5/25: Land purchase; Primary election review; A look at local turnout

The NEW PAUL DUKE STEM SCHOOL will have offer a tour of the new facility on Tuesday, June 5 from 7:30 a.m. until 9 a.m. The new school will have its first group of students will enroll in the building beginning this August.

Editor’s Note: Today’s edition is somewhat abbreviated since GwinnettForum has been experiencing email problems. We request that anyone who has sent us emails in the last four days re-send them to this address: ebrack2@gmail.com. We regret this interruption of service, and hope to get our server cooperating soon.—eeb

TODAY’S FOCUS: County Buys Land at JCB and I-85 for Continued Film Production

EEB PERSPECTIVE: Looking at the Primary Results and Thoughts on the Governor’s Race

ANOTHER VIEW: First Time since 1984, More Democratic Votes in Gwinnett Than GOP

SPOTLIGHT: Brand Bank

McLEMORE’S WORLD: Up Here

UPCOMING: Two Way Traffic Conversion Will Begin in Early July in Lawrenceville

NOTABLE: Nearly 300 Graduate from Georgia Campus of PCOM

RECOMMENDED: A Piece of the World by Christina Baker Kline

GEORGIA TIDBIT: Birth of the City of Fitzgerald Has Its Roots in Indiana

MYSTERY PHOTO: Handsome Classic Building Awaits Your Figuring Out

CALENDAR: Fast Track 5K To Be Run in Duluth on May 26

County buys land at JCB and I-85 for continued film production

By Heather Sawyer

LAWRENCEVILLE, Ga.  |  The Gwinnett County Board of Commissioners will purchase approximately 104 acres at the OFS Fiber Optics site along I-85 at Jimmy Carter Boulevard through the Urban Redevelopment Agency of Gwinnett County (URA).

This acquisition will allow the site to continue to be used for major film production purposes, while OFS will continue to manufacture optical fiber on the balance of the property. The purchase will also enable redevelopment of the acquired portion of the property, creating a major catalyst for redevelopment along the Jimmy Carter Boulevard corridor, a priority for the Board of Commissioners.

“This property is the gateway to Gwinnett County and is one of the premier pieces of real estate in the metro Atlanta area, making this not only a good deal for our community, but truly a strategic investment in its long-term success,” said District 2 Commissioner Lynette Howard.

“This new partnership will enable one of Gwinnett County’s top employers to continue to expand its operations and create jobs that will spur additional economic opportunity. This move also gives us a greater say in the site’s potential redevelopment opportunities in the future.”

The 169-acre tract of land adjacent to I-85 and Jimmy Carter Blvd. is comprised of three primary structures, Buildings 20, 30 and 50, as well as multiple draw towers used for the manufacture of optical fiber. The URA has agreed to purchase approximately 104 acres, including Buildings 20 and 50. Building 20 features 260,750 square feet of office space, while Building 50 has 422,800 square feet currently allocated to film production.

Additionally, the URA will lease roughly 60,000 square feet of office space in Building 20 back to OFS for a three-year term.

OFS is retaining 66 acres of the existing site, including Building 30, and the existing manufacturing facilities for its fiber optics business. The company is currently expanding its operations and workforce on the site. For several years, OFS has designated a portion of its property to movie production. In recent years, the site has served as a principal production facility for more than 35 movie and TV productions, including multiple major film franchises.

The total cost of the acquisition is approximately $34.32 million. The property is situated within the Gwinnett County Opportunity Zone, which means it is eligible for financing through Urban Redevelopment Agency Revenue Bonds, which will be issued by the URA with an annual debt service of approximately $2.45 million. Revenues from ongoing film production on the property, as well as lease payments from OFS on Building 20, are projected to cover most of the annual debt service.

Per the details of the contract, OFS will manage and operate the studio space on behalf of Gwinnett County. In addition, Manhattan Beach Studios, which has marketed the facility to various productions on behalf of OFS, will continue to do so for the URA.

Timothy F. Murray, head of the Global Optical Fiber and Cable business of Furukawa Electric and CEO and Chairman of OFS, says:  “The proliferation of hyper-scale and edge data centers, 5G wireless, and fiber-to-the-home (FTTH), along with the greater digitization of communications in business, are creating the need for fiber in Georgia and around the world.

“Furukawa Electric is responding with greater capacity, which you can see with the expansions and employment growth in Norcross and Carrollton. We foresee this demand continuing into the next decade with communication traffic estimated to increase during this period. The proceeds from the sale of the surplus assets will be reinvested to address the growth in our business.”

• Have a comment? Send to:  elliott@brack.net

Looking at the primary results and thoughts on the governor’s race

By Elliott Brack
Editor and publisher, GwinnettForum

MAY 25, 2018  |  It’s been quite intoxicating for me as several readers questioned why GwinnettForum did not give some facts and guidance on the races for governor in the primaries.

One person said: “You told us of your choices for every race around except the governor. And we don’t have on your site any information from the gubernatorial candidates. Why is that?”

We now recognize that was a shortcoming of ours. The reason that you didn’t see information in the governor’s race is that our thinking was that it was the one political battle where the voters knew a good deal about the candidates.  Therefore, our thought was to concentrate on the lower ticket races, where most people knew less about the candidates. We concentrated  our efforts with candidates in races from lieutenant governor on down.

Well, we were wrong. We should at least have given some guidance and allowed the candidates for governor to speak directly to the voters by answering questions we should have proposed to them. While there may not be enough time for us to do this in the run-off, we’ll certainly ask the two major candidates for governor for their input in GwinnettForum in the General Election.

Our apologies.

A MAJOR VICTORY for the people of Gwinnett this election season was the high quality of people seeking the many offices on the ballot.

Time after time, in both parties, we found solid, principled and competent people wanting to become public servants, in the many races.  That made us proud, and you should be proud, too. The candidates are beginning to reflect the diversity in Gwinnett.

The upshot is that it means that those elected from all sectors of the population should become good public servants, responsible to the people, and in the long run, we can hope, we will have better government. What more can you want from an election?

Granted, not all the candidates chose to spend 30 minutes with GwinnettForum.  We regret that they did not all take advantage of this opportunity. For those who did not choose to come see us, we simply disregarded their candidacy, and hope if they ever run again, we might get to meet and know something about them to pass on to our readers.

NEVER HAS Gwinnett County had a person from this county who became governor.

While Zell Miller had a second home in Norcross when he became governor, his main home remained in Young Harris.

The only other closest to a local governor we have had in recent years was that former Gov. George Busbee, who  chose to live in Gwinnett after he left office. He and his wife are also buried here.

The best chance for a person from Gwinnett to become governor rests now on the shoulders of Sen. David Shafer, who came within 1.4 percent of winning the Republican nomination for lieutenant governor.  He faces a runoff to win that post. Should he eventually win the run-off and the General Election, he would be in a good position to become Gwinnett’s first sitting governor.

THE MAJOR UPSET in Gwinnett in the Democratic primary was the defeat of Sen. Curt Thompson for the 5^th District Senate seat. Sheikh Rahman, a native of Bangladesh who now lives in Lawrenceville, thoroughly trounced Thompson, by a vote of 4,002 to 1,885, and won outright victory, since there was no GOP opponent.

Those candidates who made the runoff now have two months to politic before the July 24 runoff election.

• Have a comment? Send to:  elliott@brack.net

First time since 1984, more Democratic votes in Gwinnett than GOP

By Elliott Brack
Editor and publisher, GwinnettForum

MAY 25, 2018  |  For 34 years, Gwinnett has been a largely Republican County. However, judging from the turnout in the 2018 primary, the county may be moving toward more Democrats in office.

Not only that, remember that in the 2014 presidential election, Gwinnett went for Hillary Clinton, as 166,153 votes went to Ms. Clinton and 146,989 voted for President Trump. However, in other Gwinnett races in 2014, the Republicans continued to out-vote Democrats.

But that trend is in danger, you could say from results of the 2018 primary.  In every  head-to-head race throughout the county, save one, more Democratic votes were counted than Republican votes.

For instance, in the race for governor, the total Democratic votes in Gwinnett was 40,535, compared to 36,194 votes for the Republicans.  On and on down the list, the Democrats were in the majority of the votes cast in every race, except one. That was the District 2 school board race, where Republicans held the majority, 6,452 to 6,095.

Check out the other races in this accompanying table.

Democrats controlled Gwinnett County for years, up until 1984. That was the year that Republicans first outpolled Democrats. That year there were 18 offices open in Gwinnett County. One Democrat, the county Probate Judge Alton Tucker, was unopposed, and went back into office. However, in the other 17 races, Republicans captured every office. And since 1984, the Republican Party has been by far the dominant political party in Gwinnett County.

However, remember this: There were 500,308 people registered to vote. But only 80,602 voted, for a puny turnout of only 16 percent. Perhaps we should limit making big projections from such a low primary turnout.

So, in the General Election, will Republican domination continue?  Or will the Democrats have the viable candidates to make Gwinnett competitive?  Come November, we’ll find out.

• Have a comment? Send to:  elliott@brack.net

BrandBank

The public spiritedness of our sponsors allows us to bring GwinnettForum.com to you at no cost to readers.  Today’s sponsor is BrandBank, Gwinnett County’s oldest locally-owned community bank with total assets of $2.4 Billion.  Chartered as The Brand Banking Company in 1905, BrandBank was recently named #1 in Customer Service among all banks its size in the United States as surveyed by CSP, Inc.  The full-service bank is committed to the communities it serves by combining best-in-class personal service with innovative products and services using state of the art mobile technology.  BrandBank operates branches in Buford, Duluth, Flowery Branch, Grayson, Lawrenceville, Snellville, and Suwanee. Loan production offices are located in Alpharetta, Buckhead, Kennesaw, and Winder. BrandMortgage is a wholly-owned subsidiary of The Brand Banking Company and has an extensive menu of innovative lending products in 10 states.

• For more information, go to https://www.thebrandbank.com/ .
• For a list of other sponsors of this forum, click here.

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Two-way traffic conversion will begin in early July in Lawrenceville

Lawrenceville’s much-anticipated two-way conversion of Perry Street and Clayton Street is set to begin the transition on July 9. As part of the city’s Livable Communities Initiative, the conversion will allow for improved mobility, better visibility and increased safety.

The changeover on Perry and Clayton Streets from Pike Street south to the merge will take place over several weeks beginning July 9 based on the amount of work accomplished by crews on the previous night. During the conversion, drivers are advised to be patient, cautious, informed and aware. All construction work and estimated timelines are weather permitting.

Lawrenceville City Manager Chuck Warbington says: “The two-way conversion project represents an important step in the city’s vision of moving Lawrenceville forward. The two-way streets will benefit all of those who live, work, play and visit Lawrenceville’s downtown by providing increased connectivity, better navigation, and pedestrian safety. We are looking forward to having the project completed and ask for the public’s patience during the conversion process.”

The Atlanta Regional Commission’s LCI program encourages local governments to create plans that link transportation improvements with land use development strategies to create mixed-use communities. The primary goals for downtown Lawrenceville include organizing the downtown study area into a series of character areas around the Courthouse Square, ensuring that walking within downtown is safe, convenient and enjoyable. It must also create a sense of place through quality architecture that responds to Historic Lawrenceville and is unique to the downtown area.

The city of Lawrenceville is currently undergoing a resurgence of growth and expansion that is infusing not only the city, but also Greater Gwinnett, with regional economic impact, a solid core and infrastructure to support and grow Metro Atlanta’s most dynamic community. Other developments and improvements include the College Corridor, the cultural arts facility, the South Lawn project, the Lawrenceville Housing Authority project and the City View project.

Proposed timelines for the project will be available on this site as the conversion process nears implementation.

County moves to enhance tourism and expand Infinite Energy Center

The Gwinnett County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday took several actions intended to enhance tourism and to support the expansion of the Infinite Energy Center, as an important local amenity and regional tourist attraction.

For nearly 30 years the Gwinnett Convention and Visitors Bureau (GCVB), now known as Explore Gwinnett, has promoted Gwinnett County as a tourist destination. Commissioners formalized the relationship through an agreement appointing the organization as the County’s destination marketing organization. In exchange, the GCVB will receive a portion of the County’s hotel/motel tax for the purposes of promoting tourism, conventions and trade shows.

The move preceded another action amending the County’s hotel/motel tax rate to eight  percent. The new rate takes effect on Aug. 1, 2018. The last rate change occurred 18 years ago.

Two years ago the Board of Commissioners endorsed the master plan for the Infinite Energy Center campus. In addition, voters approved $67.34 million in 2017 SPLOST funding for expansion projects at the center.

In other action taken Tuesday, commissioners amended the operation and management agreement with the GCVB to manage the center’s expansion. They also approved a resolution authorizing and setting parameters for a bond issue to fund construction of a conference center, parking deck and other improvements on the campus. This is the first construction bond issue Gwinnett County has approved in nearly 10 years. Over the last decade, the County has focused on refunding and paying down debt. Staff anticipates returning to the commissioners in July with pricing results for the bonds.

Board Chairman Charlotte Nash said the Infinite Energy Center expansion is an exciting opportunity for Gwinnett County. “I’m grateful for Explore Gwinnett’s efforts to promote tourism over the years and look forward to their plans for attracting even more visitors,” said Nash. “I’m grateful to Gwinnett voters for recognizing the ability of SPLOST to enhance our community’s quality of life. And I’m grateful to my fellow board members for their support of the center’s expansion for the future enjoyment of residents and visitors.”

According to Explore Gwinnett, the Infinite Energy Center provides $200 million in economic impact annually.

Nearly 300 graduate from Georgia campus of PCOM

Nearly 300 students graduated with doctorate and master’s degrees in osteopathic medicine, pharmacy and biomedical sciences on May 24, from the  Georgia Campus – Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine (GA-PCOM). Commencement ceremonies were at the Infinite Energy Center.

Prior to graduation, a commencement dinner dance, honors brunches and a military pinning ceremony have been held. The ceremony was livestreamed via the GA-PCOM Facebook page for those unable to attend the ceremony.

The featured speaker at the ceremony was Jennifer Sterner-Allison, PharmD, the president of the Georgia Society of Health-System Pharmacists, who works as a clinical pharmacy manager at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta.

Paul Evans, the founding dean of the osteopathic medicine program at GA-PCOM, also spoke.  He currently serves as a senior medical education consultant and the president of the Paul and Roxanne Evans Education Foundation.

The commencement ceremony for the inaugural physician assistant studies class will take place on July 31 at 11 a.m. at the Infinite Energy Forum.

• For more information on GA-PCOM commencement activities, visit https://www.pcom.edu/student-life/commencement/.

GGC sweeps To 3 national championships at tech confab

Georgia Gwinnett College (GGC) information technology (IT) majors won three national championships at the U.S. Information Technology Collegiate Conference (USITCC) held recently in San Antonio, Texas.

Produced by the Foundation for IT Education, the USITCC includes nine technical competitions through which students can test their skills against the nation’s best and brightest in the IT and computer science fields. GGC’s students continued that winning record at this year’s inaugural USITCC.  Bess Burnett, ’18, and Daniel Sales, ’19, won the national trophy in the mobile application development category, while Michael Strickland, ’19, won the national title in the security category.

GGC dominated in the database design category. Steven Beteag, ’18, and Jarrod Bailey, ’20, placed fourth, while Neal Klemenc, ’18, and Joseph Tsegaye, ’18, placed third and Bess Burnett, ’18, and Johanna Timmer, ’18, took second place. Chelsea D’Alessandro, ’18, and Robert Strong, ’18, won first to take the national championship.

Lissa Pollacia, assistant dean and professor of information technology in GGC’s School of Science and Technology, emphasized: “In more than 30 years of competitions, no other school has swept all four places in a single competition category. While we have won several national championships in past years, this is the first time GGC has won the national championship in one third of the competition categories.”

This is the fourth national championship GGC has won in the database design category in less than a decade of the college’s participation.

The students’ performance also earned GGC the first Top Performing School Award, a new trophy introduced at this year’s competition.

A Piece of the World by Christina Baker Kline

This marvelous novel opens our eyes to two areas we knew little about: the person in the painting, ‘Christina’s World’ by Andrew Wyeth, and the depth of the harshness of living through a winter in Maine.  While this is entirely a fictitious work, the author has immersed herself with facts about the life of Christina Olson and her family, and draws a vivid picture of what it is living a life with a limitation, in this case a polio-like disease which makes it more and more difficult for Christina to walk. Eventually, she simply has to crawl to get around, all the time managing a house without modern elements like electricity, running water or substantial heat in a home virtually not insulated. It also makes you understand why L.L. Bean’s items must be substantial, and last a long life. Fascinating book!—eeb

An invitation: what books, restaurants, movies or web sites have you enjoyed recently? Send us your recent selection, along with a short paragraph (100 words) as to why you liked this, plus what you plan to visit or read next.  Send to:  elliott@brack.net

Birth of the city of Fitzgerald has its roots in Indiana

Fitzgerald, the seat of Ben Hill County, is located in the heart of south central Georgia, 25 miles northeast of Tifton. Settled in 1896 by a land company under the direction of Philander H. Fitzgerald, the town is best known as a place of reconciliation among Civil War (1861-65) veterans.

Fitzgerald, a former drummer boy in the Union army, had become a pension attorney with a thriving practice in Indianapolis, Ind. His interest in the welfare of his fellow veterans, well documented in the widely read weekly newspaper American Tribune, led Fitzgerald to conceive of the idea for a soldiers’ colony in the South.

Georgia Governor William J. Northen was eager to settle some of the sparsely populated areas in the wiregrass region of the Coastal Plain, and after some negotiation they settled on the area around the site of the former turpentine village of Swan on the Ocmulgee River.

Early on, the prospect of so many northerners inhabiting the Deep South was a strange concept, but as soon as settlement began, the locals offered their cooperation. An early nickname of Fitzgerald, the “Colony City,” is still in use today. Through this harmony the idea that the town would be a spotlight of post- Reconstruction reconciliation was assured. There was little strife among the new colonists, who proved their dedication to unity by naming an equal number of streets in the city proper for Union and Confederate notables. In one of the first public-works constructions in the United States, a mammoth four-story hotel was built; it was named the Lee-Grant Hotel, to honor the leaders of the opposing sides of the Civil War.

In 1906 the town became the seat of the newly created Ben Hill County, named for prominent Confederate Georgia senator Benjamin Hill. Previously the town was located in Irwin County, which was subdivided partly because Fitzgerald was about five times the size of the county seat of Irwinville. Almost immediately there was a model structure of government in the newly designated seat of government. A mayor and council were soon elected, and the city already had in place fire and police protection, infrastructure, and even a utility provider, which was quite rare at the time. The school system was among the first in the state of Georgia to issue free textbooks to students, in 1897.

Much attention was brought to the city through the efforts of Beth Davis, founder and director of the Blue and Gray Museum. The museum hosts a Roll Call of the States, in which visitors from every state in the Union are photographed with their respective state flags. This idea was derived from an early custom in the colony in which representatives of the many northern and midwestern states paraded in unity through the center of town.

The writers Brainard Cheney and Frances Mayes, as well as military leader Raymond G. Davis, were born in Fitzgerald.

Mayor Gerald Thompson, who held office from 1968 to 2011, made the growth of Fitzgerald his life’s work. Through his efforts nearly 30 industries, East Central Technical College (later Wiregrass Georgia Technical College), and services usually expected only in larger cities thrived. According to the U.S. census, the 2010 population of Fitzgerald was 9,053.

• To view the Georgia Encyclopedia online, go to http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org

Handsome classic building awaits your figuring out

Here’s another handsome building for our readers as today’s Mystery Photo. Figure out where it is and tell us something about it. However, send your answers this time to ebrack1935@yahoo.com, and include your hometown.

Because of email problems, GwinnettForum did not get any responses to the last Mystery Photo, which was provided by Frank Kellert of Norcross. the photo was taken in Prague, in the Czech Republic, and is the statue of Jan Hus in the Old Time Square. Hus was a Czech theologian, Roman Catholic priest, philosopher, master, dean and rector of the Charles University in Prague.

Fast Track 5K will be on Saturday, May 26, starting at 8:30 a.m. in downtown Duluth. . Participants and spectators are encouraged to dress in patriotic attire. The race is a USA Track and Field certified event and is a Peachtree Road Race pre-qualifier. To register, log onto http://tinyurl.com/FT5K2018. The race starts in front of Eddie Owens Presents at the Red Clay Theater and finishes on the Town Green approaching the festival center. Southeastern Railway Museum and the City of Duluth host this race.

Memorial Day Celebration in Duluth will be marked on Saturday, May 26 at 6 p.m. on the Town Green. The event will feature the Duluth ROTC with the presentation of colors; the pledge of allegiance led by Cub Scout Pack 420; and song performances by Lucy-Blair Owen. Guest Speaker will be Brigadier General Reginald G. A. Neal of Ludowici, who is presently director of the Joint Staff, Georgia National Guard. The City of Duluth places veteran flags and markers throughout Duluth City limits every year to honor our fellow men and woman who died while serving in the country’s armed forces. For more information, visit www.duluthga.net/events.

15^th Annual Memorial Day at the Gwinnett Fallen Heroes Memorial will be Monday, May 28, at 1 p.m. The ceremony is at the north parking lot of the Gwinnett Justice and Administration Center, 75 Langley Drive, Lawrenceville.  The keynote speaker will be Navy Capt. Baron V. Reinhold, commanding officer and professor of Navy Science for the Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps at Morehouse College and Georgia Tech. The service will honor Sp. Etienne Jules Murphy of Snellville, who was killed May 26, 2017, in a vehicle rollover in Syria as part of Operation Inherent Resolve fighting ISIS.

Generations Expo for 50+boomers and seniors will be at the Infinite Energy Center in Duluth on Saturday, June 2 from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. Adults over 50 or those planning for a loved one, or looking to their future, will find a world of Generations E-information, advice and opportunity at the fourth annual event, presented by Gwinnett Medical Center and the Gwinnett Daily Post.

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• Contributing columnist: George Wilson

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