Kasim Reed was, in many ways, a good mayor for Atlanta. Maybe not great — certainly not Beyoncé-at-Coachella great, as he himself might see it — but nonetheless good.
During Reed’s two terms in office, the city has prospered. The crime rate fell, transformative projects such as the Beltline moved forward, corporate America bought into the Atlanta story and thanks in part to Reed, Atlanta’s sometimes crippling bureaucracy became more professional and efficient (although considerable work remains).
Reed’s trademark accomplishment was the partnership that he forged between Atlanta’s black Democratic, urban leadership and Gov. Nathan Deal, a white Republican with roots in rural Georgia. The level of cooperation between the two was tangible and historic, reassuring audiences from corporate boardrooms to the state Legislature to Washington, D.C., that together, Atlanta and Georgia could make promises and keep them.
Given that record of success, Reed’s post-mayoral political prospects should have been bright. Running statewide as a black Atlanta Democrat has been a fool’s folly in Georgia, but Reed is still relatively young, the state is changing and in his work with Deal he has built ties and credibility with the business community that would stand him in good stead. Even if statewide office proved elusive, a possible future in federal office beckoned.
Now, in the wake of a widespread federal corruption investigation into Atlanta city government, those doors may be slamming shut.
In the latter days of his second term, through a flurry of subpoenas, indictments and guilty pleas by underlings, Reed has claimed that he just didn’t know, and given the continued absence of evidence to the contrary, that might protect him legally. But in the political realm, that excuse is considerably less compelling.
If Reed didn’t know, he certainly should have known. Those implicated in the scandal have been his people, people in positions of trust because he put them there. Even more damning, his claim of innocence through ignorance just doesn’t square with his carefully nurtured image as a hands-on, competent manager who called the tune and could make the city bureaucracy dance to it.
Like a certain president, Reed is now learning that a federal probe begun to expose possible wrongdoing in one arena can legitimately expand into other areas when facts are uncovered that demand it. As Channel 2 Action News and the AJC have reported, Reed hurried to repay $12,000 in questionable personal charges on his city-issued credit card after spending records were sought through the Open Records Act. In the wake of those media reports, federal investigators have now subpoenaed those records as well. They also appear to be investigating $40,000 that Reed had donated to a city-related non-profit, which was then used to repay the city for first-class travel for Reed and staff members on a city trip to South Africa.
No one can predict what that investigation will produce, but guilty pleas and prison sentences in similar cases involving DeKalb County commissioners suggest Reed has new cause for concern. And I have to wonder whether Reed’s trademark self-confidence, a trait that sometimes veered into arrogance, played a role in all this. During his eight years as mayor, Reed made it clear to everyone that he does not like being questioned or challenged, and that the rules didn’t apply to him. But maybe they do after all.
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