Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens says water service has been restored in the city. But many residents are wondering what’s next and if this type of crisis will happen again.
Atlanta City Council President Doug Shipman joined “Politically Georgia” on Wednesday morning to discuss those next steps.
“I think that this is going to be a wake-up call,” Shipman said. “Infrastructure is not something that’s sexy, and it’s often something that takes a crisis in order to focus policymakers.”
Credit: Special to AJC
Credit: Special to AJC
For now, boil water advisories are still in effect. Atlanta Public Schools also announced for the third day that summer schools and programming would be canceled at a number of locations.
Dickens has faced criticism for his handling of the crisis. He was in Memphis, Tennessee, when the trouble began Friday. He returned to Atlanta on Saturday and addressed reporters that afternoon.
“There’s no question communications fell short,” Shipman said. “We are, as council, holding a work session on this next Tuesday and inviting the (Dickens) administration to come, really, to a do deep dive into what we we could learn from this situation.”
Those communication problems affected Shipman, too.
“From a council perspective, I was trying to make sure that I had accurate information, but I also wasn’t, you know, receiving information to my satisfaction,” he said.
Still, Shipman said he has faith in the mayor’s office.
“Mayor Dickens has been hands-on as he usually is,” Shipman said. “He’s a very hands-on kind of mayor.”
The mayor also announced plans to establish a financial relief fund to help the many businesses that suffered losses during the outage.
Shipman said that “$5 million is the current number.”
“My hope is that within a few weeks there’ll be a very short application process and then Invest Atlanta will be administering those funds,” he said.
Thursday on “Politically Georgia”: Former Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan joins the show.
About the Author
