About Flagpole. (Athens, Ga.) 1987-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 31, 2011)
ATHENS NEWS AND VIEWS Update on Guess Who?: Doug McKillip tells the Dope he's forwarded a proposed map of Athens-Clarke County's commission districts drawn up by local attorney Ken Dious to the state reapportionment office to be used "as a starting point" for McKillip's own redistricting proposal for ACC. The composition of Dious' map—10 geographical districts; no superdis tricts—is an awful lot like what McKillip him self proposed at an Aug. 14 town hall meeting on redistricting, at which Dious spoke in favor of eliminating superdistricts, which he said decrease the chances of African Americans being elected to the commission. Where that leaves whatever map McKillip had purportedly been working on with his consigliere... er, "consultant," Bo Mabry, which had the primary goal of increasing Republicans' chances of being elected, is anyone's guess—unless they're so similar no one could tell them apart. Speaking of Mabry, the Facebook post by McKillip's right-hand man referring to "drastic actions" that might be avoided by the resigna tion of Commissioner Mike Hamby were appar ently quoted out of context in this space last week. At least, that's what Mabry seemed to be saying in three almost identically worded online comments at the Flagpole website, Blake Aued's Athens Banner- Herald blog and Johnathan McGinty's post on the Peach Pundit blog (the latter two of which linked to the story here). Cunningly point ing out that he "never said anything about redistricting in the post," Mabry posited that the Dope was engaged in "wishful think ing" to imagine Hamby's resignation could do anything to prevent McKillip and Mabry from imposing their "fair" districts on Athens—or something like that. Reached by phone and asked if he cared to clarify what he had actually meant by "dras tic actions," Mabry elegantly demurred. "Not really," he said, and hung up. Nor did McKillip care to spec ulate on what Mabry could have meant by the impenetrably cryp tic reference, which was posted on the day the two were sched uled to meet for an ACC map drawing session in Atlanta, and which concerned a particular commissioner with whom both have had very public disagree ments. "You can interpret and conjecture it any way you wish," the legislator told the Dope last week. "It's politics." Indeed it is, and few are better versed in it than McKillip and Mabry. As for those of us who continue to misun derstand the innocent words of the political consultant placed in charge of redesigning our local government by a politician with a well-earned adversarial relationship with the elected officials of that government and the power to maneuver a few of them out of office, there's no need to sit around scratching our heads. In the absence of a clarification from Mabry himself, or a rebuke from McKillip, why not ask his colleagues on the local Republican delegation—Sens. Bill Cowsert and Frank Ginn and Rep. Chuck Williams—if they'd care to hazard a guess? After all, McKillip—at least technically, and despite all appearances—doesn't belong to a party of one. Dave Marr news@flagpole.com IlfenjQIIi33[E53b32>’S Kr&zy Korner Congress is on a well-deserved holiday right now, so Congressman Broun’s kraziness is largely confined to the home stead. So, I thought it would be a good opportunity to take stock of some of Broun's predictions and see how they’ve turned out: Prediction: The "Marxist" Obama's “steamroller of socialism” was coming. Result: The workers' paradise has yet to materialize. In fact, middle- and working-class conditions are arguably worse than they were in 2008, while Wall Street bonuses and corporate profits soar. Members and supporters of the Georgia Undocumented Youth Alliance, protesting the Board of Regents' ban on undocumented students at tending state universities, assembled for a “graduation" at the UGA Arch last week. For more information, find the group on Facebook. Prediction: Obama’s “Gestapo-like security force" would enforce the president's will. Result: Obama's secret police, were he to have them, would be more likely to show up at your house, help with your crime and then call it “compromise.” Prediction: The brutal nutritional arm of Obama’s regime, Atlanta's Centers for Disease Control, would “force you to eat more fruits and vegetables” and conduct surveillance to that end. Result; Again, there’s no visible sign of the monitoring. But isn’t that how Obama’s Nazi-like government would operate—in secret? So, just in case, every time I pick up a produce item in the supermarket. I hold it up toward the ceiling's cameras, so I’m on record. “Are you happy now?!" I yell. I Matthew Pulver] Redistricting Panel’s Rees Up in the Air At the Athens-Clarke County reapportion ment committee's last meeting before a series of public input sessions (the second and third of which take place at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 30 at Clarke Central High School and 5 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 31 at Burney-Harris-Lyons Middle School), county commissioners, school board members and activists selected two potential ACC Commission district maps to be presented to citizens at the forums. The committee, appointed by Mayor Nancy Denson to oversee the process of redrawing the local electoral map to reflect population changes according to the 2010 Census, will meet in early September to review public comments and make any final revisions it deems neces sary before submitting its recommended plans to the mayor and commission Sept. 9. The committee will then present its recommenda tions at the mayor and commission's public work session Sept. 13. The commission will approve a final map at its regular meeting Oct. 4; that map will be given to the local legisla tive delegation with the request that it be ratified by the General Assembly in early 2012. But the local redistricting process has been steeped in uncertainty from the very beginning. Three school board members were appointed to the committee—one-third of its nine members, as many as are ACC commis sioners—despite the fact that the ACC Unified Government has no jurisdiction over the Clarke County School District, nor vice versa. Denson has said that she appointed the school board members in hopes that the committee would consider reconciling the school board's dis tricts with those of the ACC Commission, but that would have required a major electoral reorganization of one body or the other, if not both—CCSD has nine geographical districts while ACC has eight—and has not been dis cussed by the committee. And though ACC Commissioner Harry Sims, the chairman of the committee, has said the group will vote to approve a single map to recommend to the commis sion, other committee members—as well as commissioners—have been surprised to learn that. Since Republican Party representative Regina Quick (who, along with Democratic Party representative Shaye Gambrell and "citizen-at-large" Pilar Pages, rounds out the committee) brought forth a map that would significantly alter the existing districts as a counterproposal to a map drawn by profes sional consultant Linda Meggers containing far more modest changes, two widely disparate approaches to redistricting have been consid ered, which it is doubtful citizen input will resolve. While the committee's recommenda tion would not be binding, the prospect for commissioners of being asked to approve or reject the choice of a citizen panel many of them were not aware was being assembled until it had already been selected may not be an appealing one. Denson says she gave the committee no instructions with regard to how many maps to produce. State Rep. Doug McKillip's involvement has also clouded the picture. The Republican has said he will submit a map that would contain 10 geographical districts, eliminating ACC's two "superdistricts," each of which covers half the county, giving each citizen two represen tatives on the commission. The local committee has so far decided not to discuss eliminating superdistricts, and neither option on view at the public forums contains that provision. Dave Marr news@flagpole.com ( I COULD ToTAllV 0 \CLlWB QyJ THIS ^ \ ( wail Boy / rs wnv I Gcrr so ExC»"h&D LdUtH I SaujTVie 1/0>A PARKouR CLUB wueueuee its REAll^ uice out i get the urge to cliv^b oh th/mgs MB tried yny maud at PaRkouR im THE PAST AUD (T vJAS AWESOME Kv, DAUfO AnAcU AUGUST31.2011-FLAGPOLE.COM 5
