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Municipal election qualifying continues

Wednesday, August 23. 2017

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Qualifying for the Nov. 7 municipal elections in Barrow County began Monday and continues through Friday. City and town council seats are up for grabs in Auburn, Bethlehem, Carl, Statham and Winder.
•In Auburn, incumbent City Council members Robert L. Vogel III and Bill Ackworth had filed to run for re-election. No challengers had filed as of the close of business Tuesday. Qualifying runs through Thursday, Aug. 24 from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and Friday, Aug. 25, from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at Auburn City Hall, 1369 Fourth Ave. The qualifying fee for each seat is $144.
•In Bethlehem, incumbent Councilman Tommy Buchanan (Post 5) was the only person to file as of the close of business Tuesday. Councilmen Tommy Parten (Post 1) and Joe Price (Post 3) are also up for re-election. Qualifying runs through Friday, Aug. 25, at 4:30 p.m. at City Hall, 750 Manger Ave. The qualifying fee for each post is $22.50.
•Qualifying for the mayoral and council elections in Carl began Tuesday and runs through Thursday, from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. each day at City Hall, 1690 Carl Bethlehem Road.
•In Statham, incumbent Councilwoman Betty Lyle was the only person to file as of the close of business Tuesday. In addition to Lyle, council members Gayle Steed and David Huth are up for re-election in the citywide seats. Qualifying runs through Friday, Aug. 25, from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at City Hall, 327 Jefferson St.
•In Winder, council members Sonny Morris (Ward 1), Ridley “J.R.” Parrish (Ward 3) and Bob Dixon (at-large) all filed for re-election. Jimmy Terrell filed to challenge Parrish while Chris Akins and Todd Saxton filed to challenge Dixon. Qualifying runs through noon Friday, Aug. 25, at the Barrow County Elections Office, 233 East Broad St., Winder.
The qualifying fee for each seat is $180.
See full coverage of the qualifying period in the Aug. 30 issue of the Barrow News-Journal.

Statham transfer station in judge’s hands

Wednesday, August 16. 2017

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The future of a transfer station in Statham rests in the hands of Judge David Motes.
Attorneys for Statham Industrial and the City of Statham argued for nearly two and a half hours Monday about the city’s denial of a permit to the company for grading purposes.
Statham Industrial, a company formed by Roll-Off Systems and owned by the Simon Garret family, sued the city in superior court over its denial of an administrative appeal.
City council held a hearing of more than four hours in March about the denial of a grading permit to the company. Randy Gordon, the city’s zoning administrator and building inspector, denied the permit after a three-month, back-and-forth argument with the company.
Thomas Mitchell represented the city, and Douglas Dillard, attorney with Pursley Friese Torgrimson, an Atlanta firm, represented the company. Both attorneys argued their side for nearly an hour. Before Motes heard those arguments, John Stell, representing property owners in the Statham Industrial Park, location of the proposed transfer station, contended his clients should be allowed to intervene in the case. Motes denied his motion for “permissive intervention.”
At the end of the hearing, the judge asked each attorney to provide an order as though his side won the case. He said they could get those orders to him within 15 days.
“It’ll take a while to go through this,” Motes said.
He referred several times to the size of the filings in the case. It was more than 1,600 pages, he said. The transcript of the hearing is 194 pages. Motes said his law clerk went “through the first 900 pages” and then learned a video of the administrative hearing existed.
See the full story in the Aug. 16 issue of the Barrow News-Journal.

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