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November 2007
Cal Warlick / On Gwinnett
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
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Gwinnett’s most influential women: Who did we forget?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
From educators to politicians and even doctors, we chose some of Gwinnett’s most influential women. But maybe we left someone off our list.
If it were up to you, who would be added?
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Cal Warlick / On Gwinnett
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
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Chasing gangstas on the Internet
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Gwinnett County police will soon begin tracking gang members through a new computer system.
The Board of Commissioners last week gave permission to the department to use GangNetR.
It’s a database that shares information about gang-related activities among federal, state and law enforcement agencies.
The system already is used by investigators across the U.S., according to Gwinnett police officials.
The system will be funded with drug money seized by the police.
“With gangs becoming increasingly mobile and destructive, this GangNet system gives our police a new tool,” Bannister said.
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Drinking water from the potty
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Dogs do it all the time, of course. In a couple of years, so could the people who live in these parts.
Well, not literally.
A plan to return “highly cleaned and disinfected wastewater” from Gwinnett’s treatment plant to Lake Lanier moved a step closer to reality last week.
The Gwinnett Board of Commissioners awarded a $26 million contract to John D. Stephens Inc. to build an 8.4-mile pipeline from the F. Wayne Hill plant to the lake.
The new line, which is expected to return up to 40 million gallons of potable water to the lake every day, is scheduled to be completed in 2009.
“By returning our water to its source, we’ll be helping folks downstream along the Chattahoochee instead of sending it the other way to the Atlantic Ocean,” Board Chairman Charles Bannister said.
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Sugarloaf project gets the green light
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Construction of the long-awaited Sugarloaf Parkway extension will soon get under way.
The Gwinnett Board of Commissioners last week awarded a $23.5 million contract to E.R. Snell Contractor Inc. for the first phase of the project.
The plan calls for extending Sugarloaf Parkway 6.1 miles from Ga. 20, where the road currently ends, to Ga. 316. Snell is under contract to finish the first 2.7 miles of the project, which is scheduled to be completed in 2010.
“We’re excited to get this much-needed congestion relief project under construction,” District 3 Commissioner Mike Beaudreau said.
“Our constituents have tasked us to do something about traffic and this is a huge step in answering that mandate.”
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What do you think of UGA’s water conservation plan?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
On Friday, UGA —the biggest water customer in Athens-Clarke County— announced its recommendations on how to conserve water and reduce its use.
From eliminating automatic flushing toilets and urinals to investigating installation of hand sanitizers in bathrooms, the university hopes to reduce its water consumption by 25 percent in the short term. Also on the list: using towels in its Ramsey Center, a massive physical fitness facility and harvesting and using rainwater as much as possible.
Are these things you would ever consider in your home, work? And, perhaps the most-important question: will it work?
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City of Duluth wins Livable Center award
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The Atlanta Regional Commission last week gave the city of Duluth a “Livable Centers Initiative Achievement Award.”
The ARC granted the award for the city’s ongoing redevelopment of downtown.
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Speaking of taxes …
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Thursday is the deadline for Gwinnettians to pay the second installment of their property tax bills.
Those who don’t make the deadline will have to pay a 5 percent penalty plus 1 percent interest for every month they fail to pay.
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Cal Warlick / On Gwinnett
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
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Your house is worth paying higher taxes for
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
During a history lesson on Gwinnett taxation, county administrator Jock Connell recalled a “painful” period.
It was 1998, Connell said. The state Department of Revenue had just slapped the county with a $400,000 fine for underestimating property values across the county.
Tax assessors launched a countywide property reassessment that would raise taxes across the board.
“It was a painful, painful process,” Connell said. “You do not ever want to do that again.”
Connell said the county tried to put the best face possible on the property reassessments.
“We called it a ‘value update,’ ” Connell said. “I don’t think anybody bought it.”
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It’s time for ‘Santa talk’? It can’t be! Not already!
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Every Friday in my daughter Shannon’s second-grade class, the kids are required to write a brief note or letter home to their family telling us about the past week. They write about whatever it was that week that stood out to them. The parents are then to write a note back in response.
In the past, it has been very easy, as the subject matter has been things such as the animals of Australia or a book they read in class. Then this week we got the following note from Shannon:
Dear Family,
I wish you guys could just wave your wand and make it November 25th because then it would be my birthday and I would get presents. The thing I want the most is that pony thing. You know what I am talking about but you won’t buy it for me so I will just ask Santa Claus but I won’t tell my friends because most people in my class don’t believe in Santa so I will just keep that to myself.
Love,
Shannon
How do we respond to this?
She is not yet even 8 years old, and she already has to hide her belief of Santa to save face with her classmates.
My wife and I have talked a bit about how to handle this, but I know neither of us wants her to lose this belief already.
Our reasons are primarily selfish, no doubt about it. It seems like just yesterday we got to the point where she truly understood who Santa was and got excited about it. The weeks leading up to Christmas the excitement developed — barely contained with each toy catalog she browsed or with each viewing of “The Polar Express.”
We got about three years of this. It isn’t enough. Not for me or any parent.
Not to mention, is there any greater power a parent wields than looking your child in the eyes and saying, “Santa is coming, so you better be good”? By just uttering this simple reminder, we have the ability to instantly settle a fight with her brother, or get her to behave herself while we are running errands.
More than that, can there ever be harm in having a child believe that there is a person in this world who’s sole motivation is to reward boys and girls just for being good?
But can we really continue to keep our child holding on to a belief that other kids already know is false — at the expense of possibly being teased?
If my memory serves me correctly, I was in second grade when my mom told me there was no Santa. My mom said other kids my age already knew, and she didn’t want me to hear it from them.
I already had doubts. I grew up with three older brothers, so making it anywhere close to second grade while still believing in Santa was a miracle in and of itself.
We know it’s time to have the Santa talk with Shannon. But I wonder if this will be the end of her implicit trust in Mommy and Daddy. At her age, most arguments are won and lost simply with the statement, “my Mommy and Daddy said so.” Regardless of what proof the other kid may have, the greater authority is Mommy and Daddy. She has already had exchanges with kids who refuse to believe that there really is a number “googol.” She even knows it is a 1 followed by 100 zeros, thanks to me.
I knew this day would come, it just didn’t seem like it would be this soon.
At least I know that, regardless of whether it is Santa or Mommy and Daddy bringing the presents, she will always be excited on Christmas Eve.
I have never lost that feeling. Maybe that is what I have to hold on to.
Even without the jolly fat guy, it will still be the best time of the year for her and for me.
Jim Costelloe is a husband and father of two who lives in Suwanee and works in the commercial mortgage industry.
Revitalizing downtown Duluth
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
In many ways, these seem like great times for downtown Duluth, with a new City Hall opening by year’s end and two businesses building headquarters across the street.
But then, two popular businesses — the Soda Shop and the Main Street Coffee Shop — recently closed. Condos, just behind the Town Green, weren’t selling very fast and a number of downtown shopkeepers find themselves reconsidering whether they can make the margin between escalating rents and shrinking sales add up.
Businesses owners are hoping “Duluth’s Hometown Holidays” will help bring more business downtown.
Do you think it will work? Or does downtown Duluth still need something more to increase its foot traffic.
Kenerly’s proposal
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Four of Gwinnett’s five county commissioners said little about Glenn Richardson’s GREAT tax plan during their budget retreat in north Georgia last week.
Except Kevin Kenerly.
The fourth district commissioner railed against the Georgia House speaker’s plan to eliminate local property tax collections by swapping them with state sales tax money.
Kenerly called it an example of the kind of ill-conceived proposals lawmakers “running for office 24-7” often come up with.
Then, amid the tirade, Kenerly had a vision of his own tax plan. He called it the “KR1000, the GREATER plan.”
Like Richardson’s plan, the KR1000 would replace the property taxes Gwinnettians pay with higher sales taxes.
The difference? Kenerly said, “We set it. We collect it. We spend it.”
We think he wasn’t being entirely serious.
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Cal Warlick / On Gwinnett
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
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County commissioner wants to fine water hogs
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
County commissioner Lorraine Green wants to put teeth in Gov. Sonny Perdue’s recent edict that wholesale water providers cut their water use by 10 percent.
Green proposes that the large water system operators be slapped with a fine based on 200 percent of the base rates they pay if they don’t meet the 10 percent threshold.
Green’s plan also offers rebates to homeowners who replace water-wasting toilets with low-flow ones.
“The program is designed to ‘spread the pain’ as evenly as possible,” Green said. “It adds surcharges to large users who do not conserve. It does not single out one single user or industry.”
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Is this the Political Year of the Woman?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Elections this week in Auburn, Ga. resulted in an all-female city council and a new female mayor.
The Georgia Municipal Association says it knows of no other place in Georgia where the city fathers are actually city mothers.
And with talk of our nation possibly electing its first female president, we have to wonder if this is in fact, the Year of the Woman when it comes to politics.
What do you think? And should gender really matter?
No excuses, Buster, we’ve got an election to run
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Lynn Ledford is looking for a few good men and women to work the precincts for the 2008 elections. Perhaps “few” is the wrong word.
“We’re probably 500 in the hole right now,” said Ledford, Gwinnett’s election supervisor.
The hours are pretty good. You only work a few days, and the job pays anywhere from $110 to $250 a day.
“I think there are a lot of people out there who would enjoy this,” Ledford said.
This year, the election supervisor is trying to expand her pool of potential employees beyond retirees. That’s because she needs good strong backs to haul the newer electronic voting machines.
“The equipment is heavy,” Ledford said. “It’s really hard for the little ladies to pick it up.”
Anyone interested in the job, Ledford said, can contact Peter Combs, the poll official coordinator for Gwinnett County. Combs can be reached at peter.combs@gwinnettcounty.com.
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Cal Warlick / On Gwinnett
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
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Water under the dam
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Longtime Gwinnett boosters must dream about the dam that got away.
In 1973, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers proposed building a second reservoir on the Chattahoochee River. The Re-Regulation Dam was proposed to help ensure that metro Atlanta and the region’s downstream neighbors would have a sufficient supply of drinking water in future decades.
The dam was never built.
In 1988, the corps abruptly withdrew its support for the “Re-Reg Dam.”
The decision infuriated metro Atlanta leaders, who’d spent a combined $2 million on studies — and a lot of political capital — pitching the controversial proposal to the public. Manuel Maloof, then DeKalb County’s chief executive officer, used words we couldn’t print.
The $25 million dam, which would have been built a few miles downstream from Lake Lanier, would have slowed the flow of water from the lake. It would have made it possible for water used to generate electricity to be pumped back into the lake and re-used.
In GwinnettForum.com, the online newsletter published by former AJC columnist Elliot Brack, former Gwinnett Commissioner Marion Buice lamented the dam that never was.
“If we had built the dam back then, and we pushed hard for it, it would have given us water storage today, would have cost far less than such a facility would today,” he said.
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Tell us: How are you dealing with the drought?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
From stockpiling water to shortened showers, Gwinnett residents are pulling out all the stops to ensure they’ll survive Georgia’s drought.
What are you doing to endure?
Shh. Mommy and Daddy are mad
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It feels a little like going on vacation with your divorced parents.
You don’t know whether they’ll yell at each other or be civil for the sake of the kids. You wonder whether they’ll try to outdo one another to win you over.
Charles Bannister and Lorraine Green probably wouldn’t like that analogy.
Yet it seems like a fitting description of two opposing candidates for Gwinnett’s top elected job. They will both attend the Board of Commissioners’ annual budget retreat in north Georgia today.
Green, Bannister, their fellow commissioners and county staffers will remain at the Brasstown Valley Resort until Tuesday. That’s when each member will unveil his or her goals for the coming year.
It’s an annual ritual.
Last year, Commissioner Bert Nasuti proposed building a minor-league ballpark and bringing a baseball team to Gwinnett.
We have no idea how Green, Gwinnett’s District 1 commissioner, and Bannister, the current chairman of the board, will behave toward one another. The two are vying for the chairmanship in the 2008 election.
Lately, the relationship’s seemed a tad frosty.
But look for the two to swing for the fences Tuesday when they unveil their election-year goals.
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Sherrington names new property tax director
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Gwinnett Tax Commissioner Katherine Sherrington has appointed Richard Steele director of the office’s property tax department. Steele, a former budget analyst for the Global AIDS Program at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has worked for the county since 2005 as a branch manager for Gwinnett’s tag offices in Snellville and Lawrenceville.
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Norcross company wins “Green Power” award
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
No, this is not an award for empowering Martians.
The U.S. Department of Energy last week gave Sterling Planet of Norcross a “Green Power Leadership Award” for promoting the use of renewable energy sources.
Sterling Planet, one of six companies to receive the award, provides solar, wind, hydro-electric and other forms of renewable energy to homes and businesses across the United States.
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Green: Let the fund raising begin
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Lorraine Green, the Gwinnett County commissioner who hopes to unseat Chairman Charles Bannister, held her first campaign fund-raiser Friday.
She collected $50,000 at the 1818 Club in Duluth.
Green has a long way to go to catch up with Bannister. His latest campaign disclosure report shows that he has six times that much to spend.
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