Cobb commission special elections to be decided Tuesday

Voters in a few East Cobb precincts will be going to the polls Tuesday in a special general election for District 2 on the Cobb Board of Commissioners.

The candidates are Democrat Erick Allen and Republican Alicia Adams, and party control of the board is at stake.

Currently there are two Democrats and two Republicans on the commission, which also has been all-female since 2021.

Early voting in special elections in District 2 and District 4 ended Friday and turnout has been light, according to Cobb Elections, with fewer than 6,000 total votes cast in both races.

The polls will be open Tuesday from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., and the District 2 precincts in the East Cobb area that are in District 2 are as follows:

Chattahoochee 01: The Paces Foundation, 2730 Cumberland Boulevard
East Piedmont 01: Shady Grove Baptist Church, 1654 Bells Ferry Road
Elizabeth 01: Cobb EMC, 1000 EMC Parkway
Elizabeth 02: Covenant Presbyterian Church, 2881 Canton Road
Elizabeth 4: Gracelife Church, 1083 Allgood Road
Marietta 6A: Kenyan American Community Church, 771 Elberta Drive
Marietta 6B: Mt. Paran Church of God North, 1700 Allgood Road
Powers Ferry 01: Sewell Mill Library and Cultural Center, 2051 Lower Roswell Road
Sewell Mill 03: Immanuel Korean United Methodist Church, 945 Old Canton Road
Terrell Mill 01: Former Eastvalley Elementary School, 2570 Lower Roswell Road

(Please note: Not all voters in these precincts are in District 2. To check your status, visit the My Voter Page at the Georgia Secretary of State’s website.)

*District 2 contains only small portions of the East Cobb area.*

District 2 formerly included much of East Cobb when it was represented by Democrat Jerica Richardson from 2021 through earlier this year.

Special elections in District 2 and District 4 were ordered by a Cobb judge after May 2024 primaries were invalidated due to electoral maps that were ruled to be in violation of the Georgia Constitution.

Those maps were drawn by Allen, of Smyrna, then the chairman of the Cobb legislative delegation, but never received a vote. Since leaving office, Allen has been the head of the Cobb Democratic Party.

Adams is a Republican activist who challenged the Democratic commissioners’ used of those electoral maps that led to her disqualification for seeking the District 2 seat in 2024.

After the court rulings, Cobb commissioners voted to vacate the District 2 seat that had been held by Richardson, who was drawn out of her East Cobb home in redistricting.

Richardson and her two Democratic commissioner colleagues honored the Allen maps for more than two years in making a “home rule” challenge. But two Cobb judges ruled those maps were illegal because only the legislature can conduct county reapportionment.

In January, Richardson lost her final appeal to stay in office—although her term expired on Dec. 31—and the commission has been operating with four members since then.

Also on Tuesday, in District 4, which covers most of South Cobb, first-term Democrat Monique Sheffield will face Republican Matthew Hardwick.

Cobb Elections estimates the special elections will cost around $1.5 million.

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