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Georgia Asking Feds To End Oversight Of Mental Health Services

The oversight role stems from a 2010 settlement agreement between the state and the Justice Department. In that landmark pact, Georgia agreed to improve conditions in its psychiatric hospitals and provide robust community services for people with mental illness and those with developmental or intellectual disabilities. The most recent reports by an independent reviewer of the settlement agreement, however, point to continued deficiencies in Georgia’s current delivery system. Credit Pixabay Images

Early this year, in the waning days of his tenure as Georgia governor, Nathan Deal wrote the U.S. Department of Justice a four-page letter, asking for an end to federal oversight of the state’s mental health and developmental disabilities system.

“Georgia has made tremendous improvements in the quantity, quality and availability of community-based services,’’ Deal wrote in his Jan. 8 letter, obtained by GHN through an Open Records Act request.

“Given this remarkable progress, and given the substantial compliance that Georgia has achieved, it is time to end the federal oversight’’ of how the state delivers services to people with mental health issues and developmental disabilities, Deal said.

The most recent reports by the independent reviewer of the settlement agreement, however, point to continued deficiencies in Georgia’s current delivery system.

The reviewer, Elizabeth Jones, said Georgia has made significant progress in expanding community services. But in a September report, she also noted gaps in the state’s program to provide supported housing to those people who need those services. She cited, in particular, such housing and services for people who are repeatedly in and out of jails or hospital emergency rooms, and for the homeless.

And Jones said the state isn’t meeting its obligations to provide needed services and support to people with developmental disabilities, especially those with “challenging behaviors.’’

Georgia officials followed up the Deal letter with a meeting in Washington earlier this month with DOJ officials. The administration of Deal’s successor, Gov. Brian Kemp, would not comment on the meeting, and neither would Justice officials.

Josh Belinfante, an attorney representing the state of Georgia, said in a March 11 letter to DOJ that “Governor Kemp agrees fully with Governor Deal’s letter and his [Kemp’s] executive counsel, David Dove, will be joining us for the meeting.”

Advocacy organizations agree that while Georgia has made major progress, significant gaps remain.

“While it’s clear the state has made remarkable progress, I’m not sure how the state can say they’re in full compliance” with the settlement agreement, said Susan Goico of Atlanta Legal Aid. Her organization is part of the “amici,” or friends of the court, involved in the Georgia settlement agreement. ‘‘The job’s not done yet,’’ she said.

Many people with complex mental health needs “are cycling in and out of jails,’’ Goico said. She also cited a shortage of specialized providers.

“The independent reviewer and her experts have done exhaustive work examining the strengths and weaknesses of Georgia’s system and whether the state is complying with all of the provisions of the settlement agreement,’’ Goico said.

“She [Jones] has found, and I agree,” Goico said, ”that there is still more work to be done to make sure people with mental illness are connected to the housing and community supports they need, as required by the settlement agreement. The settlement agreement is not at a place where we can walk away and hope for the best. … I have a real concern that leaving the job undone will only set us back.‘’

The Department of Justice, contacted by GHN last week, declined to comment on the Georgia situation.

The DOJ involvement in Georgia several years ago followed a series of 2007 articles in the AJC that reported on dozens of suspicious deaths in state mental hospitals and a lack of funding for community services.

The 2010 settlement agreement was extended in 2016.

Deal, in his letter, said Georgia has spent $263.5 million in its efforts to comply with the terms of the agreement.

He said that as a sign of the improvement in community services, the state has reduced the number of its psychiatric hospitals from seven to five and cut the number of beds to serve people with mental illness or developmental disabilities.

Of those remaining in the hospitals, Deal said, more than half are forensic patients, i.e., those involved in the criminal justice system. People with developmental disabilities, Deal pointed out, are no longer being admitted to the state-run hospitals.

Georgia, he said, “remains committed to sustaining the gains achieved and the continuous improvement of the system.’’

In the 2010 pact, Georgia agreed to establish community services and housing for about 9,000 people with mental illness, and to create community support and crisis intervention teams to help people with developmental disabilities and mental illness avoid hospitalization.

The attorney for Georgia, Belinfante, said in his letter to DOJ that from October 2010 to June 2018, the state provided supported housing to 8,532 individuals.

Goico questioned many of the numbers in the Belinfante letter.

Devon Orland of the Georgia Advocacy Office, part of the amici group, said, “There’s no question the state has put forth a significant effort. I’m thrilled they have made progress” toward reaching their goals, but “they’re not there” as of now.

She said it would be up to the federal judge involved in the settlement case to approve any final agreement to end the Justice Department oversight.

“Deal wanted [the settlement agreement] to end during his administration,’’ Orland said. Deal was elected governor in 2010 just a few weeks after Georgia and the feds reached the agreement.

In a supplemental December report, the independent reviewer said the state has failed to conduct sufficient outreach to people who are frequently seen in hospital ERs and those in jails and prisons.

“This results in under-counting the numbers of individuals who may need such support,’’ the report said. “The state, at best, only has the current capacity to provide supported housing to slightly over 3,100 individuals and the potential capacity to provide supported housing to approximately 4,700 individuals.’’

Such housing is a highly effective strategy to help individuals with serious mental illness achieve recovery, greater independence and meaningful participation in integrated community activities, the report said. It can also reduce the frequency and length of psychiatric hospitalizations, the report added.

Belinfante concluded his letter to Justice by saying that ‘’in the past eight years, the census of the state hospitals has drastically [been] reduced, with no new admissions of persons with a primary diagnosis [of intellectual or developmental disabilities] to any state hospitals, and the state has developed a robust network of community providers’’ to serve people with mental illness and developmental disabilities.

A spokeswoman for Kemp, Candice Broce, responding to a query from GHN, said that “although we respect the independent reviewer’s work, we do not agree with recent claims regarding the state’s compliance. However, at this time, we decline the opportunity to get into further details regarding the settlement.’’

Andy Miller is editor and CEO of Georgia Health News

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ukvec · 6 years ago

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Beltline, Invest Atlanta approve grants for 252 new affordable housing units along trail

Beltline officials want to secure affordable housing on the Southside Trail before it gets built out.

While designers and construction crews work toward making the Atlanta Beltline a contiguous 22-mile loop, project officials are paving the way for more—and much needed—affordable housing along the path.

Invest Atlanta and Beltline officials green-lighted millions of dollars in grants in recent days to help support the development of two new housing complexes, which will together comprise 252 affordable-living units, leaders say.

On the Southside Trail, the four-mile leg that will link the Eastside and Westside trails, Peoplestown’s 55 Milton would feature 136 affordable units for households taking home between 40 and 80 percent of the area median income.

Just southwest of D.H. Stanton Park, the project will use $2 million from the Beltline Affordable Housing Trust Fund, according to a Beltline blog post.

“Atlanta Beltline Inc.’s investment at 55 Milton represents an effort to proactively secure affordability before trail construction,” the post reads.

Other affordable units on the southside swoop being secured or built with help from the trust fund include apartments at Adair Court, Stanton Oaks, and Trestletree Village.

On the newest extension of the Eastside Trail, stretching from Kirkwood Avenue to Memorial Drive, another $2 million grant from the Affordable Housing Trust Fund will help finance Madison Reynoldstown, officials said.

The $26 million project is planned for Memorial Drive and Chester Avenue, with a section facing the trail.

Madison Reynoldstown. project overviewPraxis 3

The 116-apartment development will have 78 units earmarked for families earning 60 percent of the area median income or less.

Project timelines are yet unclear, and this story will be updated if new information comes to light.

Once the Southside Trail is fully built out—the project secured the land needed to make that possible a year ago, and work to clear the path and engineer the new trail has been ongoing—the Eastside, Westside, and Southside trails will form 10 miles of contiguous paved path.

1940s Midtown auto shop razed for modern, high-end apartments

Newport to revive Atlanta’s historic Hotel Row with pop-ups through (at least) July

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ukvec · 6 years ago

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A Year In, Atlanta’s Inclusionary Zoning Does Little For Affordable Housing

A year ago, Atlanta adopted a new rule requiring developers building along the BeltLine include low-cost units. But so far, it hasn’t done much for affordable housing in the city.

Andre Dickens stands along the BeltLine trail in Atlanta’s West End neighborhood and admires the incoming development.

Construction workers are converting a row of old warehouses into breweries and shops serving things like pickles and gelato.

“You see new stuff is coming in,” said Dickens, an at-large Atlanta City Council member. “This area is transforming. And it’s some needed change and revitalization.”

Neighborhoods, like this, around the BeltLine, are becoming some of the most desirable in the city.

Dickens said that’s why he pushed for a new rule, known as inclusionary zoning, for any development that happens around the trail.

It requires that even luxury apartment buildings keep a portion of their units affordable: either 10 percent at about $850 in rent for a one-bedroom or 15 percent at $1,100.

“So that the BeltLine won’t be 100 percent for the wealthy,” Dickens said. “You at least have, you know, 15 or so percent or more set aside for low-income individuals.”

That’s the idea.

But the city adopted the policy more than a year ago and, so far, it hasn’t done much for affordable housing in the city.

Atlanta City Council member Andre Dickens, who pushed for inclusionary zoning in Atlanta, isn’t worried about the first year’s results. (Stephannie Stokes/WABE)

Inclusionary zoning is based on the assumption that developers will keep building, and since the rule went into effect, they haven’t. Just two projects have been approved around the entire trail.

Dickens wrote off the downturn as normal. Think of it as an adjustment period, he said.

“I don’t have any panic about year one. Year one is doing what it should do, which is give everybody an opportunity to get to steady state,” he said.

Some developers, though, see year one differently. They worry the construction slowdown may be more permanent.

To get at why, Tim Schrager of the high-end apartment developer Perennial Properties said you have to understand what it takes to finance any project.

“Development deals are very challenging. They’re complex. The cost of construction. The cost of land. The cost of materials,” Schrager said. “Everything is very expensive today.”

So, when developers have to tell investors that the project is going to bring in less revenue on 15 percent of the units for inclusionary zoning, they may face a dilemma.

“I don’t think that the electricians and the framers are going to start reducing the cost of their labor because of inclusionary zoning,” Schrager said. “The deal’s not going to pencil out.”

Meaning investors won’t fund the project.

Inclusionary zoning sets prices based the region’s median income — aiming at those who make 60 to 80 percent — which has increased only sluggishly as rental rates have soared.

The two developments that have moved forward rely either on government subsidies or philanthropic donations to provide affordable units.

If other builders without that extra support can’t pull off their development deals, then the city could end up with fewer units overall, Schrager said.

In a city growing by 10,000 people each year, he said that could exacerbate housing issues.

“It’s a risky bet that the city is making,” Schrager said, “because nobody disagrees that we need more supply.”

But Georgia State professor Dan Immergluck said if there is a supply issue, the policy is not to blame.

“The numbers do not support any notion that the inclusionary zoning has deterred development,” he said.

Immergluck, who backs the policy, compared apartment construction around the BeltLine to the rest of the city. He found it is declining — everywhere.

“Real estate markets go through cycles, and the city has seen over 30,000 apartments built in really about a five-year period,” he said. “So the cycle is just slowing.”

Even in prior years, Immergluck’s study showed there were only a handful of projects inside the inclusionary zone.

The exception is the year before the policy went into place when permits spiked to nine. Immergluck said that likely represents developers rushing to avoid the regulation.

In general, he said, most development has been concentrated in areas like Midtown that the rule doesn’t touch.

“If anything, the ordinance was weakened severely,” Immergluck said, by constraining it to the half-mile around the BeltLine.

He said if Atlanta wants to create more affordable housing, it should expand inclusionary zoning citywide.

And Immergluck said it should include for-sale units, too. As apartment construction has slowed, townhome building has picked up — with some houses around the BeltLine asking $1 million.

Developers worry the affordable housing rule is deterring building around the BeltLine. Georgia State professor Dan Immergluck said construction has declined throughout the city. (Stephannie Stokes/WABE)

This disagreement over the impact of inclusionary zoning has played out around the country, as cities have turned to the policy to make up for rising rents.

Portland, Oregon, is also questioning whether it’s stifling construction, while New York has boasted thousands of low-cost units as a result of it. Meanwhile, Denver ditched its inclusionary zoning law in favor of forcing developers to pay into an affordable housing fund.

But in one way, the debate over the policy in Atlanta is especially precarious. The city is in Georgia, which has laws protecting landlords from city regulations.

To Steve Rothman, a land use attorney in Atlanta, the language in Georgia code is unambiguous. It states that cities can’t tell residential property owners what to charge for rent.

But Rothman said that’s exactly what inclusionary zoning does.

“I advise people that it’s clearly in violation of the words in the statute and that the city would have a hard time defending it,” he said.

He said it would probably take several years to litigate the issue, and, for now, developers aren’t interested in entering the legal fight.

Council member Andre Dickens said he doesn’t expect one.

He argued the city satisfied state law by offering developers perks, like expedited permitting and the ability to pay an opt-out fee.

Also, he said you have to consider the value of the BeltLine.

“You and I right now are standing on a billion dollars of public development,” Dickens said. “A developer comes here and they’re benefiting from this billion dollars’ worth of public investment.”

He said now city residents deserve something in return.

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ukvec · 7 years ago

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GA: Hartsfield-Jackson Luggage Cart Contract Pressured by Industry Shifts

June 01–A struggling contract for luggage carts at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport is the latest example of a shrinking line of business due to technological advancements and shifting consumer patterns.

In this case, it’s wheels on luggage and airline baggage fees prompting travelers to pack lighter that are causing consternation for Smarte Carte, the airport’s current contractor.

"Those dynamics have caused the demand for luggage carts at airports to decline," said Michael Multer, senior director of business development for Smarte Carte. "It hasn’t necessarily been dramatic, but it has been inexorable. It has declined at airports over time."

The luggage carts cost $5 per cart at Hartsfield-Jackson. Workers for a Smarte Carte subcontractor collect the carts and return them to dispensing units. An exception is the international terminal, where carts are free, as is more common in international terminals, and provided through a different company.

The airport last year put the domestic terminal luggage cart contract out to bid, but Smarte Carte was the sole company that submitted a proposal.

That’s because "the financials of the luggage cart industry are shaky," Multer said. The Atlanta airport sought a company to provide 1,000 new luggage carts to be placed in the domestic terminal entrances, baggage claim areas, parking decks and rental car center.

"Best case scenario, a luggage cart costs $300. So if the airport wants 1,000 of them, that’s a big capital investment," Multer said. Smarte Carte is the market leader in luggage carts, and its competition includes smaller company Flight Services & Systems, but FSS did not compete for the Atlanta contract.

The annual rent Smarte Carte proposed to pay was less than the minimum $100,000 required, according to Hartsfield-Jackson general manager Roosevelt Council. As a result, Smarte Carte’s proposal was disqualified. Council said the airport will rebid the contract.

Meanwhile, the Smarte Carte contract, originally due to end last year, was extended with a new expiration date of June 3. But since the contracting was not successful, the Atlanta City Council finance committee voted Wednesday to extend Smarte Carte’s current contract month-to-month for up to six months while the new contract is rebid.

"We have to make a decision," Council said. "Chances are that we probably won’t change our MAG [minimum annual guarantee for rent]."

During the contracting process, Smarte Carte raised concerns about the rent and the requirement for 1,000 carts, which it said "vastly overstates the cart demand need as well as the capacity of the system."

It’s yet to be seen what will change when the deal is rebid, and whether any other company will compete for the contract.

"I can’t say why no one else submitted a proposal," Council said. "I’m always surprised that people don’t submit proposals on things."

Multer compared the decline of the luggage cart business to other services that have become obsolete.

"It’s like payphones at the airport. It used to be a million-dollar source of revenue at the airport, and now they’re gone," he said.

The airport has also recently struggled with contracting for an airport bank branch and ATMs as the growth of online banking and cashless payment services drives down the demand for ATMs and banks. Airports nationally face the prospect of a decline in the cash cow of parking revenue, amid the expansion of Uber and Lyft and potential for self-driving cars.

"Airports are constantly looking for increased revenue," Multer pointed out. When a contract ends up bringing in less revenue or incurring a cost, it’s a struggle to figure out how to provide the service while stemming the loss in revenue.

Smarte Carte has branched out further into other lines of business, including lockers, baggage storage, strollers and massage chairs, shrinking the share of luggage carts to about 50 to 60 percent of the company’s business, according to Multer.

"If we look and see that our revenue from luggage carts is declining and we don’t do anything about it, then shame on us," he said.

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ukvec · 7 years ago

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This Jackie Bradley Jr. Over-The-Shoulder Circus Catch Is Totally Unfair

In the top of the sixth inning of today’s Blue Jays-Red Sox game in Boston, Kendrys Morales crushed a long fly ball to the deepest part of Fenway, in straightaway center. This was a double, for sure, except that Red Sox center fielder Jackie Bradley Jr. is a comic book superhero:

Boston’s outfielders are ridiculous, and should be outlawed.

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ukvec · 7 years ago

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Former Atlanta Braves pitcher Tom Glavine lists 3-acre home for $6.75M (Photos) – Atlanta Business Chronicle

The home where famed former Atlanta Braves pitcher Tom Glavine and his wife Chris have raised their five children is for sale for $6.75 million.

The eight-bedroom, nine-bathroom home at 910 Hurleston Lane in Johns Creek encompasses 16,132 square feet and was built by the Glavines over a period of two years. It comes with a backyard baseball field and basement batting cage — both built by Braves groundskeeper Ed Mangan — and is located in the exclusive gated community Country Club of the South in Johns Creek, Ga. It includes a championship Jack Nicklaus Signature Golf Course; Glavine is an avid golfer.

Glavine starred for the Braves during their record-setting 1990s run. After the team finished last in 1990, his pitching helped take the Braves to the National League West title the very next year — the Braves’ famous worst-to-first 1991 season.

This season is shaping up like that, Glavine said.

“They are a little bit ahead of where everybody thought they were going to be – to be really, really competing for their division. Sometimes things happen sooner than you plan, like they did for us in 1991, so hopefully this is another one of those years,” he said.

With a 20-11 record, a league-best nine complete games and the National League Cy Young Award, Glavine helped the Braves advance to their first World Series — where they lost to the Minnesota Twins in extra innings in the dramatic seventh game.

The Braves went to the Series again in 1992, and then in 1995 against the Cleveland Indians. Glavine threw eight-shutout innings in Game 6, earning the world championship with a 1-0 victory. He was named the World Series Most Valuable Player.

Along with Greg Maddux and John Smoltz, Glavine was part of one of the best pitching rotations in baseball history. Together they won seven Cy Young Awards from 1991 to 1998, with Glavine’s honors in 1991 and 1998. He was a 10-time All-Star, led the National League in wins five times and even won four Silver Slugger Awards.

Glavine was inducted into the baseball Hall of Fame in 2014, along with Maddux. Smoltz joined them a year later. In 2011, Glavine became a color commentator for Braves baseball games.

Today, change is in the air for the Glavine family. Two of the couple’s children are out of college and on their own, a third is in college (Peyton Glavine is a left-handed pitcher, like his dad, for the Auburn University Tigers), a fourth is entering his high school senior year and the fifth is in third grade, Glavine said. It is time to find a smaller house, although they have enjoyed 910 Hurleston Lane, he said.

“It was the perfect house for what we wanted. We wanted a destination for our kids and their friends,” Glavine said. “We had kids here all the time hanging out. We could actually do that, and we were not all on top of each other. It worked perfectly in that regard. We had a lot of fun memories with those guys hanging out here.”

The family is looking for a smaller home in the Country Club of the South neighborhood and surrounding areas of North Fulton, such as Alpharetta or Milton, Glavine said. He plans to keep playing golf with the same group of guys. "It may just be a longer commute (to the course) now depending on what happens," he said.

“We plan on staying here; we haven’t decided what to do. We toyed with the idea of going into Buckhead but I am not sure how realistic that is,” he said. “We are comfortable here and we know the surroundings. I am hard-pressed to believe we wouldn’t end up somewhere in this area.”

It’s also been home to another famous former Brave and friendly Glavine rival, Smoltz. His house in Milton, 700 Foxhollow Run, is listed for $4.998 million.

Asked whether he hopes his house sells for more than Smoltz’s, Glavine laughed. “We are competitive, I hope so – yes. I don’t know what John’s listed for; he has a beautiful house.”

Smoltz’s 18,265-square-foot home has 10 bedrooms, 10 full bathrooms and four half bathrooms, and is on a 19.74-acre lot. It also has a baseball field.

Glavine’s Hurleston Lane home in Johns Creek was built on two lots that back up to the Chattahoochee River, listing agent Paul Wegener of Atlanta Fine Homes Sotheby’s International Realty said. It has a long private drive and professionally landscaped grounds including a pool and spa, a cabana, a fire pit, and a basketball court in addition to the baseball field.

The home was designed by Atlanta architect Norman Askins. It features gothic-style archways, French oak doors, hand-carved staircases, gothic reproduction mantels from Francois and Co., and limestone floors reclaimed from a church in France. The study features judge’s paneling with moldings replicated from St. Philips Cathedral in Atlanta and a ceiling decorated with restoration plaster lattice panels from Fischer and Jirouch Co..

The great room is defined by a two-story cathedral ceiling, iron chandelier and a hand-made leaded glass transom window. In the kitchen are commercial-grade appliances, stone accents and hand-hewn trusses. There are also a breakfast room and a fireside great room. Three sets of French doors lead out to the covered back porch with a masonry fireplace, gas lamps, iron railings and views of the backyard.

The master suite includes a fireside sitting area, a spa-like bathroom with a freestanding tub and steam shower, and a custom closet system built out into four separate rooms to include shoe closets, a dressing room, a library ladder, built-in dresser drawers and a hand bag vignette.

On the terrace level are a billiard room, arcade room, custom bar and wine cellar, an exercise and steam room, and the pitching and batting cage.

According to Fulton County property records, 910 Hurleston Lane most recently changed hands on July 24, 2001, when Clyde R. and Linda C. Williams as grantor sold the property for $620,000 to grantees Thomas M. and Christine S. Glavine. Prior to that transaction, Jack Nicklaus Development Corporation of Georgia was grantor of 910 Hurleston Lane for $179,500 to Robert R. and Glenda S. Bulger on May 3, 1989, records show.

The Glavine home is one of the larger, newer properties in the 950-acre, 733-home Country Club of the South, which was developed mainly in the 1990s, Wegener said. The neighborhood features a championship Jack Nicklaus Signature Golf Course, which has hosted a number of professional tournaments over the years and currently hosts an American Junior Golf Association event that draws the top junior players from all over the world.

Country Club of the South has 24-hour security patrols. It has been home to numerous successful entertainers, executives and entrepreneurs over the years. In addition to Glavine, they include retired Atlanta Braves stars Greg Maddux, Charlie Liebrandt, Jeff Blauser and Paul Assenmacher; football stars Chris Doleman, Garrison Hearst, Randy Cross, Andre Rison and Victor Greene; music celebrities Usher, Whitney Houston, Bobby Brown, L.A. Reid and Babyface; comedian Jeff Foxworthy; and NBA Hall of Famers Allen Iverson and Bernard King.

The home entertains well, Wegener said. The Glavines hosted fundraisers there for charities including Atlanta-based Cure Childhood Cancer, a nonprofit dedicated to raising money and awareness for childhood cancer research, he said. The couple serves on Cure Childhood Cancer’s advisory board.

There are currently 33 homes in the Atlanta area listed above $5 million, according to First Multiple Listing Service data cited by Wegener. The average days on market for those listings is 176 days, he said.

The Glavines are building a home in Alys Beach in the Florida Panhandle, but Glavine said that would be a vacation, weekend and off-season home for the time being. “When our little guy is in high school maybe we will spend more time down there,” he said.

Glavine said he is enjoying watching this year’s Braves turnaround into a real competitor for the National League East Divison title, although he was surprised it happened so quickly. “They are off to a great start. I hope they sustain it through the course of the year.”

Glavine said the team is fun to watch, both the young players and the veterans.

“Freddie Freeman is a staple. I have a lot of appreciation for him and what he’s accomplished. Ozzie Albies, the second baseman, is having a phenomenal year and then the young pitchers are starting to grow up a bit. It is fun to watch them develop,” he said.

He thinks the team is a playoff contender. “Obviously it is a little bit of a surprise. Certainly the way they are playing, the way their young pitching continues to develop from start to start, has been something to watch,” Glavine said. “Hopefully everyone continues to be healthy — that is one factor you can’t predict, the injury bug — and I think they are going to be in thick of it (division title race) all year.”

Atlanta’s Largest 25 Homebuilders

Ranked by Number of homes closed in 2016

Rank Company Number of homes closed in 2016 1 D.R. Horton Inc. 3,070 2 Century Communities of Georgia 1,265 3 PulteGroup Inc. 758 View This List

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ukvec · 7 years ago

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The Big Disconnect: Google Fiber’s Unfulfilled Promise In Atlanta

Credit Ankita Ackroyd-Isales / WABE

It’s been more than three years since the Google Fiber frenzy took hold of the Atlanta area.

From Alpharetta to Avondale Estates, Sandy Springs to Smyrna, folks fed up with chronically unreliable internet connections, abysmal customer service and expensive monthly bills lapped up Google Fiber’s promise.

And there was an altruistic component, too: Google Fiber would help close the digital divide in part by extending discounted or free high-speed internet to low-income residents.

Beyond the activity some residents saw at the street level, plenty of action was taking place behind the scenes. Engineers mapped out nearly every mile of fiber — enough to get to Iceland, according to Google.

The backbone of the system is a miles-long ring of fiber circling the city. From the ring, glass optical lines branch off and feed into “fiber huts,” structures about the size of a one-car garage. Within Atlanta’s city limits, Google installed a dozen of the prefab units between mid-2015 and early 2016 at a cost of about $150,000 to upwards of $250,000 each. When all was said and done, the company had dropped more than 20 of the huts around metro Atlanta.

Once inside the hut, Google’s fiber optic cables snake through rows of switches, amplifiers and other equipment before embarking on the last mile or so to customers’ homes. One hut can supply gigabit internet speeds to 20,000 or 30,000 homes.

It’s that last mile that has proven to be the trickiest and the most expensive mile of the overall build-out. (Google Fiber has not disclosed the total cost of the Atlanta project, but its first fiber foray, in the Kansas City region, is believed to have carried a billion-dollar price tag.)

This fiber box is a small part of Google Fiber’s ‘last mile’ components. According to the building’s developer, this box connects to existing fiber lines to relay Google Fiber’s super-fast high-speed internet signals. (Jim Burress/WABE)

Google has released little public information about the Atlanta rollout delays, and company officials declined WABE’s multiple requests for an interview on the status of the project and other specifics. But it’s possible that, in the time it has taken Google Fiber to figure out how to travel the last mile to people’s homes, fiber optic technology may no longer be the best way to get there.

Atlanta isn’t the only city to see Google Fiber falter. In Nashville, big telecom operators sued and all but blocked Google Fiber from tapping half of the city’s 88,000 utility poles — essential for completing the backbone of its last-mile delivery. Nearly four years after the company announced it was coming to Nashville, Google Fiber finally reached 10 Nashville neighborhoods late last year.

Google Fiber didn’t face as many obstacles here, although its Atlanta build-out has been anything but a textbook case. One thing is indisputable: most who were once gaga over Google are now fed up with its failed fiber promise.

The Early Days

If smiling politicians were a barometer, the January 2015 press conference to trumpet Google Fiber’s selection of Atlanta as its next fiber city could’ve been the region’s biggest announcement since the city landed the 1996 Olympics.

The mayors of Avondale Estates, Brookhaven, College Park, East Point, Hapeville and Smyrna— cities that, along with Decatur and Sandy Springs, also would be connected to Google Fiber — glowed as then-Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed spoke on their behalf.

“Abundant high-speed broadband access will make our economy stronger and make our community stronger,” Reed gushed.

As Google Fiber’s director of marketing, Scott Levitan, told the crowd: “Google Fiber will help put Atlanta on par with the fastest cities in the world like Seoul, Tokyo and Zurich.”

“Today is one of the most important moments in the life of the Atlanta metropolitan region.” Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed announcing Google Fiber was coming to the metro area in January 2015

He portended hundreds of trucks descending on Atlanta streets, advising it “will take a while before everyone’s neighborhood is served.” He added the process could last a “couple of years.” But no matter the timeline, Levitan assured, “We’ll do our best to keep you informed along the way.”

Initially, a two-year timeframe looked reasonable. By that summer, crews laying fiber-optic cable were busy demolishing sidewalks and closing streets to traffic — and, in the process, infuriating commuters and residents alike.

Google Fiber’s contractors also faced allegations of carelessness after repeatedly damaging underground infrastructure. Georgia’s Public Service Commission stepped in to investigate after a Google Fiber contractor, S&N Communications, ruptured utility lines three dozen times. A decision on whether to fine the company up to $10,000 per violation is expected in June.

Wired And Waiting

“Up here on the ceiling,” Midtown resident Jeffrey Welch says as he points at the crown molding of his second-floor condo near Piedmont Park, “there’s a [nearly] invisible cable.”

You’d need to squint to see it, but there it was: fiber-optic cable, made of one sliver of glass about the diameter of a human hair.

Unlike most Atlantans, Welch has Google Fiber.

Kind of.

The wiring is there, but more than a year after Google technicians installed it— at a cost of $13,000 to the condo association for paying someone to oversee the crews as they worked in each of the 69 units, according to Welch — Google Fiber had yet to throw the switch.

GOOGLE FIBER SERVICE AND HOUSEHOLD INCOME

Despite Google Fiber’s promise that it’s for all of Atlanta, FCC data show the company concentrates* its service in more affluent areas. In Fulton and DeKalb Counties, just six of the census blocks where Google Fiber reported customers were in census tracts with average incomes less than $35,649 per household.

*Note: data are self-reported by service providers and are from December 2016, the latest made available by the FCC.

Credit: Geoff Hing, APM Reports

It’s not because Atlanta has been unwelcoming. Municipalities across the metro area have made concessions to pave the way for Google Fiber, banking on the unquestioned benefits of being associated with the company’s good name.

“It does come with a certain cachet,” College Park City Manager Terrence Moore said of the gigabit-speed service. “Frankly, it’s a benefit to us because we have the opportunity to market ourselves as a Google Fiber community.”

Moore said College Park officials sliced through much of the typical bureaucratic red tape inherent with applying for a city permit. That allowed Google Fiber to ramp up its planning and design phase and quickly begin construction, according to city officials.

“We’ve done everything humanly and organizationally possible to support Google Fiber in an effort to bring their products to the community,” Moore said.

By the end of January 2018, Google Fiber had met the city’s requirements for expanding into the northern sections of College Park, according to William Moore, head of engineering for the city. He says just a few small steps remained before workers could begin deploying fiber and connecting customers. Google Fiber representatives needed only to sign an application and write a $250 check for each of the four required permits.

Easy enough.

But Google Fiber’s people never stopped by city hall to finish the process.

The continued, unexplained delays bother Michelle Suzette Jones, who never thought three years ago when she signed up for the service that she’d still be waiting for a Google Fiber truck to drop by.

Jones says she’s seen it all before.

“We get the short end of the stick here, so maybe it’s ingrained in me to be suspect,” Jones says of living in College Park. “When something says it’s coming down this way and then it suddenly doesn’t, [I have] to wonder, is it because [College Park is] browner? It’s poorer?”

Google Fiber hasn’t completely abandoned College Park. It does provide gigabit speeds to one address. The lone address also happens to be the most expensive rental option inside the city line. It’s called The Pad on Harvard, and the year-old, $41 million development is the first new residential building of its kind in College Park in more than 40 years.

Rod Mullice has nothing but good things to say about Google Fiber. He convinced Google to wire his development, The Pad on Harvard, above, for its lightning-fast internet. The Pad is the lone address where you can find Google Fiber service in College Park. (Jim Burress/WABE)

“I fixed the coffee machine for you!” Rod Mullice calls out in a raised voice as he shows me around the Pad’s clubhouse. A grateful resident acknowledges the gesture.

Mullice led the development of The Pad on Harvard, aided by his background in transit-oriented construction projects. It’s because of that background he knew of thousands of miles of surplus, unused fiber-optic lines — known as dark fiber — running parallel to MARTA’s railways. Given The Pad’s proximity to MARTA’s College Park transit station, he had a hunch he could convince Google Fiber to tap into MARTA’s dark fiber, light it up and, in the process, link The Pad’s 109 apartments with gigabit internet speeds.

“I pursued them aggressively,” Mullice says of lobbying Google Fiber. “Aggressively.”

It worked.

Mullice says The Pad’s residents have had nothing but positive experiences with Google Fiber, but he still questions how the company has handled its commitment to the area.

“It doesn’t give me great joy,” he says of the fact his project is the only building with Google Fiber in town. “I want everybody to have it.”

The Trouble With Digital Inclusion

In the Kansas City region; Austin, Texas; and Provo, Utah, Google Fiber did something almost too good to be true. It handed out free internet (for up to seven years) to anyone willing to pay a one-time installation fee of $300. Sure, the gratis package was one-200th the speed of Google Fiber’s drool-inducing gigabit plan. But free is free.

By the time Google Fiber put out its shingle in Atlanta, it had dropped the on-the-house option in favor of a $50 (and much faster) monthly plan. But the company still planned to offer limited low- or no-cost service to certain residents. At least that’s how Terrence Moore, College Park’s city manager, says he understands it — although he admits Google Fiber has offered few details

“I think when Google Fiber made those offers of having free monthly service, they probably were sincere,” says Georgia State University economist Bruce Seaman.

He says Google Fiber’s speedy service alone wouldn’t completely bridge Atlanta’s digital divide, no matter how many homes it wired. And despite missteps, Seaman says no one should be quick to single Google Fiber out.

“It’s hard to uniquely criticize Google Fiber when, of course, it is the broader issue for all providers.”

Although no longer universally available to any customer who wants it, there was still reason to believe early on that Google Fiber planned to bring free, high-speed internet access to at least some residents — like an Obama-era program known as ConnectHome, which used Atlanta as a pilot city.

Michelle Suzette Jones, a College Park resident, signed up for Google Fiber three years ago, but has yet to see a truck roll by. (Jim Burress/WABE)

Under the program, families living in subsidized housing in select cities got a free tablet computer and free high-speed internet. In Atlanta, Google Fiber was supposed to provide that service. When it couldn’t, cellular provider T-Mobile stepped in, but with speeds only a fraction of what Google Fiber had promised.

Also, in the summer of 2015, Google Fiber representatives approached the Atlanta Housing Authority with a nearly too-good-to-be-true proposition: allow Google Fiber to hook up the 282 apartments at AHA’s Cosby Spear Highrise in the Old Fourth Ward and, for the next decade, neither residents nor the AHA would pay a penny for access.

There were a few strings attached, however.

In exchange for wiring the towers, Google Fiber wanted what AHA read as an exclusive, 10-year license to install, operate and maintain fiber-optic equipment at Cosby Spear, according to documents obtained by WABE under the Georgia Open Records Act. (Later, Google Fiber broadened the request to include AHA’s Martin Street Plaza and Westminster Apartments properties, which would get free service for four years, not 10.) Google also wanted AHA’s permission to market its products — both free broadband internet and not-so-free television — to residents.

The idea of exclusivity raised some eyebrows at the housing authority.

AHA officials stood firm that Google Fiber “needs to have non exclusive rights to allow access to other carriers,” according to a March 2016 internal memo.

“Google’s response tells me that they are not really taking our concerns seriously.” AHA attorney Lou Cataland in an email to the Atlanta Housing Authority’s upper management

And then there was the timeline. Google Fiber wanted up to three years from the date of a signed contract to flip the fiber switch and begin providing residents with service. The housing authority wanted to limit the wait to one year. But perhaps the biggest stalemate came over what would happen if the Atlanta Housing Authority transferred ownership of the towers. Google Fiber wanted a clause in the contract that would require the new owners to abide by the existing terms of the agreement.

When the AHA pushed back, Google Fiber refused to budge.

“Google’s response tells me that they are not really taking our concerns seriously,” wrote AHA attorney Lou Cataland in an email to the housing authority’s upper management. “Given the vast differences between our positions, going back and forth with red lines will likely be a waste of time.”

After about a year of back-and-forth, the deal soured.

The housing authority declined WABE’s interview requests, but did allow access to Cosby Spear’s residents. That includes 65-year-old De’Loris Garrott, who frequents one of Cosby Spear’s two computer labs because she doesn’t have internet access in her apartment. Garrott knew of Google Fiber and says she even called to inquire about getting service. She was unaware, however, that her landlord and Google Fiber had been in talks to provide free internet to residents.

“Obviously you’ve heard something we haven’t heard.”

Linda King, 72, would’ve received free gigabit service had negotiations not collapsed between her landlord, the Atlanta Housing Authority, and Google Fiber. (Jim Burress/WABE)

Garrott’s friend and neighbor, 72-year-old Linda King, was also in the dark about the back-and-forth between the authority and Google Fiber. King says she used to have internet in her unit, but had to cancel it because she couldn’t afford Comcast’s $160 monthly bill. She wants the internet back, so King says she’ll be patient with Google Fiber. “I’ll be glad when they get here,” she laughs. “I’m ready.”

The negotiations were never made public. In fact, Google Fiber requires organizations sign a nondisclosure agreement before discussing partnerships.

Unchecked Power

Greg Fender had a hunch that was the case. Fender knows most Georgia mayors and city managers on a first-name basis and says he gets calls from them weekly, if not daily. As a Georgia Municipal Association contractor who helps cities with cable and telecommunications issues and agreements, Fender offers these local officials — free of charge — advice on how to negotiate often hefty fees from private companies seeking to use public rights of way.

When it became clear that Atlanta and a handful of surrounding cities were likely going to be the next Google Fiber recipients, Fender expected he’d soon be looking over contracts and advising local officials about what came next. That’s because all of Google Fiber’s distribution huts are in public parks or other public rights of way.

But no one sought him out.

Ryan Fender (left) and his father Greg Fender (right) work with cities big and small on public rights-of-way issues. When Google Fiber came to town, none of Georgia’s municipalities reached out for guidance. Greg Fender says that’s a first for him, and he’s been in this line of work for three decades. (Jim Burress/ WABE)

Fender wondered if city officials might be so excited about Google Fiber that they didn’t want to rock the boat. He also wondered if Google Fiber might have used its familiar name and brand power to convince officials to stay mum.

To move forward with discussions “concerning existing or future product development efforts,” Google Fiber required one local government agency to sign a confidentiality statement that silenced it for three years.

Asked about the nondisclosure agreements, Google Fiber spokesperson Sunny Gettinger responded via email, “When we first start working with cities and partners, we do often enter into NDAs with them simply because of the amount of confidential and competitively sensitive information we share, especially in the early days of the project.”

Fender points to another high-profile company that’s using what he’s coined “the Google model” of doing business: Amazon. The retail behemoth’s strategy for choosing a location for its coveted second headquarters relies on city leaders offering up the best incentives — including softening regulations and easing protocol.

“I caution cities against doing that,” says Fender, adding that playing by those rules puts almost unchecked power in the hands of the private company, often at the expense of the city.

Google Fiber’s Loss = Google’s Gain

Google Fiber has never given a definitive answer as to when it will complete its Atlanta rollout. A review of hundreds of emails, internal memos and other correspondence shows Google Fiber was careful not to make such promises —even to top officials, and even as it expanded to new cities across the nation.

“We continue to see Fiber as a huge market opportunity,” says Ruth Porat, the CFO of Google Fiber’s parent company, Alphabet Inc., on a call with investors in July 2016. When asked earlier this year about Fiber’s progress, Porat was more circumspect.

“We concluded that we would pause the pace of rollout … so that we could spend time on, ‘How do we really bring technology to bear in a more meaningful way?’” Porat says during a Q&A at the Morgan Stanley Technology Conference in San Francisco in February.

That pace is likely to pick up only when Google Fiber has “something that is substantive enough [in] value to justify accelerating the rollout again,” added Porat.

Analysts believe that “something” likely involves wireless data transmission.

Google Fiber locates all of its transmission relay points — known as ‘fiber huts’ — on public rights of way. This one in East Point’s Sykes Park is one of two located in the city. (Jim Burress/WABE)

In the past few years, the company has started to look at how it might shed its dependency on fiber-optic cables along the costly and cumbersome “last mile,” potentially bypassing the cables with wireless connections.

In 2016, Google Fiber acquired WebPass, which found success in delivering wireless, high-speed connections to large apartment buildings in major urban areas. In the time that Google Fiber has left Atlanta consumers waiting, Comcast and AT&T — the two dominant broadband providers serving the area— have improved and expanded their networks. That’s one reason why almost nine out of 10 Fulton County households currently are able to access internet speeds of 250 mbps or greater. In fact, Comcast and AT&T now advertise speeds equal to or greater than Google Fiber’s gigabit package.

AT&T’s monthly sticker price is $80, while Comcast charges between $115 and $140 (the latter does offer highly discounted promotional deals, especially if you’re willing to have your data tracked). Google Fiber’s service — where it exists — is cheaper at $70 a month.

And even though its availability lags behind that of its competitors, Google Fiber is, in a way, still benefiting.

Google itself makes most of its money putting ads in front of consumers’ eyes. More bandwidth and faster connections — even when offered by competitors — mean Google can place ads faster and more efficiently.

While Google Fiber hasn’t disrupted the broadband market in any material way, “they have spurred competition and created fiber where there wasn’t going to be any fiber,” says Seth Wallis-Jones, consumer analyst at IHS MarkIt. “So in that respect, they’ve succeeded.”

Still In The Dark

Local governments barely hear a whisper out of Google Fiber these days, according to Ryan Fender.

After being in the dark for months, Smyrna’s leaders got an update last August from Google Fiber, which led former Smyrna Mayor Pro Tem Teri Anulewicz to express disappointment that the process wasn’t moving as quickly as first hoped.

“Google Fiber has assured us they’ll continue to work with us toward the goal of expanding broadband connectivity for more people in Smyrna,” Jennifer Bennett, the city’s community relations director, wrote in an email.

While some Smyrna apartment complexes were in the process of being connected, Bennett says Google Fiber wasn’t planning to build out the network or provide general service to all of Smyrna immediately.

That was 10 months ago. Google Fiber hasn’t provided the city any additional update since then, according to Bennett.

In fact, Google Fiber hasn’t applied for a permit since Thanksgiving, according to a BuildZoom analysis for WABE. The “upcoming events” section of Google Fiber’s Atlanta webpage has gone silent, too. It hasn’t had an entry in months.

Yet, Google Fiber continues to encourage consumers to sign up.

As for its promise to keep Atlanta informed along the way, Google Fiber has this message for folks who are still waiting:

“We appreciate their patience,” the company writes in an emailed statement. “When we have new information, we will provide it so they can take action.”

***

This story is part of an investigative journalism collaboration supported by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. WABE is working with APM Reports, WNYC in New York, KPCC in Los Angeles and KCUR in Kansas City.

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Mail Sent To UPS Headquarters Rerouted To Chicago Apartment

CHICAGO (AP) — A former UPS worker has been charged in a scam that rerouted mail meant for the company’s headquarters to his Chicago apartment.

The Chicago Tribune reports that 24-year-old Dushaun Henderson-Spruce was charged in a criminal complaint with mail theft and fraud.

The charges say Henderson-Spruce submitted a form on Oct. 26 to change the address of the company’s headquarters from Atlanta, Georgia, to his one-bedroom garden apartment.

Court records say a UPS security coordinator discovered the change Jan. 16 and postal inspectors retrieved about 3,000 pieces of mail from the apartment.

The charges say more than 10 checks addressed to UPS totaling more than $58,000 were deposited into Henderson-Spruce’s account.

Henderson-Spruce has previously said it was a mix-up and his identity may have been stolen.

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Property Details for 3166 SW Belfour Ln

3166 Sw Belfour Ln, Atlanta, GA 30331 3166 Sw Belfour Ln, Atlanta, GA 30331 Property Features Bedrooms Upper: 5 Baths Full: 3

*School data provided by National Center for Education Statistics, Pitney Bowes, and GreatSchools. Intended for reference only. GreatSchools Ratings compare a school’s test performance to statewide results. To verify enrollment eligibility, contact the school or district directly.

Property History for 3166 SW Belfour Ln Year Taxes Land Additions Total Assessment 2017 Price Not Available $14,680 + $80,080 = $94,760 2016 $2,857 $14,680 + $80,080 = $94,760 2015 $2,868 $14,680 + $80,080 = $94,760

The price and tax history data displayed is obtained from public records and/or MLS feeds from the local jurisdiction. Contact your REALTOR® directly in order to obtain the most up-to-date information available.

3166 Belfour Ln Sw, Atlanta, GA 30331 3166 Belfour Ln Sw, Atlanta, GA 30331 Property Features Upper Bedrooms: 5 Baths Full: 3

Property History for 3166 Belfour Ln SW Year Taxes Land Additions Total Assessment 2017 Price Not Available $14,680 + $80,080 = $94,760 2016 $2,857 $14,680 + $80,080 = $94,760 2015 $2,868 $14,680 + $80,080 = $94,760

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6 Cranford High School Students Attend Conference in Atlanta, GA

Congratulations to Emma Lore, a Cranford High School junior, who won an Instructional Award for competing in the Apparel and Accessories Marketing Role Play event at the annual DECA International Career Development Conference in Atlanta, Georgia which was held from April 21-25, 2018. She won a second place medal for her creativity and presentation in Role Play 1 from a field of approximately 300 students. This conference was composed of more than 19,300 students who participated in a variety of competitive events and leadership seminars while networking with numerous business executives from across the United States.

In addition, the following CHS DECA members also represented Cranford DECA in Atlanta, Georgia. The team of Hannah McCarthy & Kevin Schwartz in Sports and Entertainment Marketing Team Decision-Making Event, the team of Matthew Fonseca and Jeremy Hunt also in Sports and Entertainment Marketing Team Decision-Making, and Matthew Doran competed in Restaurant and Food Service Marketing. Less than eight percent of all NJ DECA members earn the privilege of attending this international event. These six students have won at both the Regional and State Career Development Conferences during the 2017-2018 school year and continued to hone their business skills in Atlanta.

DECA prepares emerging leaders and entrepreneurs for careers in marketing, finance, hospitality and management in high schools and colleges around the world. DECA is organized into two unique student divisions each with programs designed to address the learning styles, interest and focus of its members. The High School Division includes 200,000 members in 3,500 schools.

It is a great accomplishment for these students to represent Cranford High School at the International Level at the DECA International Conference, and they continue to make their families, school, and community most proud.

Donna Cathcart Cindy Keyasko (DECA Advisors)

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Similar Homes For Sale Near Atlanta, GA

Atlanta, GA 30310 Atlanta, GA 30310 Bedrooms: 3 Baths Full: 2 Lot Size: Less than 1/3 Acre

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John A. Williams, Atlanta developer and philanthropist, has died

John A. Williams, a seminal Georgia developer and minority owner of the Atlanta Falcons, died suddenly Monday.

His company, Preferred Apartment Communities, released a statement saying employees are profoundly saddened to announce the loss of its co-founder, chairman and chief executive officer.

“The Board and the Company are indebted to Mr. Williams for his strong leadership, real estate vision, outgoing personality and boundless energy. The Board’s thoughts are with John’s family at this very difficult time,” the statement says.

Over the course of his career, Williams directed and coordinated the development, construction, and management of more than $15 billion in real estate developments across the nation. Approximately $5.5 billion of this activity has focused on multifamily housing, and the rest was in property such as hotels, condominiums and offices.

Williams founded an iconic Atlanta company, Post Properties, in 1970. It had more than 30,000 apartments. He took Post Properties public as a REIT in 1993 and left the company in 2003.

Williams is survived by his wife Nancy; three children, Jay, Sarah Brook and Parker, and two grandchildren, Jack and Harrison.

He won a number of accolades in his life, from Cobb County’s, "The Mack Henderson Public Service Award," to being inducted into the Georgia State University J. Mack Robinson College of Business Hall of Fame as well as the Georgia Institute of Technology College of Management Hall of Fame. He also served on numerous business and community boards and led the effort to build the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre which cost $150,000,000. The 2,800 seat main theater is named "The John A. Williams Theatre."

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2018 HBA Parade of Homes to Showcase 50+ New Atlanta Homes

ATLANTA — Spring in Atlanta is synonymous with home tours, and this year is no exception. The Greater Atlanta Home Builders Association (HBA) is excited to announce the 2018 Atlanta Parade of Homes, which takes place the weekends of April 20-22, April 27-29 and May 4-6. This gives interested homebuyers three full weekends to visit homes.

The HBA scattered-site Parade of Homes features more than 50 new homes around the metro-Atlanta area. Many homes are decorated models that include the latest and hottest design trends. The 2018 Parade showcases a wide variety of homes of all sizes, layouts and architectural styles. The tour features everything from affordable entry-level homes and townhomes to moderately priced homes, large homes in popular communities and elegant mansions in exclusive gated neighborhoods. This event is free, self-guided and open to the public. Specifics on builders and communities participating will be available on www.ATLHomesParade.com closer to the event. Look for the ATLHomesParade app and follow #ATLHomesParade on social media for updates.

“The Atlanta Parade of Homes offers those in the homebuying process the opportunity to view many communities at one time,” said Corey Deal, Executive Officer of the Greater Atlanta HBA. “It is a great time to buy a new home in metro Atlanta, and this event showcases Atlanta home builders’ new home designs and trends for 2018.”

Homebuyers have a great opportunity to choose the exact location, home design and designer options with the many new homes available for purchase. As an added bonus, many builders and home sellers offer incentives and price reductions to attract buyers. The 2018 Atlanta Parade of Homes allows homebuyers the opportunity to walk through a variety of new homes around Atlanta and choose the perfect community to call home.

For more information regarding the 2018 Atlanta Parade of Homes, visit www.ATLHomesParade.com or call 678-775-1465. This event is sponsored by Atlanta’s Best New Homes TV, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, AtlantaNewHomesDirectory.com, Builders Digital Experience (BDX) and Denim Marketing.

About the Greater Atlanta HBA:

The Greater Atlanta Home Builders Association (HBA) is a 1,000 member, not-for-profit trade association affiliated with the Home Builders Association of Georgia and the National Association of Home Builders. The HBA is the 8th largest local home builders association in the nation and the largest in Georgia and is dedicated to promoting, protecting and preserving home ownership by maintaining the housing industry as a viable economic force in the Atlanta area. The official charity of the HBA is HomeAid Atlanta, a non-profit organization that builds and renovates transitional housing for metro Atlanta homeless children, women and men.

For information about the Greater Atlanta Home Builders Association, visit www.AtlantaHomeBuilders.com or call 770-938-9900.

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Atlanta paid nonprofit to cover pricey airfare for Reed, staff

Former Mayor Kasim Reed (left) and city attorney Cathy Hampton represented the city of Atlanta on an economic development trip to South Africa in 2017. BOB ANDRES / [email protected]

As time expired on Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed’s term in December, the City Council voted to donate $77,000 to three charities, including two that were near and dear to Reed’s heart — a scholarship fund at his alma mater Howard University and an Atlanta charity for troubled youth.

Some $40,000 went to a dormant non-profit created to raise money for affordable housing and job creation.

The expenditures of taxpayer money raised few questions and included a parting gesture from the mayor himself: the source of the funds was a raise Reed turned down and left with the city for charity.

But the $40,000 donation has now been returned to the city for a different purpose: to cover some of the expenses of a controversial trip Reed and staff members took to South Africa in the spring of 2017.

On March 5, the nonprofit Partners For Prosperity wrote a $40,000 check back to Atlanta to cover pricey business-class airfare for Reed and seven city employees.

The maneuver was an apparent attempt by Reed to fulfill a promise he made to have private donations reimburse taxpayers for the difference between business-class airfare and the amount that would have been spent on tickets in coach. The transaction raises questions about the appropriateness of the expenditure and the transparency with which it occurred.

+ Former Mayor Kasim Reed took nine city employees, including two members of his security detail, to South Africa on an economic

“That wasn’t what the council thought it was approving,” said City Council President Felicia Moore, a district council member at the time. “We thought the funds were going to charitable organizations — not for reimbursing the city for expenses that shouldn’t have been incurred in the first place.”

Jeff Dickerson, a spokesman for Reed, said the donations fulfilled the mayor’s promise to use non-governmental funds to cover costs of the South Africa trip, and fell within his rights. The total cost of the trip was $90,000.

“These were not ‘city tax dollars,’” Dickerson said, “but income the mayor earned but deferred for the purpose of advancing economic development and helping Atlanta students attend college.”

Cathy Woolard, a former Atlanta City Council president who ran for mayor last year on platform to clean up city ethics, said “it’s clear that taxpayers paid” for the airfare.

“Just because there’s a middle organization doesn’t mean there wasn’t tax money that paid it,” Woolard said.

Purpose of donation not explained

City Council passed pay increases for themselves and the mayor that took affect in 2014. Reed pledged the incremental increase in his salary to charity and an account was created within the city’s human resources department to manage the funds.

In November, a month before Reed left office, the City Council’s Finance Committee approved three grants from the mayor’s forgone salary: $18,514 to Howard University, $18,514 to the mayor’s youth scholarship fund, and $40,000 to Partners For Prosperity.

Former Human Resources Commissioner Yvonne Yancy initially told Finance Committee members that the $40,000 was going to Invest Atlanta. Councilwoman Yolanda Adrean then told Yancy that Invest Atlanta wasn’t a charity, to which Yancy said there was a mistake on the ordinance and that the legislation would have to be corrected to reflect the money was actually going to Partners For Prosperity.

The council was not told that Partners For Prosperity would turn around and return the money to compensate taxpayers for the South African trip, a video of the proceeding shows.

“Wow,” Adrean said Wednesday. “That’s big. It reminds me of that game where you put the ball under the cup and keep moving the cup.”

Partners for Prosperity was created in 2015 by the city’s economic development agency, Invest Atlanta, to “promote economic development and financial sustainability in distressed areas through job training and recruitment and financial literacy programs,” and to help create affordable housing.

Eloisa Klementich, president and CEO of Invest Atlanta, who is also chief financial officer for Partners For Prosperity, initially told the AJC and Channel 2 that she was not aware that the city would ask for the donation to be repaid. She later appeared to contradict herself and would not answer the question clearly.

“Did I know that? No, the ordinance said it was a donation to us,” Klementich said.

Later, she said: “We knew that they (the city) were going to ask us for partnership opportunities. That is part of our mandate.”

Asked repeated yes or no questions about if she knew the donation would be returned to the city for airfare costs, she again referred to knowing about “partnership opportunities.”

On Monday, a month after the check is dated, the Partners for Progress board voted to approve the payment to the city.

It was the first check the organization had ever written.

+ Partners for Progress, a nonprofit formed by Invest Atlanta to help promote affordable housing, job creation and economic development, cut this

A constitutional question

Spending taxpayer money on donations to nonprofits made headlines in 2015 when former state Attorney General Mike Bowers and investigator Richard Hyde blasted DeKalb County commissioners for donating tens of thousands of dollars of taxpayer money to favored charities in their districts.

Their rebuke of DeKalb’s spending found that the donations fell outside the commissioners’ legally delegated powers and were prohibited by the gratuities clause in the state Constitution, which bars public officials from making gifts of taxpayer money or property.

“There is no authority for a member of the (board of commissioners), or a county employee, to make charitable contributions using government funds,” the two men wrote.

Bowers, who served as attorney general from 1981 to 1997, noted that the gratuities clause has been in the state Constitution since 1877 and that successive court rulings and opinions of the attorney general have strictly interpreted the statute.

“Regardless of the charitable or worthwhile nature of the recipients or their undertakings, Georgia courts have strictly construed laws that prohibit gifts of government property,” the report said.

It’s unclear how the gratuity clause might apply when the City Council approved the expenditure.

“They absolutely do not go against the gratuities clause, because the income was earned and donated as a gift to nonprofit organizations consistent with the ordinance,” he said. “Instead of personally accepting the money as salary, as was his right, the mayor instead invested it in an economic development opportunity for the City of Atlanta.”

AJC Staff Writer Stephen Deere contributed to this report.

How we got the story

The AJC requested proof that taxpayers were refunded for costs associated with business-class airfare to South Africa for former Mayor Kasim Reed and city employees. The city produced a $40,000 check from a nonprofit. Digging deeper, the AJC learned the money originated from the city.

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ukvec · 7 years ago

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What We Know About The Atlanta Ransomware Attack

On Friday, city of Atlanta interim Chief Information Officer Daphne Rackley said the city would not pay the ransom. Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms later said all options are on the table.

The city of Atlanta said its Information Management team learned of a computer outage at 5:40 a.m. Thursday, March 22, 2018.

That’s when the city says it was hit by a ransomware attack that has crippled some city departments. Since then, Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms has held a series of press conferences (Thursday, March 22; Friday, March 23; and Monday, March 26) about what she has called a “massive inconvenience” for the city and threat to national security.

On Monday, March 26, Sandy Springs-based cybersecurity firm SecureWorks CEO Michael Cote said his firm had completed the containment phase and part of the investigation and was helping the city of Atlanta transition to the recovery phase to restore critical systems.

On Tuesday, March 27, employees were told they could turn on their computers and printers again.

On the first day the city of Atlanta’s Chief Operating Officer Richard Cox learned of the attack, he said city officials wanted to let the public know as soon as possible. He said the attack may have impacted other agencies in Georgia.

“Security matters are ongoing and they’re impacting everyone,” Cox said. “In fact, we were advised of several agencies even here in Georgia that have been impacted. They’re really bad people that are moving quickly.”

Cox said the three departments that were not impacted by the attack were public safety, water services and Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.

Airport Internet Outage

Since Friday, March 23, the airport has turned off free WiFi for passengers and disabled security wait times and flight information updates on its website. Airport spokesman Reese McCranie said nearly 1,000 city of Atlanta employees working at the airport had very limited or no access to their e-mail and the internet. He said there was no timeline on when all services would be restored, but services were taken offline out of an “abundance of caution.”

Atlanta Police Department

City of Atlanta police chief Erika Shields confirmed public safety — including police, fire and 911 — was not impacted, but she said officers were issuing tickets and filing reports by hand as a precaution.

Atlanta Municipal Court

Parking tickets, reset forms and change of address forms can be paid for and completed in person at the court during normal business hours. However, all court dates are being rescheduled, and no failure-to-appear notices are being generated because of the computer outages. The Department of Corrections has been processing defendants who were arrested and taken to custody manually since Friday.

The Department of City Planning said information for the public would be limited during this time and zoning applications will take longer than normal to process and review. The Office of Housing and Community Development said it will only communicate with customers through “in-person conversations at its intake desk” and is unable to process disbursement requests.

City Employees

City employees were told they could turn on their computers, printers and city-issued devices on Tuesday, March 27 — the first time since the ransomware attack. Employees are being asked to avoid using the Kronos web application to submit timesheets and instead to use manual time clocks or timesheets to document their work hours.

Employees are also being told not to try to connect to the city of Atlanta’s VPN (virtual private network). New job applications are also not being accepted during this time.

On Wednesday, March 28, the city launched a new page on its website: the Ransomware Cyberattack Information Hub. It has answers to frequently asked questions for residents and city employees.

The Hackers

According to a computer screenshot sent to 11Alive by a city employee, a group that cybersecurity experts have identified as SamSam, demanded 6 bitcoins in exchange, about $50,000, for decrypting the city’s data and files it was holding hostage.

The group has demanded and received ransom payments of nearly $850,000 since December 2017 from businesses, hospitals, universities and government agencies that they typically target.

Security experts said the deadline for the city of Atlanta to pay the ransom after a cyberattack shut down some of its computer networks was likely Wednesday.

But it’s not clear how the city paid or if it will pay the ransom.

Kennesaw State University cybersecurity expert Andy Green said the website for the city to communicate and share files with the hackers was deleted.

“This is new territory in that they have never shut down a portal before that we’re aware of,” Green said. “If the city’s made the decision to pay the ransom, then that communication would be happening via new channels that we’re not aware of.”

Green said usually the group provides about six days before they move on to their next target.

“We’ve got some really tough questions to ask the city of Atlanta,” Green said. “This should be a warning for other municipalities because I don’t think this will be the last attack by any stretch of the imagination.”

City of Atlanta officials said it knows who the hackers are but would not confirm the group’s name or provide details on the ransom.

Internal Audit

According to CBS46, an internal audit found the city of Atlanta’s “IT department was on life support, and there was basically no formal plans in place to protect the city from cyber threats.”

A city auditor told CBS46 the city of Atlanta was in the early stages of implementing a security fix when the ransomware attack occurred.

Previous Cyberattack: April 2017

The founder of an Augusta-based cybersecurity firm, Jake Williams, tweeted that his firm Rendition Infosec knew of five city of Atlanta systems, including a webmail server, that were infected in April 2017.

A statement on its website said the city of Atlanta left its file-sharing client servers open to the Internet and failed to fix the issue at the time:

“The City of Atlanta was not patching its Internet facing hosts more than a month after *critical* patches were released by Microsoft. Microsoft released patches on March 14, 2017. Our scan data shows these hosts being vulnerable (and compromised by unknown attackers) on dates spanning from April 23, 2017 to May 1, 2017.”

The city of Atlanta’s servers are just a few of more than 148,000 computers that were compromised last April by hacking tools that were leaked and possibly created by the National Security Agency, called “Eternal Blue” and “Double Pulsar.”

Ransomware is not new to Atlanta. Last summer, cybersecurity experts estimate hundreds of companies in Georgia may have been impacted by the global WannaCry ransomware attack.

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