Fresh Loaf

Last week, City Council voted to override Mayor Shirley Franklin’s decision to shutter Atlanta’s oldest fire station as part of a round of budget cuts. Despite council’s vote to fund the station, the decision to re-open it rests with the mayor — and herroner ain’t budging.

“Why would the mayor just let this money sit in an account in order to just win an argument with the City Council? There is no good reason other than to impose her will.”

— Jim Daws, head of the city’s firefighters’ union, to the AJC

“This is certainly a different Council than the one I’ve been serving on during this administration or the previous administration. People have been more independent in their thinking — and not necessarily in agreement with the administration. This is a new day.”

— Councilmember Felicia More, to CL

“The hubbub over Fire Station No. 7 and the needless confrontation with Franklin only add to the evidence that this council lacks credibility in dealing with the city’s significant financial problems.”

— Sept. 5 AJC editorial

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Terri Montague looked disappointed.

The CEO of Atlanta Beltline Inc., the nonprofit agency tasked with planning and building the 22-mile project, stood before the Atlanta City Council’s finance committee on Wednesday to present how the group planned to spend an estimated $117 million that was to be generated from the first round of TAD bonds. Councilmember Felicia Moore asked Montague what was the rush — council was about to go on recess and the Beltline has until Oct. 31 to settle an outstanding debt for a key piece of property near Piedmont Park. Moore was planning on tabling the item, she said.

What’s the rush? Well, to put it simply, Beltline leaders are against the slow-moving bureaucracy that is modern-day government. Council returns from its summer sojourn in mid-August and the Beltline has investors coming to scope out the project the following week. Montague said the investors need to have a sense that the city is truly committed to the project. It needs the money.

(more…)

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Atlanta City Councilwoman Felicia Moore introduced legislation calling for council oversight of the city’s involvement in the Atlanta Housing Authority’s plans to demolish public housing.

“[This] ordinance is to make sure in the future it’s clear by code there’s an understanding the Council is the governing authority of the City . . . ”
— Moore, as quoted in Atlanta Progressive News Jan. 7

“We respectfully submit that, because of the legally mandated autonomous operation of the AHA, these items of legislation are beyond the City’s authority and purview.”
— Attorney Sharon Gay, of McKenna Long & Aldridge, in a Jan. 14 letter to Atlanta City Council

“This is a blatant, purposeful media campaign to discredit me because they don’t like this legislation.”
— Moore, as quoted in the AJC, in response to a comment by AHA spokesman Rick White alleging that Moore worries demolishing public housing in her council district would move her supporters out of her district

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