “built-in amendment process for her own campaign.”
He said the complaint, filed with the Georgia Government Transparency and Campaign Finance Commission, is “baseless and politics at its worst,” and shows “a deliberate attempt by Catherine Pozniak and her small platoon of Democratic socialists [that] is on full display by Cobb County.”
Chastain has hired Jake Evans, a former Republican 6th District Congressional candidate and a former head of the State Ethics Commission, to represent him in the complaint. That won’t be acted upon until after the Nov. 8 general election.
In his release, Chastain continued to hammer away at what he has charged is a coordinated campaign by outsiders to influence the Cobb school board.
Among Pozniak’s contributors is Emma Bloomberg, the daughter of former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who gave $300.
She’s among the “far-left fringe supporters” of Pozniak that include “the scandal-ridden Southern Poverty Law Center, the Teach-For-America organization, the radical National Education Association, among many other liberal groups/individuals in the far left Hall of Fame,” Chastain’s release said.
He asserted he “will not be distracted by the antics of this ‘woke’ candidate.”
Chastain came under fire over the weekend for a comment on his campaign Facebook page mocking the value of an Ivy League education.
Pozniak holds a doctorate in education from Harvard, and on Sunday, Chastain congratulated the No. 1 Georgia Bulldogs for their football win—he’s a UGA graduate in a post bragging on Cobb schools recent SAT scores.
He also congratulated “my opponent’s far-left, Northeast, out-of-touch liberal, Ivy League university as well. Go, Harvard Football!”
More than 100 comments followed, many of them critical of the post. You can read through them by clicking here.
One commenter said “Love my Dawgs!!! …. Also, why are you tearing down someone for their school? Wouldn’t want my daughters to hear a school board member mock schools that kids in their district might attend (Ivy League, Northeast, or Liberal).”
Said another: “I hope there are more cogent arguments in favor of his opponent than the objectors present. Who will be better for education in Cobb? That is the issue, not perceived alma mater insults.”
In an interview earlier this week with East Cobb News, Chastain said he mentioned Harvard in the context of questioning Pozniak’s doctorate credentials.
“My opponent, when she emphasizes that she’s a doctor, what did this person do?” he said. He claimed that what she completed was not a dissertation but a capstone project that is being embargoed until 2057.
Normally mild-mannered in public, Chastain admitted that the pitched rhetoric from his campaign “is not like me, but it’s important to get out our message.”
A full candidate profile of Chastain is forthcoming, as is a similar profile of Pozniak.
In her interview with East Cobb News, she noted Chastain’s refusal for a direct debate (they’ve appeared at differing forums but not together).
She also said her education background (she taught on a native reservation in South Dakota and was a state education administrator in Louisiana) are needed on the board to ensure the Cobb school district improves, especially for students at-risk, after the COVID-19 pandemic.
“My opponent is saying things are good enough,” Pozniak said. “But for so many families and students, it’s not good enough.”
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Cobb DOT has revised a proposed raised median on Lower Roswell Road between Johnson Ferry Road and Davidson Road to include left-turn lanes in either direction.
Cobb Commissioner Jerica Richardson said Friday she’s holding a public meeting next week to discuss the planned Lower Roswell Road improvement project.
The meeting is Thursday from 6-7 in the community meeting room at the East Cobb Library (4880 Lower Roswell Road, Suite 510-B), in the Parkaire Landing Shopping Center.
The meeting is a follow-up to a virtual meeting held in June following comments from some East Cobb residents questioning the need for the project.
Cobb DOT initially proposed a variety of improvements along Lower Roswell between Woodlawn Drive and Davidson Road that cost $9 million and have been earmarked in Cobb government’s 2011 Special-Purpose Local-Option Sales Tax (SPLOST).
But the project has been delayed for years due to acquiring right-of-way and concerns from business owners about a raised median along Lower Roswell between Johnson Ferry Road and Davidson Road.
During the June virtual meeting, Cobb DOT director Drew Raessler said the raised median has been revised to include left-turn lanes in either direction, to the McDonald’s heading eastbound and into Parkaire Landing from westbound lanes.
Cobb DOT markings where crashes commonly occur on Lower Roswell Road near the Parkaire Landing entrance.
Raessler said the raised median is necessary to reduce the number of crashes along that strip of Lower Roswell. He said data collected between 2015-2017 showed the number of crashes was four and a half times the statewide average and that a raised median would reduce crashes by. more than 50 percent.
He said the crash totals have been so high because there are 14 separate access points along Lower Roswell in that area.
Raessler said Cobb DOT continues to work with local business owners to purchase final parcels of right-of-way and to improve their access and visibility.
He noted that his office is negotiating with Tijuana Joe’s, a popular restaurant on the southeast corner of Johnson Ferry and Lower Roswell, to keep its “iconic” sign that can be seen in all directions.
Right-of-way considerations may require having the sign to be relocated on a small property with “a driveway that’s difficult to get into even now.”
If you’re interested in attending Thursday’s meeting, please RSVP with Richardson’s office by clicking here.
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A Cobb Superior Court grand jury has indicted an East Cobb woman who’s been charged with assaulting and strangling her mother to death with a robe belt.
An eight-count indictment was handed down Thursday against Gretchen Fortney, 52, who was arrested on Sept. 30 for murder and aggravated assault.
She was indicted on one count of malice murder, three counts of felony murder, three counts of family violence-related aggravated assault and another count of aggravated sexual battery.
An arrest warrant said that Martha Fortney, 78, was assaulted with “an unknown object or objects” by Gretchen Fortney on the morning of Sept. 30 at the residence they shared in the Loch Highland subdivision, resulting in multiple injuries to the older woman’s torso and head.
The warrant states that the victim “was observed with what appeared to be the belt from her robe tied or looped around her neck” and there was a “visable ligature mark which resulted in her death.”
The indictment states that Gretchen Fortney caused the death “by blunt force trauma and strangulation” first by striking her mother with a hard object, then by tying a cloth belt around her neck. The assault damaged Martha Fortney’s left eye, right elbow and ribs and sternum, according to the indictment.
Gretchen Fortney also is accused of penetrating her mother’s sex organ with an unknown object, prompting the count of aggravated sexual battery.
Martha Fortney, who was listed as the owner of the home on Loch Highland Pass, was involved in Bible studies at Johnson Ferry Baptist Church and the Daughters of the American Revolution, according to an obituary.
Gretchen Fortney remains in the Cobb County Adult Detention Center without bond.
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With fall (and even wintry!) weather this week comes a flurry of seasonal and Halloween-related events in East Cobb over the weekend.
One event that’s a very important exception is coming up Saturday morning. The Credit Union of Georgia (an East Cobb News sponsor) is holding a Community Shred Event from 9:30 a.m. to noon at its East Cobb branch (1020 Johnson Ferry Road). The objective is to reduce identity fraud, and members of the public can bring up to one carload of documents to be safely shredded.
Two local churches are inviting the public to their free fall festivals on Saturday. From 11-3, it’s the Unity North Church Fall Festival(4255 Sandy Plains Road), with games, inflatables, a bake sale, pumpkin carving and more.
Later on, Mt. Zion UMC (1770 Johnson Ferry Road) will be holding its annual Party in the Patch festival from 4:30-6:30. You can buy a pumpkin at their ongoing sale (which concludes on Halloween) and enjoy games, food, bouncy houses and more.
On Saturday night, what promises to be a new East Cobb Halloween tradition makes its debut. It’s the Mabry Middle Foundation’s Haunted House immersive Halloween experience featuring a professor being driven mad by his students, and promises payback. It takes place from 7-10 p.m. at Mabry Middle School (2700 Jims Road), and it’s a ticketed event to benefit the foundation’s work supporting the school’s academic programs and facilities improvements.
Other features include a pumpkin boutique where guests can purchase professionally decorated pumpkins, and a kids area designed specifically for younger guests.
On Sunday, Cobb Commissioner Jerica Richardson is holding another Family Fun Health Fair from 12-5 p.m. at the Sewell Mill Library and Cultural Center (2051 Lower Roswell Road).
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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The following food scores for the week of Oct. 17 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!
Our inbox was hopping this morning with early November opening dates announced for the East Cobb locations of Marshalls and Chopt.
The former will be opening to the public on Thursday, Nov. 3, according to a release sent by the Massachusetts-based off-price retailer.
Marshalls is taking up some of the space formerly occupied by Stein Mart at Merchant’s Walk (1311 Johnson Ferry Road, Suite 424). It’s a relocation of the Marshalls at East Lake (2203 Roswell Road) and will contain 24,727 square feet.
The store hours will be as follows:
9:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Monday-Saturday
10 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Sundays
“Our newest store in Marietta will offer an ever-changing selection of high-quality, on-trend, and brand-name merchandise at the amazing prices that Marshalls is known for. We’re excited to bring this experience and exceptional values from fashion and beauty to home and more to a new neighborhood,” Marshalls president Tim Miner said in the release. “With thousands of new items delivered to our stores every day, we strive to provide our shoppers with amazing brands every time they shop.”
A store closing announcement isn’t posted outside the East Lake Marshalls, which remains open for the time being, but there’s a storewide clearance sale sign at the entrance.
Just across Johnson Ferry at Pine Straw Plaza, finishing touches are being put on Chopt, a salad concept eatery which we noted last month is being renovated completely in the former space of California Pizza Kitchen.
Chopt sent word today that the first day of business at the new East Cobb location (4250 Roswell Road, Suite 630) will be Wednesday, Nov. 9.
It’s one of two Chopt openings in metro Atlanta—another is in Peachtree Corners next week—making it six in the area.
Chopt offers a variety of salad options with more than 18 “shockingly delicious dressings,” according to a company release, as well as wraps and sandwiches.
The East Cobb location includes 2,513 square feet, indoor seating for 46, a patio for 30, as well as curbside pickup and self-serve kiosks.
The day before an opening Chopt designates a community non-profit to receive 100 percent of proceeds for what it calls a “day of giving.” The East Cobb and Peachtree Corners locations are partnering with HOPE Atlanta, which helps people challenged by food and housing insecurity.
Patrons can contribute on Tuesday, Nov. 8 by dining in from 11:30 a.m.—2 p.m. or 5—7:30 p.m. or by ordering online or via the Chopt mobile app.
Chopt’s normal business hours will be Monday-Saturday from 10:30 a.m.—9 p.m. and Sunday from 11 a.m.—8 p.m.
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As she nears the end of her third term in office, Cobb Commissioner JoAnn Birrell is telling voters she’s a steady hand amid significant change in county government and the Northeast Cobb community she has represented for more than a decade.
She’s running for a fourth term in new District 3 boundaries in East Cobb that are more favorable for a Republican candidate. In 2018, she won with a little more than 51 percent in a redrawn district that included much of the city of Marietta.
Since then, however, the political dynamics have changed in Cobb, which is now governed by a majority of three Democrats on the all-female Board of Commissioners.
Birrell is one of two Republicans in the minority, and opposes a Democratic-led bid to invoke home rule provisions to keep District 2 Commissioner Jerica Richardson in office.
But the bigger issues facing the county, Birrell said in a recent interview with East Cobb News, center around how to fund a growing demand for providing and upgrading key services and solve major staffing shortages.
“Things are pretty critical,” she said. “We don’t know what the future holds.”
In the Nov. 8 general election, Birrell is facing Democrat Christine Triebsch, a former Georgia Senate candidate.
She said she did so because she wanted the county to fill existing positions before creating 148 new jobs across the government.
“I think right now we’re in pretty good shape [financially],” she said. “But I’m concerned that our budget next year is not going to be sustainable with the new positions.”
Some departments are experiencing 40 percent vacancies, including infrastructure functions such as transportation and water, sewer and stormwater management.
The budget also incorporates provisions of a pay and class study for county employees, as well as continuation of step and grade salary increases for public safety.
Those are measures supported by Birrell, who has said that public safety is her highest priority.
For a larger view of the new District 3 boundaries, click here.
Commissioners will soon be hearing a proposal for a stormwater impact fee that Cobb has never imposed; Birrell said she opposes it because it would be another tax burden for citizens who are paying higher water bills.
She also was vocally against a proposal for the county to designate single haulers for commission districts, a measure that was tabled earlier this fall.
Birrell said Cobb doesn’t need to get into the business of regulating private trash providers.
“We get a lot of the complaints but it may not need to come back,” she said. “They’re in that business and they have to work together to make sure our citizens get service.”
Birrell has raised nearly $52,000 in the current election cycle (through Sept. 30), prompting claims from Triebsch that her opponent is more vested in business interests than those of average citizens and homeowners.
In her most recent campaign disclosure form, Birrell reported receiving $2,500 contributions from John Tanner and Cynthia Reichard, the CEO and Executive Vice President, respectively, of Arlyessence, a fragrance company that recently received $27 million in bonds from the Development Authority of Cobb County (commissioners appoint some of the members but aren’t directly involved in that process).
Another $2,500 contribution to Birrell’s campaign is from Tom Phillips, a businessman whose 50-acre property on Ebenezer Road was rezoned by commissioners last year for a 99-home subdivision. Pulte, the applicant, has since pulled out of developing that land.
But Birrell said she prides herself on being accessible to anyone.
“You can ask any citizen that I hear from that I’m very responsive,” she said.
As for charges that Birrell has been more sympathetic to development interests, she said “go ask the East Cobb Civic Association and homeowners associations about the things I have stopped that were too dense and not appropriate for the area.
“I always listen to my constituents,” she said, noting her rejection of a large-scale multi-use development in the I-575-Bells Ferry area last year.
Commissioners are expected to vote a second time next week on the home rule vote that Birrell said will end up costing taxpayers money in a legal wrangle she thinks the county is likely to lose.
“It was not fair that Jerica was drawn out of her district in the middle of her term,” Birrell said. “But the legislature draws our lines. Reapportionment is not a home rule provision.”
But Birrell said she isn’t animated by partisan motives when it comes to most issues.
“A lot of our votes are along party lines,” she said. “I’m outnumbered on some things but I’ve tried to work with the full board.
“You have to look at the issue and do what you feel is right.”
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 Cobb-based non-profit The Center for Family Resourcesis accepting donations for its 36th annual Thanks for Giving Food Boxes drive.
The goal this year is to provide 1,000 boxes of food for families in need, and community members can participate by becoming a Smart Stuffer Packing Partner or by sponsoring or donating to this year’s“I’m Thankful For…”Giving Campaign.
The Thanks for Giving boxes provide food for family to “keep or create their own family traditions in ways that are meaningful to them.”
Families receiving the boxes are those who register through the CFR or who are supported by local schools and other non-profit partners, including Cobb Senior Services, Communities in Schools of Georgia in Marietta/Cobb and LiveSafe Resources.
“Our annual Thanks for Giving event has allowed us to feed Cobb families for more than 35 years,” said Melanie Kagan, CEO for the Center for Family Resources. “We are so grateful for the support we receive from this community and our supporters, including Genuine Parts Company, Lockheed Martin and Publix Super Markets Charities who are this year’s Presenting Sponsors.”
The food boxes are valued at between $65-$75 each using a suggested shopping list and can be delivered to the First Baptist Church Marietta (148 Church St.) until Nov. 10 or to the IAM Local Lodge #7091032 (1032 South Marietta Pkwy SE), from Nov. 14-17.
The boxes will be distributed to families the week before Thanksgiving.
For more information about how to take part in the the Thanks for Giving program, click here.
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A float and participants at Walton’s 2021 homecoming parade. Photo courtesy of Amanda Brown
Two high schools in East Cobb are having homecoming parades this week that will affect traffic in some areas.
On Wednesday, a portion of Holt Road will be closed from 6-7 p.m. for the Wheeler homecoming parade.
The route starts at Grace Marietta Church (675 Holt Road) and heads south to the school (375 Holt Road) and the student parking lot behind the football stadium.
That’s where a festival will be taking place until 8 p.m. There will be food, games and other activities that are open to the public.
On Friday, the Walton homecoming parade takes place, starting at the Target store at Merchants Festival at 2:15 p.m. The route continues westbound on Providence Road, then to Pine Road and Bill Murdock Road before arriving at the school (1590 Bill Murdock Road).
The class councils for each grade will compete for best float, and the Walton band will lead the athletic floats and homecoming court in the parade.
Both football teams are battling for playoff berths in the Georgia High School Association’s Class 7A Region 5.
Wheeler is 4-3 and will be playing Osborne, which is 5-2. Walton is 5-2 and will be playing host to Cherokee.
Kickoff times for both games are 7:30 p.m. Friday.
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