DeKalb CEO touts first 100 days
Burrell Ellis fired DeKalb County's police chief, hired a public safety director, broke bread with local leaders and traveled to Washington to woo federal officials.
Those are among the accomplishments that the county's new chief executive officer touted at a speech Wednesday at the Druid Hills Golf Club.
This week, starting with a presentation Monday at a south DeKalb senior center, Ellis is touring the county to highlight his first 100 days in office -- even though the milestone passed in mid-April.
The former county commissioner got off to a fighting start when he took over in January, battling then-Police Chief Terrell Bolton and ultimately firing him.
Meanwhile, Ellis outflanked the County Commission to fund a cabinet-level public safety position. He hired veteran cop William "Wiz" Miller as his public safety director, saying he needed someone to coordinate the police and fire departments. Miller also will manage the county's code enforcement agency, since property maintenance complaints are a big problem in DeKalb.
Public safety was a top issue for Ellis and the other CEO candidates last year, and Ellis told a crowd of about 200 Wednesday that it still is his priority.
"We're on the rebound. We've got a police department where morale is on the rise again," he said.
The CEO noted his meetings with Vice President Joe Biden and other officials in the Obama administration, saying that DeKalb had received $28 million in stimulus money so far. He also said he was reaching out to local leaders, meeting with the mayors of DeKalb's 10 cities plus commission chairmen from neighboring counties. He also has attended meetings of the Atlanta Regional Commission, which his predecessor, Vernon Jones, shunned.
Former County Commissioner Robert Lanier was impressed.
"It's very refreshing to me to see someone with his character and integrity trying to pull the county back together," said Lanier, who served four terms beginning in the mid-1970s and runs a real estate company.
Even neighborhood leader Ann Brown, a past critic of Ellis, praised him.
Brown, president of the Belvedere Civic Club south of Decatur, is a Bolton fan who expressed disappointment when he was fired. She didn't attend Wednesday's speech but said she likes some of the things Ellis has done so far, such as hiring Miller. She also praised the way Ellis balanced this year's budget with minimal layoffs.
"His rating has gone up with me," she said, adding: "But I'm looking to see how we're going to move forward."
Ellis is planning to speak more about his first 100 days. He's scheduled to appear at the offices of Senior Connections in Chamblee at 11 a.m. Thursday and at the old courthouse in downtown Decatur at 6 p.m. He's also expected to speak twice Friday, at 9 a.m. and 1 p.m., to graduates at the Georgia Perimeter College campus in Clarkston.
About the Author
Ty Tagami is a staff writer for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Since joining the newspaper in 2002, he has written about everything from hurricanes to homelessness. He has deep experience covering local government and education, and can often be found under the Gold Dome when lawmakers meet or in a school somewhere in the state.
