South Fulton built Sandy Springs and subsequently North Fulton.

South Fulton built Sandy Springs and subsequently Milton, Johns Creek and to an extent Roswell and Alpharetta. The facts can’t be denied unless “you want your cake and eat it too.”

I was talking about the Secretary of the Senate, not the Secretary of State.

The Secretary of the Senate is an office than performs many of the same functions as the Clerk to the Fulton County Commission. Those functions being: Keeping an accurate record of daily proceedings in Senate Chamber;Tallying and records all votes on motions and legislation;Producing the “Order of Business” for each legislative day; andIndexing all legislation for reference purposes among others. [SOURCE: Secretary of the Georgia State Senate] In short, the Secretary of the Senate is equivalent to the Clerk of the House which is also equivalent to the Clerk to the Fulton County Commission. All three positions are designated as the official keeper of records for each of their respective legislative bodies.

The difference is that the Secretary of the Senate is a state office. The Clerk to the Fulton County Commission is a local office. The Secretary of the Senate deals with 56 state senators on a daily basis, not to mention the dozens of lobbyists and ordinary citizens who grace that office with their presence. The Clerk to the Fulton County Commission only interacts with seven county commissioners.

The Secretary of the Senate has multiple copies of all 1,800 bills and resolutions introduced by members of the Georgia Senate during the 150th session of the Georgia General Assembly. I can assure you that no where near that many ordinances are introduced by the Fulton County Commissioners.

And finally, the Secretary of the Senate has a budget of $1,229,925 [SOURCE: FY2010 budget]. The Clerk to the Fulton County Commission has almost the same budget even though that office deals with fewer commissioners and fewer pieces of legislation.

Again I ask, how is the bloated budget of the Clerk to the Fulton County Commission not systematic of the rampant government waste that plagues Georgia’s largest county?

One in five Georgia counties have less than 10,000 residents. The inefficiency of a government serving a small geographic area and population an expense that metro Atlanta can no longer afford.

Along those same line of reasoning, Sam Olens is more qualified to be President of the US than Sarah Palin.

You’re almost as bad as “NonPartisanGA” in your obsession with me.

I singled out Sharon Beasley-Teague, Joe Heckstall and Donzella James not for their support or opposition to Senate Bill 552, but because these three entrenched incumbents have been in the legislature forever. Beasley-Teague, Heckstall and James were in office when I was a kid spending my afternoons at the Sandy Springs’ KinderCare on Pitts Road, and they’re still in office now. Yet, south Fulton has little or nothing to show for their years of service to the community.

As for any possible constitutional or Justice Department challenges, only an activist Justice Department would determine that the re-creation of Milton County denies or abridges the right to vote on account of race, color, or membership in a language minority group. If the DOJ starts legislating from the bureaucracy, then the only recourse would be for the State of Georgia to sue in federal court to overturn section 5 of the Voting Rights Act. And I don’t need to remind anyone that section 5 is already on shakey ground with the United States Supreme Court [Savage, David G (2009-4-30). Voting Rights Act section that singles out South may be abolished. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved on 2010-3
-13.].

As Paul Harvey says the rest of the story is that Andre conspicuously leaves out State Representatives Roger Bruce and Virgil Fluud who fall in the same category, because they toted the water for Andre supporting the failed attempt to form the City of South Fulton.

Proponents have failed to present border that would pass constitutional of DOJ challenges. Now Mr. Walker pontificates about Sandy Springs voting to leave Fulton or Dunwoody leaving DeKalb without anything on the ballot. Is the referendum I missed?

Lastly nowhere does anyone on any side have any up to date financial studies reflecting current state on the viability of either end of a split Fulton County or the Fulton County School System.

-requires no change to GA’s constitution
-no new government entity to deal with for regional planning purposes
-small, homogeneous and affluent so N. Fulton residents don’t have to worry about their $$ going somewhere they don’t approve
-Forsyth probably would welcome the idea

- Must pass out of House/Senate (doesn’t need Gov. signature because it is a constitutional amendment)
-Pass statewide ballot muster
-Bill to order referendum must pass House/Senate and be signed by new governor
-Referendum is held in North Fulton- excluding Sandy Springs
-When Milton County is established- the City of Sandy Springs can opt to join Milton County

This would all be unnecessary if there wasn’t a 159 cap on counties-

You’re assuming that the people of south Fulton are politically motivated enough to do anything other than what their church pastors or elected officials tell them to do.

If –as jamesr572 suggests– money was taken from south Fulton to subsidize north Fulton, then a fully engaged electorate would have protested these so-called inequities.

The fact is that south Fulton contains some of the most politically apathetic people in our great state. They only get mad, organized and mobilized after the key events affecting them have taken place. By then, there is little the people of south Fulton can do except complain about how they believe the process has been unfair to them.

That’s the truth about south Fulton.

They keep electing folks like Sharon Beasley-Teague and Joe Heckstall and Donzella James; folks who have no political power or influence, and then expect the legislature to give them some respect.

Now let me talk about HR 21 for a second here:

House Resolution 21 allows the General Assembly to re-create a previously existing county which was merged into another county. HR 21 allows the legislature to set the boundaries of that previously existing county, and I believe that the legislators of the affected area(s) will listen closely to their constituents when drawing up the new maps.

Sandy Springs has expressed a desire to leave Fulton County. Their mayor, Eva Galambos, said as much during her testimony before the House State Planning & Community Affairs Committee this past week.

If Sandy Springs wants to join a re-constituted Milton County, and the qualified voters therein approve a referendum having that effect, then why should Sandy Springs not be allowed to go?

Regardless of what Milton County may have looked like in the past, it is up to residents of the new Milton County to determine what their community will look like in the future. If that happens to include Sandy Springs, then so be it.

The property owners in developing North Atlanta would have suffered increasing taxes as the infrastructure building and development occurred while simultaneously and enjoying increased property values. Currently, and due to in part to a lack of good Comprehensive Plan , South Atlanta residents have lower values and pay less tax.

In a relatively more progressive DeKalb, a forward looking Comp Plan allows for lots of new development in south DeKalb. Subsequently, those property owners will reap the benefits in their property values and suffer more taxes.

As to Sandy Springs, that is pretty interesting information, but they are located in the middle of FULCO now. I fail to see why the historical perspective is relevant.

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