The simmering battle over the
structure of regional governance got hot at Wednesday’s meeting of the board of
the Atlanta Regional Commission. Metro Atlanta residents lined up to protest
the proposed revisions of the ARC’s bylaws. Credit: David Pendered
At least nine organizations
sent representatives to voice opposition to proposed revisions to the ARC’s
bylaws. They want the bylaws to prohibit the ARC from seating on its board
developers and others who have an interest in development. The proposal does not
do that. “I have a problem with a person or employer who could benefit” from
actions taken by the ARC board serving on the ARC board, said Fayette County
Commission Chairman Steve Brown. If Brown isn’t leading the revolt, he
certainly is a standard bearer.
The ARC board is scheduled to
vote on the proposed bylaws at its September meeting. At the Feb. 4 meeting of
the Fayette County Issues Tea Party, Brown delivered remarks and a presentation
that states: “The past and current ARC chairmen are non-elected officials in
real estate development who are with community improvement districts, competing
for transportation dollars within the region.”
ARC’s past chair was Tad
Leithead, who chairs the Cumberland Community Improvement District, which
Leithead’s linkedin.com profile says is “directly responsible for almost $3
billion of transportation improvement in Cobb County.” Leithead also serves on
the board of the North Fulton CID, which is chaired by Kerry Armstrong – the
current chairman of ARC’s board of directors.
ARC Chairman Kerry Armstrong
has come under fire for his work in the development field. Armstrong now serves
as a senior vice president at Pope and Land Enterprises. Armstrong previously
served nearly 22 years with Duke Realty, which absorbed his former employer of
Weeks Corp. and before that A.R. Weeks and Assoc., and is a past chair of the
Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce and a number of other locally significant
organizations, according to an announcement of his hiring by Pope & Land.
Incidentally, Armstrong’s former business associate, Ray Weeks, was named in
2005 by then Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin to chair the Atlanta BeltLine
Partnership, the organization that was to raise private funding to build the
public amenities associated with the BeltLine.
For its part, the ARC contends
the bylaws revision is a simple housekeeping matter. The bylaws need to be
updated to “align the bylaws with the current operating environment,” according
to a summary the ARC released Wednesday. This step is the necessary outcome
related to the vote by the ARC board in 2011 to adopt an “Evolution Strategy
and Plan,” according to the ARC.
The proposed bylaw changes
named in a summary by Cherokee County Chairman Buzz Ahrens include topics such
as “Revised purpose, objects and functions language,” and “Updated and
clarified board membership and terms of office,” and “Drafted a stand-alone
ethics policy.”
Brown says these proposed
changes don’t go far enough. “I don’t hold anything against anybody in this
room,” Brown said. “I don’t want anyone to take anything I say that way. … I
respectfully disagree with the point of a CID board member being a citizen
member of ARC.”
Incidentally, President Obama
is the bigger target of these groups’ broader effort to combat what they perceive
as efforts to create a mandatory regional government in metro Atlanta. Groups
have united in efforts to oppose certain regional solutions to issues facing
metro Atlanta. Credit: repealregionalism.com Their prime example of the Obama
philosophy is the regional transportation sales tax proposed in 2012, which
would have compelled counties to participate regardless of their voters’
wishes.
According to the Transportation
Leadership Coalition, represented by Field Sercy at Wednesday’s meeting of the
ARC board, the ARC’s proposed bylaws will put the ARC even further away from
the control of voters. Sercy was joined by representatives of Common Cause of
Georgia, Fayette County Issues Tea Party, Georgia Watchdogs, Unhappy Taxpayers
and Voters, Rockdale County Think Tank, and Dunwoody Tea Party in speaking
against the proposed bylaws. “I want you to see that, at the end of the day,
taxpayers and voters are in change of this government,” said Viola Davis,
president of Unhappy Taxpayers and Voters. “If these changes are approved, then
ARC will go even further off-track than it was intended.”
Source: http://saportareport.com/blog/2014/08/should-arc-ban-developers-from-its-board-tax-groups-press-the-question/ Posted in David Pendered Date: August 27th,
2014, 11:16 pm –
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