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Issue 10.27 | Friday, July 2, 2010 |
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TODAY'S FOCUS DULUTH, Ga., July 2, 2010 – Gwinnett Place is truly the central business district of this county, and our area is a top draw year round. Gwinnett Place collectively offers a wide variety of dining, entertainment and shopping attractions that can only be found in our portion of Gwinnett County.
We have some of the newest hotel accommodations, including a new Holiday Inn and other locations that have recently completed multi-million dollar renovations. Gwinnett Place is home to one of the county’s tallest buildings – the 17-story Atlanta Marriott Gwinnett Place, Gwinnett’s premier location for conferences and other special events. Did you know that we have a Bahama Breeze restaurant in Gwinnett and the only such location in northeast metro Atlanta? We are the only local place to enjoy the expanded menu of a Chick-fil-A Dwarf House. Gwinnett Place also has unparalleled international cuisine from Italian to Japanese and all the choice brand names, from quick snacks to family style dining. The Gwinnett Place CD has two malls – Gwinnett Place and Santa Fe. We have the largest indoor international food market in the country, Assi Plaza. Gwinnett Place is the only destination with Fry’s Electronics, Sears and The Shane Company. And we are soon to be home to the new Mega Mart shopping experience, the first American opening for one of Korea’s biggest retailers. Gwinnett Place can even claim one of the country’s largest dance and music venues – the Will Bill’s Dance Club and Concert Hall. Our area is also uniquely served by the members and leadership of the Gwinnett Place Community Improvement District (CID). The CID joins the interests of area commercial property to expand the economic vitality of greater Gwinnett Place. As you will hear more in the coming months, Gwinnett Place will soon claim another first-of-its-kind accomplishment – one of the first diverging-diamond interchanges (DDI) in Georgia. The Gwinnett Place CID is working closely with county, state and federal transportation officials to retrofit the Pleasant Hill Road bridge over Interstate 85 with a DDI, which allows drivers to cross over to the “opposite” side of the road to greatly improve traffic movement. The DDI is an exciting innovation because it immediately reduces traffic delays, costs less than a entirely new bridge and can be adapted using the existing roadway infrastructure. So as you can see, there is no summer slowdown for greater Gwinnett Place or the Gwinnett Place CID. We are fully at work to keep Gwinnett Place the place to be, and we invite you and your family to come be part of the action. To learn more about all the businesses at Gwinnett Place, please take a look at the VisitGwinnettPlace.com site. And more information about the Gwinnett Place CID is always available at GwinnettPlaceCID.com. Mark Williams is chair of the Gwinnett Place CID Board of Directors. He is the owner of Printing Trade Company - a full-service print company his family started 39 years ago. He has served in appointed and volunteer roles with numerous civic efforts countywide and in the cities of Norcross and Duluth. Mark lives in Cardinal Lake, one of Gwinnett’s oldest and largest neighborhoods. EEB PERSPECTIVE JULY 2, 2010 – It may be difficult to see ties between the city of Wolverhampton, England, and Gwinnett County. Both are suburbs of larger cities, Birmingham in England, and Gwinnett a suburb of Atlanta.
But Wolverhampton, with a population of about 250,000 is an older city, going back to the year 900, and very industrialized, while Gwinnett has gown only in the last 60 years, and is a mix of light industries, office parks and suburban homes. But there is another tie. The mayor of Wolverhampton, elected this May, is Malcolm Gwinnett, 57, possibly a relative of Button Gwinnett himself, though that tie has not been pinned down. The new mayor has been one of 60 Wolverhampton councilors (councilmen) for 20 years, serving for 15 years on the planning committee. We talked to the new mayor the other day, after a tip from Jann Moore of the Gwinnett Commission office. We learned that being mayor is primarily a combination of presiding at the meeting of the city, every six weeks, which lasts one to two hours. Lots of work is done in their committees. Each of the councilors gets paid 10,000 pounds annually, while the mayor gets 20,000 pounds.
Their government works on a parliamentary system, though the mayor says now it's a “hung council,” with 29 Labor seats, 26 Conservative seats, five Liberal Democrats (among them Gwinnett) and one seat open of a Conservative who died recently. “If Labor pinches that seat, then it will be down to me to cast the deciding vote,” Gwinnett says. He enjoys serving. “It's a good place to help people, and that's what we're put there for.” Like all governments, Wolverhampton is feeling the economic pinch. “We've changed a lot lately, saving 27 million pounds out of a 300 million budget. Lots of our paper-pushers are gone. We've also saved 100,000 pounds in council salaries.” Much of the work of the mayor's office is social and ceremonies such as “prize-givings, church functions, openings can fill a day. It can be a 12 hour day sometimes, with engagements morning, afternoon and evening. We average 315 functions a year.” Gwinnett once was a baker, but retired and sold the business. Today he is involved with “outdoor shows. We go up and down the country with children's inflatables, slides, etc. It takes us all over England each year.” The new mayor was born in Netherton, six mile away. He's lived in Wolverhampton for 30 years, has four children and eight grandchildren. He and his wife travel often. “We do a holiday each year in the USA. We've been to Florida several times, to Hawaii and the west coast cities of Seattle, Los Angeles and San Diego.” His hobby is watching English football, especially his favorite, the West Bromwich Albrion team, about 20 miles away from his home. Malcolm Gwinnett has never been able to establish a direct tie with Button Gwinnett, who was born in Glouchestershire, about 35 miles from Wolverhampton. He has thought that perhaps trips to the USA might help locate relatives, but none have surfaced so far. (Button Gwinnett left no direct descendants.)
The Internet home page of Wolverhampton notes: “One of the early subscribers to the Charity School was Button Gwinnett, a merchant from Bristol who married a local girl named Anne Bowne in April 1757. The importance of Gwinnett however lies in the fact that after business failures in England he went to North America and in 1776 was one of the 56 signatories of the American Declaration of Independence.” *
* * * * Rosemary Walsh of Sugar Hill reminds us that a Button Gwinnett signature sold for a record $722,500 at Sotheby's in New York in April, 2010, exceeding the high estimate auction officials had placed on the document. The sale was part of the James S. Copley Library collection and the buyer was not present at the auction, and not identified. ABOUT OUR SPONSORS
The public spiritedness of our underwriters allows us to bring GwinnettForum.com to you at no cost to readers. Today’s featured sponsor is Mingledorff’s, an air conditioning distributor of the Carrier Air Conditioning Company. Mingledorff’s corporate office is located at 6675 Jones Mill Court in Norcross Ga. and is proud to be a sponsor of the Gwinnett Forum. With 32 locations in Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, Florida, Mississippi and South Carolina, Mingledorff’s is the convenient local source with a complete line for the quality heating, ventilating, air conditioning, and refrigeration parts and supplies you need to service and install HVAC/R equipment. Product lines include Carrier, Bryant, Payne, Totaline and Aeroseal. For all of your HVAC needs, and information on the products Mingledorff’s sells, visit www.mingledorffs.com and www.carrier.com.
McLEMORE'S WORLD ARCHIVE
FEEDBACK Editor, the Forum: Safety and public health are issues addressed by local government. Trash pickup involves both. Public health doesn’t always mean everyone has the right to choose everything the way they want or don’t want. For example, immunizations are required for schoolchildren before they attend class. Very few exceptions are made. I do understand where the recent GwinnettForum letter-writer, Daryl Cook, is coming from. I also live alone and have extremely little trash. It's hardly worth the plastic trash bag I use to place it by the curb. But just think what would happen if everyone who lived alone took their trash to work! I’m happy the writer mentions she pays for it, but otherwise, it’s simply not fair to make an employer pay to dispose of employee’s personal trash. Duluth has an interesting arrangement. You pay a goodly amount to purchase special purple county trash bags. That is your fee. The more you throw away, the more you pay. I like that idea. However, county-wide, with such a variety of areas and number of trash haulers, I guess the county officials decided that option was not worth pursuing. When I moved to Gwinnett County in 1987, there was only one trash hauler per neighborhood. I don’t know the statistics, but I do know it’s still the case in many areas. If you live in city limits, it’s the city who decides who the trash hauler is. With the big push to privatize government services (and, yes, trash pickup IS a government service, no matter who provides it), I believe we inadvertently created more problems than we ever envisioned. With four or five haulers, at least one every day of the week going through my neighborhood, there is never a day that goes by without the noisy trucks speeding between houses because they serve so few of them. That is NOT a good traffic safety situation, especially with children living in the neighborhood. With Atlanta area pollution, the additional traffic only adds to our Code Orange and Code Red Smog Alert days in summer. Please take a good look at your property tax bill (or your landlord’s). My tax bill includes taxes to fund schools, even though my children are grown and gone. Even if you’ve never had children, county property taxes still include school taxes. Currently, many people without trash service illegally take their trash bags to shopping center and apartment dumpsters, or other illegal sites. On the way, bags sometimes fall off into the road, get run over, and garbage is strewn all over the place. This is a public health issue, as well as a traffic safety hazard. When trash service is mandatory, this situation will resolve itself. I, for one, am looking forward to the new trash service. The opportunity to recycle many more types of items at street-side will save me time and gasoline I currently use to haul my “extra” recyclables to the Recycling Bank. I’m looking forward to only one set of trucks per week, on only one day. And, I’m looking forward to cleaner streets.
Thinks early voting so soon can be disservice Editor, the Forum: While “early
voting" (began May 28) certainly makes it appear to be accommodating
to those who cannot make to the polls this July 20, such early
voting is a disservice not only to the free flow of information
to keep the public fully informed on all the issues. It is
also a disservice to the candidates, many of whom spend most of
their budget in the final weeks of campaigning---and whose dollars are
totally wasted to all those who voted early.
UPCOMING The biggest Fourth of July activity in Gwinnett will be in Auburn, where a two-day celebration is being planned, Mayor Linda Bleschinger says. The activities get started at 2:55 on Friday, with a welcome by the mayor prior to the start of eight hours of musical performances in downtown Auburn. Then on Saturday, events are planned from 10 a.m. until 11 p.m., with the annual car show going on all day. Trophies and plaques will be awarded. Also ongoing are vendors and a continuation of musical groups performing. A highlight at 10:30 a.m. will be a watermelon seed spitting contest. Fireworks conclude the two-day event at 9:30 p.m. on Saturday. Duluth Duluth's patriotic celebration will end with a BANG on Saturday, July 3, at Scott Hudgens Park, located in River Green Business Park with a theme of "Capture the Spirit of Good Living.” Gates will open at 5 p.m. and conclude with a fireworks display at dusk. Monetary donations will be accepted for admission and parking. A stage show will begin at 6 p.m. Festivities will include family friendly activities: inflatable rides, rock wall, carnival games, pony rides, face painting, food vendors and live entertainment featuring:
Loganville The 2010
Loganville Fourth of July Parade and Celebration will be held on Saturday,
July 3, from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. The parade brings an estimated
8,000 people to Loganville as it comes down Main Street. In Braselton,
American Le Mans Series champion and Corvette racing driver Johnny
O'Connell will be the grand marshal for the "Celebrate Braselton"
parade on Sunday, July 4 at 4 p.m. on Georgia Highway 53 in the historic
district of town. Festivities including exhibits, vendors, children's
activities and live music in Braselton Park. Lawrenceville
will celebrate America’s independence at its Seventh Annual "Prelude
to the Fourth," with a theme of Somewhere Over the Rainbow! Sugar Hill Celebration activities begin at 6:30 p.m. In E.E. Robinson Park in Sugar Hill with live music. At 9:40 p.m. there will be the singing of the National Anthem, followed immediately by fireworks. At 10:15 p.m., there will be the showing of a movie, Night at the Museum. Norcross Activities begin at 4 p.m. On Saturday, July 3, in downtown Norcross, where there will be pony rides, a dunk tank, inflatables, games, food vendors, a magic show and live music. A musical performance begins at 7:30 p.m. in the new Lillian Webb Park. A fireworks display, set to begin at dark, closes the night's activities. Snellville Though the City of Snellville has not funded any holiday activity, the First Baptist Church of Snellville is planning an evening of activities on July 4, beginning at 4:30 p.m. Among the activities will be rides for the kids, face painting and vendors. A church service is set for 5 p.m., while the fireworks will begin at dark. Berkeley Lake This smallest of Gwinnett cities has a community gathering, set for July 3 this year. There is what Berkeley Lake residents call a “parade” (really mostly people walking a quarter of a mile) from Berkeley Lake Elementary School to the Berkeley Lake Chapel. Following this will be games for the kids on the chapel lawn, including cupcakes and lemonade at the chapel. At 1 p.m. there will be an art show in the new city hall. No celebrations The cities of Suwanee, Buford, Dacula, Grayson and Lilburn have no Fourth of July municipal activites planned. An event held in previous years, the “Gwinnett Glows” fireworks show in Lawrenceville, provided by the county, was not funded this year. Emory Eastside, BremnerDuke in venture
Emory Eastside Medical Center (EEMC) and BremnerDuke Healthcare Real Estate (BremnerDuke), a division of Duke Realty Corporation (Duke Realty), have broken ground on a new two-story, 40,162-square foot medical office building. The new facility, which is directly adjacent to the hospital, will include a Spine Center sponsored by EEMC, as well as office space for medical service providers, including neurosurgical and endocrine specialists. The hospital also has begun construction of a 12,000-square foot expansion to its Emergency Department. This expansion will increase capacity by 30 percent, improve patient flow, and reduce wait times. From left are Snellville Mayor Jerry Oberholtzer, Dr. Michael Hartman, Melissa Bennett, CFO Tom Jackson, COO Dustin Greene, and Dr. Murray Robinson. NOTABLE Amigos for Christ and the Gwinnett Coalition for Health and Human Services' are to partner at the Gwinnett Great Days of Service (GDOS) with the annual “Celebrate Service Music Festival.” The Great Days of Service, scheduled for October 1-2, seeks individual volunteers from businesses, school groups, scout troops, civic and social clubs, church youth groups, etc. to participate in volunteer service projects around Gwinnett County. The event was created in the spirit of Gwinnett's slogan, "Success Lives Here." The days are designed to gain community awareness for the Gwinnett Coalition and the more than 900 health and human service agencies and organizations that the coalition represents. Amigos for Christ, one of the largest non-profit organizations in Gwinnett County, has been putting on the Celebrate Service Music Festival for seven years as a way to create awareness about serving in one's community and giving back to others. Ellen Gerstein, director of the Gwinnett Coalition, says: "Since both organizations just celebrated their 10th anniversaries and we both create the same awareness, it was natural to collaborate with the Music Festival as a way to celebrate and reward the volunteers of GDOS." We seek to create community awareness, while educating citizens and leaders about the needs around them. Last year GDOS had over 80,000 volunteers, and completed over 150 service projects, making it one of the largest volunteer initiatives in the country. Key to the success of the event is local support and involvement. The occasion will have over 60 non-profits showcasing what they do and how the people can become involved. John Bland, director of Amigos for Service in Gwinnett, says that “This event brings out the best in people and creates solidarity among our community." The day culminates with an all day music festival put on by Amigos staff and volunteers at Suwanee Town Park. There will be 11 bands, events for kids, a golf tourney, 3v3 soccer, two bike rides, a 5K road race, bean bag tournament, a bake off and food for sale. Stay alert about Gulf coast with new free service Starting
July 8, 2010, GulfNewsClips.com will offer a free summary of news clips
collected from more than 80 sources around the United States. It's the
smartest and easiest way to keep up with what's happening in the Gulf
states. To sign up now, go to http://www.gulfnewsclips.com. RECOMMENDED READ
“Malcolm Gladwell is a thought-provoking New Yorker author with an easy to read style that makes you think. He takes a number of mundane topics and examines them from a different perspective. The title comes from one such topic about a dog psychologist (Cesar) who has the ability to tame the most aggressive of animals. Rather than ponder over what Cesar might do or say to the animals, Gladwell dwells on what the animal hears or interprets form Cesar’s actions. This process is applied to many diverse topics from “Pitchmen” to military decisions. A most worthwhile read.”
GEORGIA ENCYCLOPEDIA
The Blake
Plateau is a large, relatively shallow (800-1,200 meters) carbonate bank
that lies 200 miles off Charleston on the continental shelf. It runs from
near Cape Hatteras in North Carolina, past South Carolina and eastern
Florida, to just north of the Bahamas. At the eastern, seaward edge of
the plateau, the Blake Bahamas Scarp descends 18,000 feet toward the abyssal
plain below. This scarp forms the highest geologic structure east of the
Rocky Mountains.
The structure
of the Blake Plateau clearly illustrates the process of the North American/
African separation beginning in the Late Triassic period (208 million
years before present) as well as the development of continental shelves
generally. It also provides additional evidence through recent sediment
and fossil analyses of the events occurring at the Cretaceous/Tertiary
boundary that led to the great mass extinctions of many animal and plant
species of that time. The Blake
Plateau began to form as the North American plate disengaged from the
African plate in the Late Triassic period, forming the Atlantic Ocean.
Beginning with rifting that shattered the subsurface, lava flows and down-faulted
valleys formed at the edges of the continents and offshore. Later sediments
formed a progressively thicker wedge seaward. As rifting continued during
the Jurassic period, the carbonate deposits formed in what was then a
warm, shallow sea: the early Atlantic Ocean. The weight of the deposits
of sediments and of the carbonates bent the crust downward, which allowed
more deposition, allowing the carbonates to reach a thickness of more
than 30,000 feet (10 kilometers). The plateau
is of economic interest because of the 1970 and 1996 discoveries of immense
deposits of hydrocarbons in the form of methane and methane hydrate that
may be developed commercially in the future. Many geologists now believe
that this immense carbonate bank may contain huge quantities of usable
methane gas.
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TODAY'S QUOTE
For the 2010 primary season, GwinnettForum asked all candidates facing primary opposition in Gwinnett County to provide answers to a few questions. You can read their answers below by clicking on the links. Candidates with no primary opposition are noted. They'll be asked in the fall by us to fill out issues surveys, which we'll publish before the November election.
PROFILE KEY
2010 FEDERAL CANDIDATES U.S. Congress, District 4
U.S. Congress, District 7
2010 STATEWIDE CANDIDATES Georgia Governor
Georgia Lieutenant Governor
Georgia Attorney General
Georgia Commissioner of Agriculture
Georgia Commissioner of Insurance
Georgia Labor Commissioner
Georgia Secretary of State
Georgia State School Superintendent
Georgia Public Service Commission
2010
LEGISLATIVE CANDIDATES Republicans
State Senate, District 40
State Representative, District 51
State Representative, District 88
State Representative, District 95
State Representative, District 96
State Representative, District 98
State Representative, District 101
State Representative, District 102
State Representative, District 103
State Representative, District 104
State Representative, District 106
2010 GWINNETT COUNTY CANDIDATES Gwinnett County Commissioner, District 2
Gwinnett County Commissioner, District 4
MORE RECENT COMMENTARY
ABOUT US GwinnettForum.com is a twice-weekly online community commentary for exploring pragmatic and sensible social, political and economic approaches to improve life in Gwinnett County, Ga. USA. Contact us today. © 2001-2010, Gwinnett Forum.com is Gwinnett County's online community forum for commentary that explores pragmatic and sensible social, political and economic approaches to improve life in Gwinnett County, Ga. USA. PHONE: 770.840.1003 |
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