Newspaper Page Text
r A
CL A
Mayor
N T H E 5
Davison Takes
LATE
Office
A r this issue of Flagpole hits the streets,
#\o Athens-Clarke County will have a new
Mayor and three new Commissioners. One week to
the day before taking office, then-Mayor-Elect
Heidi Davison talked with Flagpole about her
Community Snapshot Project, the role of the
Manager, and how she'll spend her first day on
the job.
Flagpole: A few weeks ago you convened a
group of citizens [dubbed the "Community
Snapshot Project"] to help you
research specific issues. What were §
those issues? ~
Heidi Davison: We were
talking about what I needed to do
to begin to work on some of the
issues that we talked about during
the campaign—land use, afford
able housing, economic develop
ment and neighborhood protec
tion—in order to begin to work on
those issues and fulfill my obliga
tion to the community. I don't
have all the answers for all of
those things. There are so many
issues that need to be addressed,
and you've got to start some
where.
There was no reason for me to
have a quote-unquote "transition
team," because I don't get to
create a team of people who rep
resent a certain point of view who
are going to run certain depart
ments or head up certain agencies.
I don't get to do that, and that's
not a negative, it's not a positive,
it is an "is." We've got a lot of
great people on government staff
who have a lot of skills, a lot of
expertise, and we inherit them.
Based on that, I started calling
people who I knew who represent a wide range of
people—they're black, they're white, they're
men, they’re women, they're older, they're
younger—who were not necessarily identified
with a particular issue, because I didn't want the
people to become the issue. People I knew who
would go out and do the work, go collect the
data. And then they can get a team of people to
help them. So-I may have a small group of 15,
but that group could very easily grow into a
group of 60.
What we talked about doing was, "Let's just
look at what currently is, and where we are right
now." So all we're doing is collecting data, and
that's it. Who's working on it, who are the
players, what are they doing, what plans to they
have for the future, what would they like to do,
what are some of the barriers that are keeping
them from moving forward on that issue—we
don't even have that list of questions fully
fleshed out. And then maybe [we will] do some
research on what's going on in other places, and
who some of the people are that we might want
to contact outside of our own circle here as a
resource for us. We're not judging, we're not
DAVISON: 'Let's just look at what currently is. and where we are right now'
assessing, we're not evaluating, we're not criti
cizing, or anything like that. All we're doing is
getting a picture of where we are right now.
FP: Will the team continue to work with you?
HD: That's up to them. We don't know what's
going to happen once we finish collecting this
data. We don't want to put any boundaries or
restrictions or expectations on what we're going
to do next, because that doesn't leave open any
possibilities for what we might do. We might
decide as a group what is a good next step, we
might pull other people into it, pull some
[county] staff into it. Maybe ask Commissioners
to help define what that next step is in terms of
what we want to accomplish.
FP: What are your initial priorities at the state
level?
HD: [There is a] growth management policy
group in Atlanta, and they have a model that can
help communities figure out how much they can
grow in relation to their water resources. If you
grow beyond your capacity to deliver water, you
know, then what are you doing to your commu
nity? [So] growth management is one. Indigent
defense keeps coming up, to take some of the
burden off of the local communities, because that
is a larger issue. You don't want to lose local con
trol over a lot of things, but there are some
things where the state can play a role. The state
can obviously play a role in transit. Maybe some
economic development, job training, things like
that. Also affordable housing, and how we can
create some ways to balance the needs of folks
who are not working high wage jobs who need a
good place to live that's clean and safe. There
may be some things the state government can do
to help us with those.
FP: Just before the holiday break, [ACC
Manager] Alan Reddish named a new assistant
county manager. Were you consulted about that?
HD: No, but everybody has to remember that
the way that our government is structured is that
Alan is hired to run the day to day operations of
the government, and his job is to hire and fire
department heads, which includes his managers.
It's one thing to go and tell Alan that you have
some concerns or whatever, but it's up to Alan to
take care of those things. So for me to play a role
in that would be inappropriate. It's
his job to hire the people that he
thinks are the best for that posi
tion, and then if we have a problem
with it afterward we go directly to
Alan, because that's where the buck
stops. I knew he had a search out,
and he'd narrowed the field down,
but I never asked him where he was
[after that].
FP: What do you think about the
outgoing Mayor and Commission
holding a separate meeting to con
clude business and forgoing the
changing of the guard?
HD: It doesn't bother me one
way or the other, to be honest with
you. Doc said he was thinking
about having a separate meeting so
that the Tuesday night meeting
[would be] our meeting. I haven't
given it much thought. I inter
preted it to be "This is your night."
I think that's kind of a gift, really,
when you think about it. So I
appreciate that.
FP: It's Wednesday; January 8.
How will you spend your day?
HD: Well, that's a good ques
tion. I'm supposed to have a ten
o'clock ACORTS [Athens-Clarke Oconee Regional
Transportation Study] meeting, but I heard that
that might get canceled. I don't know yet. I have
another photo shoot that afternoon at three—I've
had more pictures of me taken in the last two
months than I've ever probably had taken in my
whole life. Other than that I don't have anything
on my calendar. So what I'm thinking I'm going to
do is probably try to get moved in and get my
space organized. I don't know what'll happen that
day. I'm leaving it sort of open, and I'll just be
surprised, and take each moment as it comes.
Brad Aaron
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6 FLAGPOLE.COM • JANUARY 8. 2003