GwinnettForum | Number 20.44 June 23, 2020
FEEL COOPED UP as a family with little to do during this pandemic? Expand your energies and get involved with Gwinnett in a positive way: help make the county cleaner and prettier. Gwinnett Clean and Beautiful offers you two options: clean up a roadway, or a stream. Here two employees with AECOM are cleaning up Bromolow Creek during our 2019 Great Gwinnett Wetlands event. For more details, see Upcoming below.
TODAY’S FOCUS: With 29 Years After Starting Coalition, Ellen Gerstein To Retire
EEB PERSPECTIVE: The World Embraces Mass Transit; So Should Gwinnett, Too
ANOTHER VIEW: Lot of Our Thinking Goes Back to John Locke, Quite Ironical
SPOTLIGHT: The Gwinnett Stripers
FEEDBACK: Florida Pedestrian Bridge Was Built of Different Material
UPCOMING: GC&B Offers Great Playtime, While Cleaning up Roads, Streams
NOTABLE: GGC Students To Save a Bundle Through Textbook Grant
RECOMMENDED: Movie: A Fortunate Man by Bille August
GEORGIA TIDBIT: Multiple Ships of U.S. Navy Have Been Named Savannah
MYSTERY PHOTO: Here’s a Building for You To Pinpoint Its Location
29 years after starting coalition, Ellen Gerstein to retire
LAWRENCEVILLE, Ga. | The Gwinnett Coalition for Health and Human Services has announced that Executive Director Ellen Gerstein will be retiring at the end of 2020. In light of Gerstein’s retirement, the board of the Gwinnett Coalition is launching a search for the next executive director.
Gerstein
On the announcement, Gerstein says: “I am honored to have served as the founding executive director for the Gwinnett Coalition for Health and Human Services. For 29 years I have had the privilege to partner with so many exemplary community leaders, agencies and professionals. I have participated in and witnessed positive community-level change and growth in my tenure over the past three decades.”
Gerstein joined the Gwinnett Coalition in 1991. Under her guidance, the Gwinnett Coalition has:
- Completed and implemented the first health and human services needs assessment – including a detailed action plan to address needs.
- Started the Gwinnett Helpline, which has provided over 750,000 referrals to address life’s basic needs during the past 29 years.
- Overseen the largest volunteer event in the country, Gwinnett Great Days of Service, with a combined economic impact of over $40 million dollars for the past 20 years.
- Started an affordable housing nonprofit: the Gwinnett Housing Resource Partnership.
- Helped start five of Gwinnett’s six cooperative ministries.
- Recommended and helped design the three Gwinnett County health and human service cluster centers in Norcross, Buford and Centerville.
- Developed the first comprehensive youth health survey and implemented subsequent surveys to address high-risk behaviors of our youth.
- Raised over $2 million dollars to address youth substance abuse prevention.
- Created first Veterans Resource Center in Gwinnett.
Chuck Warbington, Gwinnett Coalition board chair and Lawrenceville City Manager, had this comment on her retirement: “We are grateful for Ellen’s leadership and dedication to Gwinnett over the years. We know she will continue to be a force for good as she enters this next stage. We appreciate her commitment to the Gwinnett Coalition in ensuring the new executive director has a seamless transition.
“As a board, we are excited about the future of the Gwinnett Coalition and look forward to finding a new executive director who is passionate about building upon Ellen’s efforts and accelerating the Gwinnett Coalition’s efforts.”
For Gerstein, looking back on a career dedicated to helping people leaves her feeling grateful to have had the opportunity to live a life of purpose in Gwinnett.
“I am so proud that the Gwinnett Coalition continues to be a shining star among the thousands of Health and Human Service Coalitions in the country,” she said. “I want to thank each person I have worked with and who has supported me and the Gwinnett Coalition along this tremendous journey. I also want to encourage each of you to keep up the fight. As long as there are desperate needs in our community, our work is not done.”
As she transitions into a new phase of life, Gerstein is looking forward to continuing teaching a leadership course at Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, Georgia, consulting for nonprofits, spending time with her twin grandsons, traveling and writing.
Before helping found the Gwinnett Coalition, Gerstein ran an Arizona-based rehabilitation program for violent offenders. Her experience also includes counseling substance abusers and runaway and emotionally disturbed teens. A native of Atlanta, Gerstein graduated from the University of Georgia with a bachelor’s in criminal justice and a master’s in business management/human relations and organizational behavior from the University of Phoenix.
- Have a comment? Send to: elliott@brack.net
The world embraces mass transit; So, too, should Gwinnett
Light rail in Denver. Photo: PIxabay.
By Elliott Brack
Editor and Publisher, GwinnettForum
JUNE 23, 2020 | Watch out, Gwinnett. You don’t need to delay mass transit.
While so far Gwinnett County has dilly-dallied on mass transportation, the rest of the world’s large cities are embracing mass transit.
However, now there appears to be a more hopeful attempt for Gwinnett to address mass transit, perhaps in the General Election in November.
The county has kept open its options by sending a notice of intent to the mass transit agency, ATL, to call for a referendum in November. Now the task is to decide what components of a mass traffic project will be presented to voters.
We tend to agree with County Commissioner Ben Ku….who feels that Gwinnett needs to approve going to work on mass transit now, since it’ll only cost more money in the future.
So there’s renewed hope. The big question that the people of Gwinnett want to know is exactly how the county proposes to put the issue to the voters. The proposal must be sound monetarily, while also comprised of proposals that make sense strategically for the county. That may even include entire new ways of thinking, something that Gwinnett voters have not seen before.
We’ll throw out a proposal to see if it flies: Gwinnett should develop two mass transit hard-rail lines in Gwinnett, while thinking of the future. One route would connect with the Doraville MARTA station, have a station at the former Western Electric site, then follow the power line right-of-ways to the Gwinnett Arena. Years from now, that route could continue to Buford, and possibly Gainesville.
The second line would leave the Indian Creek MARTA station, head for Snellville, then end in Lawrenceville. Years from now, we can see this route connecting to Winder and Athens, as these two areas become part of the wider Metro Atlanta area.
Possible? It’s up to the commissioners to make sure some proposal is presented, and for the voters to approve it. Progress: sure, it’s a long shot.
However, if Gwinnett does nothing, it will merely fall aside from competing with other areas of the world for intelligent expansion of transit.
The oldest mass transit system is in London, built while we were fighting the Civil War, in 1863. Finally, near the turn of the 20th Century, other cities started building transit systems, often underground, simply to facilitate the movement of people.
Budapest and Glasgow systems date from 1896. Other early systems include:
- Chicago (the El), 1897
- Paris, 1900;
- Boston, 1901;
- Berlin, 1902;
- New York, 1904;
- Athens, 1904;
- Philadelphia, 1907;
- Hamburg, 1912;
- Buenos Aires, 1913;
- Madrid, 1919;
- Barcelona, 1924;
- Tokyo, 1927;
- Osaka, 1933;
- Moscow, 1935;
- Stockholm, 1950
- Toronto, 1954;
- Rome, 1955.
Why does Gwinnett need to catch up on mass transit? There are already 179 cities in the world with mass transit systems. Atlanta dates from 1979. In addition, there are 32 worldwide cities where mass transit systems are now under construction.
But get this: Of the 179 cities with mass transit systems, 41 of these are in China alone. And China has seven cities where systems are under construction. Added together, 48 of the world’s 211 transit systems (23 percent), are in China! India has 13 transit systems, and seven more cities building systems now.
Yet even third level cities have their own systems for moving people around. This would include Algiers, Minsk, Sofia, Tbilisi, Pyongyang (yes North Korea), Monterrey, Oslo, Panama City, Lima, Lausanne, Izmir, Kiev, and Caracas, among others.
It’s time for Gwinnett to make a decision.
Source: Wikipedia.
- Have a comment? Send to: elliott@brack.net
Lot of our thinking goes back to John Locke, quite ironical
By Ashley Herndon
OCEANSIDE, Calif. | With all of the folderol these past weeks and months, the turmoil has resurrected in my mind some historical philosophies and structures of our great democratic experiment.
Herndon
It’s funny how recently when sharing some of these thoughts with friends, family, and acquaintances I have heard a lot of hunhs…and even been ‘unfriended’. At least, I can’t be unfamilied, I don’t think! I have been diagnosed as crazy, characterized in some unprintable phrases, and other epithets…but I plod on. All of this necessary emphasis on inequality and unnecessary uncivil behavior led me to review how we became or got started as an unequal society.
Then I remembered John Locke (1632–1704). He was hard to read and grasp. He was an English philosopher and physician and widely regarded as one of the most influential of the Enlightenment thinkers and commonly known as the “Father of Liberalism.” (Wikipedia)
Locke
Locke was referred to in his day as the “great and glorious asserter of natural Rights and Liberties of Mankind.” [Not just white northern Europeans.] He was responsible for more than his Two Treatises of Government (1689). These became the playbook of American Revolutionaries. Jefferson paraphrased him in ‘The Declaration’, and many of us citizens were taught at both the high school and university levels such supreme ‘liberal’ philosophies. Read on.
Another consideration. Locke also authored the Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina (1669), which granted that “every Freeman in Carolina shall have ABSOLUTE POWER AND AUTHORITY over his Negro Slaves.”
As one of his loudest critics exclaimed in 1776, “Such was the language of the humane Mr. Locke!”
This reference was not surprising or unwarranted, since Locke was a founding member and the third-largest stockholder of the Royal African Company. This company secured & held a monopoly over the British slave trade. You reckon his relationship to Carolinian slavery (even from afar) was a bit more than incidental?
Locke undoubtedly had a decisive hand in drafting the inherently illiberal Fundamental Constitutions, which did more than endorse slavery. It was a manifesto promoting a semi feudalistic and wholly aristocratic society. Every effort had been made to “avoid erecting a numerous democracy.”
No wonder our forefathers then and us today have missed the full throat of freedom … and been coerced by elitism right from jump street, without being taught or learned the facts.
Another reason why it seems inequality is pervasive in our country can also be related to Locke’s period as precedents. A court of heraldry was added to the governances to oversee marriages and maintain pedigree, or (don’t get ‘uppity’). This court pedigree gave the credence to establishing class identity and providing a policing method for its maintenance…at least in the southern colonies. The northern colonies had their issues with strict religious/puritanical and then industrial classes to strengthen their social and economic systems/hierarchies.
Sing along with me: “Red and Yellow, Black and White, they are precious in his sight.”
- Have a comment? Send to: elliott@brack.net
The Gwinnett Stripers
The public spiritedness of our underwriters allows us to bring GwinnettForum.com to you at no cost to readers. The Gwinnett Stripers, Triple-A International League affiliate of the Atlanta Braves, is one of these supporters. On March 1 Major League Baseball (MLB) and Minor League Baseball (MiLB) announced there would be a delay in the start of both the MLB and MiLB seasons in the best interest of public health amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. Currently, the beginning of our season remains postponed consistent with the mandates of MLB and MiLB. We place our full trust in MLB, MiLB and the local public health authorities as they work on determining the timing of a safe return to Coolray Field for our fans and team. We will continue to provide information as it becomes available and we look forward to baseball returning when it is safe.
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Florida pedestrian bridge was built of different material
Editor, the Forum:
A recent post questioned the Peachtree Corners pedestrian bridge, wondering if it might collapse as one did in Florida. The record shows that the bridge at the Florida International University was nothing like the one at The Forum. What fell in Florida was structural concrete bridge, not a metal bridge as Peachtree Corners has.
— Mike Wood, Peachtree Corners
Seeks reasons why anyone would vote to reelect president
Editor, the Forum:
I’m confused as an open minded voter. As a news junky I watch MSNBC and Fox News. I read The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. I have trouble understanding why anyone would vote for Trump. I cannot discern any specific action by Trump that makes America better.
If anyone can point to an evidence-based action done by Trump that improves American society please reply to this letter. I am open to having my eyes wide-opened but doubt anyone will be able to give facts to support Trump’s re-election.
— Al Schneiberg, Sugar Hill
Dear Al: We suspect some in the Trump Camp will be pleased to enlighten you on this question, and we hope they will present such evidence here. After all, we like to feel that we have open-minded readers in all political camps.–eeb
Send us your thoughts: We encourage you to send us your letters and thoughts on issues raised in GwinnettForum. Please limit comments to 300 words. We reserve the right to edit for clarity and length. Send feedback and letters to: elliott@brack.net
GC&B offers great playtime while cleaning up roads, streams
While it’s not exactly “playtime” during the COVID-19 pandemic, participation in Gwinnett Clean and Beautiful’s Adopt-A-Road and Adopt-A-Stream Programs are a great way to get outdoors while having a positive impact on your community.
For Adopt-A-Road, Gwinnett Clean and Beautiful (GC&B) will provide all the supplies you need – safety vests, trash bags, warning signs and litter grabbers – in a handy supply bag. GC&B does this in exchange for you adopting a one-mile+ stretch of road in our county to keep clean and beautiful for a period of one year on at least four cleanup days. This will give your family, group, organization, neighborhood or business a featured spot on two Adopt-A-Road signs as recognition for your service.
For Adopt-A-Stream, GC&B will provide water monitoring training along with all the supplies needed so you can collect baseline water quality data to help us observe the conditions of local streams. This will also increase awareness of pollution and water quality issues. This program also comes complete with certifications in chemical, bacterial and macroinvertebrate testing from GC&B and the Gwinnett County Department of Water Resources.
- Any individual or groups that have any questions about next steps, send GC&B a message at gwinnettcb@gwinnettcb.org.
Gwinnett library offers virtual programs of authors in July
The Gwinnett County Public Library has live virtual programs for the community and you don’t need a mask! Please add these author events to your published calendar.
July 7 at 3 p.m.: Marian Keyes, author of Grown Ups. Marian Keyes is an Irish writer of fiction noted for its readability. As well as her novels, she produces non-fiction and is best known for her work in women’s literature. Much of her writing deals with family life.
July 7 at 7 p.m.: Rita Woods, author of Remembrance. She is a family doctor and the director of a wellness center. Remembrance is her first novel. The author will appear in conversation with Atlanta’s own author, Joshilyn Jackson, the New York Times bestselling author of The Almost Sisters, Never Have I Ever and many others.
July 21 at 5 p.m.: Kristin Harmel, author of The Winemaker’s Wife, the number one international bestselling and USA. She is author of The Room on Rue Amelie, and a dozen other novels that have been translated into numerous languages and sold all over the world.
July 21 at 7 p. m.: Atlanta Reads – virtual live book club. Please email events@gwinnettpl.org to let us know you want to join in. The Library will send you a reminder and a link you click on to join that night.
July 28 at 7 p.m.: Sameer Pandya and Kiley Reid with Joshilyn Jackson. Join New York Times bestselling novelist Joshilyn Jackson for a live author conversation with Sameer Pandya and Kiley Reid about their new books Members Only (Pandya) and Such a Fun Age (Reid).
GGC students to save a bundle through textbook grant
Georgia Gwinnett College (GGC) students will save a projected $585,000 in textbook costs, thanks to more than $66,000 in Textbook Transformation Grants. GGC faculty members will use the money to create open-source textbooks, learning materials and other resources online.
Offered through Affordable Learning Georgia (ALG), the grant program is designed to increase the availability of affordable alternatives to traditional textbooks. Research conducted by the College Board suggests that college students paid more than $1,200 to purchase textbooks and supplies in the 2018-19 academic year.
It takes about a year to build and test the online materials, according to Dr. Hyesung Park. The assistant professor of information technology, who, along with her team, earned one of the three grants awarded to GGC, said a lot goes into the creation of these resources. She says:
“We work to align the online books and resources to meet course outcomes, while being accessible, engaging and targeted to meet the needs of our students.”
Assistant professor of information technology, Dr. Umar Khokhar and his team also earned a grant. Khokhar said the online textbooks and resource materials can contribute to student success. He adds: “The students really like to have online materials, which they can access from anywhere,” he said. “In addition to that, no-cost solutions also save money and I believe this also increases the students’ retention as well.”
In a recent survey, students gave high marks to the online materials. One student wrote: “It’s very easy to access and I could access it anywhere, plus very organized, so I could find what I needed in a few seconds.” Another said: “I like that it was written by our professors with their knowledge and experience and that there was no cost to the book.”
The University System of Georgia and GALILEO, Georgia’s Virtual Library, reported award amounts ranged from $2,400 to $30,000 for each project proposal. In this round of funding, GGC garnered the highest grant award total for its three projects.
GGC officials said this round of grant awards brings the college’s ALG award total to more than $370,000 and represents a total cost savings of $2.7 million for GGC students since the program began in 2015.
Movie: A Fortunate Man by Bille August
From Karen Harris, Stone Mountain: This Danish feature film is a lush and yet restrained look at ambition thwarted by misdirected ambition. Peter Sidernius is a gifted engineering student who has conceived of a way to improve Denmark’s environment by harnessing energy through water and wind turbines. After a brutal break with his family, Peter moves to Copenhagen to attract supporters of his plan. He meets Philip Solomon, who enthusiastically supports Peter’s ideas. Peter meets Philip’s sisters, Nanny and Jakobe, and pursues Jakobe. The two suffer separations as Peter single-mindedly pursues his goals. His battles with his family are in the background as the years go by and subtle awareness is thwarted by Peter’s singular path. The film is based upon the eight-volume novel translated into English as Lucky Per, written by Danish Nobel Prize-winning author Henrik Pontoppidan. It was originally published between 1898 and 1904.
An invitation: what books, restaurants, movies or web sites have you enjoyed recently? Send us your recent selection, along with a short paragraph (150 words) as to why you liked this, plus what you plan to visit or read next. Send to: elliott@brack.net
Multiple ships of U.S. Navy have been named Savannah
The fourth USS Savannah (CL-42) engaged in Atlantic and Meditteranean operations during World War II (1941-45), most notably Operation Torch, the allied invasion of North Africa.
Between the late 1800s and mid 20th centuries, multiple ships belonging to the U.S. Navy were named Savannah. Two ships carrying the name CSS Savannah were part of the Confederate navy and are the subject of a separate article.
USS Savannah, 1799-1802
The first USS Savannah was a coastal galley constructed by John Patterson in Savannah in 1799. It was one of a few vessels commissioned by Congress to serve as naval militia training craft. The ship was designed by Joshua Humphreys and eventually came under command of Major General Charles C. Pinckney of South Carolina. After three years of use off the Georgia coast, it was sold in 1802.
USS Savannah, 1842-1870
The second USS Savannah was commissioned by the U.S. Navy as a frigate. Construction began in New York City in 1820 but was not completed until 1842 for lack of funding. Commanded by Andrew Fitzhugh, the Savannah joined the Pacific Squadron as its flagship in 1844. In preparation for the Mexican War (1846-48), the Savannah and the rest of its squadron were positioned off the coast of California. On July 7, 1846, less than two months after war broke out, the Savannah successfully took the provincial capital of Monterey without firing a shot.
In 1853 the vessel was assigned a three-year stint on the Brazil Station, a fleet of ships that protected American trade with Brazil and Argentina. Inactivated upon its return in 1856, the ship was then converted into a 24-gun sloop of war and later served as part of a home squadron that patrolled the Gulf of Mexico. On March 6, 1860, the Savannah and the USS Saratoga participated in the “battle” of Anton Lizardo, in which they engaged and captured two Mexican ships that had been commandeered by mutineers.
During the Civil War (1861-65), the Savannah was deployed off the coast of Georgia where it helped capture two Confederate prizes—a schooner, E.J. Waterman, and a ship, Cheshire—before being taken out of active service in February 1862. For the remainder of the conflict, it served as a training ship at the U.S. Naval Academy. After the war, the Savannah continued in that capacity on transatlantic routes, until it was decommissioned in 1870. In 1883 the vessel was sold to E. Stannard and Company.
(To be continued)
- To view the Georgia Encyclopedia article online, go to http://georgiaencyclopedia.org
Here’s a building for you to pinpoint its location
With what looks like a “rose” window, this could be a church. Tell us more about this building, what it actually is now, and where it’s located. Send your thoughts to elliott@brack.net and include your hometown.
What was thought would be a relatively easy photo for local residents to recognize turned out to have only two correct answers…..and from people who do not live in Georgia. The mystery Photo was that of Myers Hall, a co-ed dormitory at the University of Georgia.
George Graf of Palmyra, Va. writes: “Myers Hall – named for Jennie Belle Myers, a longtime house mother at UGA – opened in 1954. It is also the residence hall where Charlayne Hunter-Gault lived after she and Hamilton Holmes desegregated UGA in 1961; a display of memorabilia related to that time in UGA’s history is planned for the lobby.
“Located at the heart of South Campus, Myers Community is home to several innovative residential academic programs; Mary Lyndon Hall houses the French and Spanish language communities, Rutherford Hall is the location of Franklin Residential College, and Myers Hall is the magnet residence hall for the University of Georgia Honors Program. With historic Soule Hall, the residence halls of Myers Community deliver housing to approximately 880 students in a variety of coeducational and visitation arrangements.”
Allan Peel of San Antonio, Tex. comments: “Today’s mystery photo will likely be easy for many of your readers. It is the Myers Hall at UGA in Athens.
“The Myers Community or ‘Quad’ consists of four residential halls – the Myers, Rutherford, Mary Lyndon and Soule Halls. The building depicted in the mystery photo is the Myers Hall, and is located on South Lumpkin Street in the heart of the South Campus, just a stone throw away from Sanford Stadium, the Tate Student Center, and the Stegeman Coliseum. Because of its central location, and attractive grounds, the area around the Myers Hall is often used as a central tailgating location during home football games. The dorm has a capacity of 410 students and the four-story Myers Hall was built in 1953.”
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