 Hi everybody, my name is time Valentine. I don't despite yours working one. I don't really know how to hold a mic So this will hopefully suffice. We want to welcome you all so much to historic Athens I'm see a lot of familiar faces if this is your first time in Old Fire Hall number two We welcome you. We want you to know that we are very excited about tonight's proceedings tonight is a night for Athens to consider both the past present and future of our community We wanted to start with a short introduction of our organization And then we are going to pass things over to our excellent Moderator who will introduce in just a moment. My name is Tommy Valentine I serve as the executive director of historic Athens historic Athens is a 55 year old 501 c3 education advocacy nonprofit We work to celebrate and conserve the community heritage of Athens, Georgia Oftentimes you see us engaging work known as historic preservation or heritage conservation And that includes working to save some of the most important built parts of our environment homes neighborhoods Historic districts, but we also work to preserve uncover celebrate and educate on The full story of the Athens the Athens story Athens history We are constantly working to improve on that You probably know stories and nooks and crannies of Athens that we're still learning about But that's why this is not a it's not a one-person nonprofit This is a organization that has an audience of approximately 12,000 people Locally based here in Athens, Georgia. We have about 300 dues paying members who we are very grateful for including our sponsors And so tonight we will be live-streaming so that those that were not able to secure Tickets to this sold-out event are going to be able to watch from the comfort of their home I do want to take a moment just to acknowledge a few folks in the room if you are a member sponsor or a Member of our trustees if you just raise your hand for just a moment Okay, thank you The as I said, this is a year-round mission 55 years in we're not done and we know that there's a lot of work to do tonight's questions are going to concentrate primarily on issues of historic preservation local history and cultural community heritage so We do want to let you know that Because we were really interested not in gotcha moments But in carefully considered positions of these candidates all questions were submitted to the candidates more than a week in advance However, there's only about eight questions in each forum that are prescribed And so as time allows our moderator will turn to you the audience and solicit you for questions now It's candidates y'all so Folks have things to say they're running for a reason we may not get to those additional questions But it may not be a bad idea to keep one in the back of your mind if it's something that you'd like to share With the audience, okay, I want to take for a moment and take our microphone I didn't acknowledge our staff. You've met a lot of our interns for SPIA. So let's hear for our interns Historic Athens is very proud to Focus on paid internships only and that's supported through UGA's SPIA Also our staff if you remember verse to have I know we have some outside raise your hand staff staff staff staff Okay, great. Thank you In addition to in addition to our core education advocacy nonprofit historic Athens We also operate the historic Athens welcome center, which how many thousands a year? 9,000 people a year. That's their first touch point into Athens, Georgia We have Caitlyn from the welcome center Michelle from the welcome center You met Jody outside who works with hands-on historic Athens which provides direct home repairs to load a moderate-income individuals in historic homes often seniors living by themselves and Our newest employee who I'm going to be passing the microphone to is hope Igelhardt hope is our you can let's hear it for hope Hope is a longtime grassroots community advocate she was working in preservation well before I got here and was Largely responsible for the preservation of the first African-American historic District here in Athens, Georgia. She was part of our organization when we were known as Athens Clark Heritage Foundation She is now our director of engagement and African-American heritage And I wanted to pass the microphone to her so she can just introduce herself to you and talk a little bit more about the organization Welcome everyone It is an honor and privilege to be with you here tonight And we thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to be here with us um, one of the things that I would like to expound upon tonight is that historic Athens focuses on Public programming for our community and that includes each and every one of you My position was created to have a richer fuller experience in telling our story as not as just one Athens, but bringing the fabric of Athens together and so with that I'm going to turn that back over to Tommy Valentine All right, um, we do want to emphasize as a 501c3 Remember, yes, we're nonpartisan We're we do not engage in endorsements or campaign activity But we are able to provide things like this in the forthcoming voter guide That's going to be produced from our candidate questionnaire as voter education as part of that voter education We do want to urge you when you go to the ballot box to support tea sploss this year We have a signature project there that would allow us to increase historic district signage around the county Including for our next two historic districts, which we're hoping will be part of telling a fuller story. So With that said We are dependent on your support Hope salary was paid through a one-year grant provided by the National Trust for Historic Preservation But it's a seed grant Hope has already proven an irreplaceable part of our team But for the sake of hope and for our ongoing operations, we need more members and sponsors You can visit today from your phone historic Athens comm forward slash join to support programming like this and Ensuring that we're taking an equitable approach to local heritage conservation with that said Someone who's been we mentioned we're 55 years old The our moderator today was with us for 17 of those years He is one of the if not the longest serving trustee in our organization's history He is a past president of the historic Athens board of trustees a well-known community figure and the perfect person to moderate Fairly tonight's proceedings. Let's hear it from Marvin Nunnally Let me say good evening to everyone We want to just say first of all, thank you for sacrificing your time This would not be possible Historic Athens wouldn't be possible without you you you and you being here as I look across the room and see some of my fellow board members Who are on the board with me when I served here and people who've been out there fighting in the community for historic preservation here in Athens, Georgia I'll tell you it's just a joy Walter to see them out there like this beautiful lady over here Rosemary good And that's my sweetheart. Give her a hand y'all please give her a hand Yes, yes So without further ado, let's you know, we're gonna have a great time tonight We're gonna have a good if you got an empty seat raise your hand We got two over here three over here. So if you want to come take a seat, please come take a seat come take a seat So with our let's go ahead and get our candidates to come on down, please I've got mr. Mark Evans if you come down mr. Tim Denson Would you come on down elder Johnson and hottie Henson with y'all please come on down come on down See James Alexander as well. Mr. Alexander. Is he here? Do mr. Alexander make it in and hope you've got those Yeah, I need those How do you get to see you great great Now I'm ready to have a good time tonight folks, okay? I truly hope and pray that you all are ready because we're gonna come at you. Okay. All right. Can we do that now? Let me just say when I think of board of education, I think it's so integral to have People who are have the children The children at state so that's that's that's my backdrop. I'm gonna tell you right now I'm I'm a I have a heart for kids and I work with a youth group for the last 10 years And so I am an advocate with several different school districts and I show up and ask a lot of questions So once again, I'll take this out move this up to the side there now So what we'd like to do I would like to take a quick moment for each one of you to you know, just kind of real in a one minute or less Introduce yourself. We're gonna start with his height. Mr. Johnson. Mr. Dessen Thank you, mr. Evans Thank you, let's go ahead and get directly in the question Keep in mind candidates tonight's questions are geared toward historic Preservation dollar where we have historic Athens. So for all the candidates keep that in mind. Okay. All right So if you don't answer it historically, I'm gonna call you I'm gonna go bump. Okay Wrong answer. Okay, so we have a good time tonight number one And I like to ask each candidate answers in less two minutes or less. Is that correct? All right Here we go. All right Miss Inslee What is your favorite historic site building or neighborhood in Athens and what is your personal connection to it? This isn't really geared towards education But it is education because I do feel like kids need to understand the cultural history of Clark County and the Morton Theater Played such a critical part in that we had jazz and blues musicians That came to Athens, Georgia that that we need to learn about and know about It's a critical part. I think of the liberal arts piece of what we need to teach our kids So I'm gonna have to go with the Morton Theater. She stole mine, but I got more than one Morton Theater, of course, but uh growing up I had a best friend his dad His granddad actually was the owner Wilson's barbershop. So I always went down there I got my haircut and I had hot meals from Wilson's restaurant, which is now the Was it the world famous? But that that whole area hot corner. I spent Timeless amounts of time down there as a childhood And it's not just the structures the murals on it in that area Depict the story along with the structure and I think that's very important to emphasize not just on the buildings But the stories behind it, you know the sacrifices that were made, you know The time spent the blood sweat the tears like she said the performances not just the performances I remember I was in a program Early childhood called creative visions and we I was involved in a lot of productions at the Morton Theater So it's kind of near and dear to my part of it, you know, it's kind of near and dear to me personally But not just the Morton Theater specifically that whole area downtown Athens High Corner Thank you And man, I know like Tommy said the awesome the questions to us earlier. I've been thinking about this one It's hard. It's really hard. I mean, there's so many amazing places I think I could say a different one with every single answer um, I think uh, just what what's what's speaking to me right now is I would say, um The brick factory at sandy creek nature center. I don't know how many of y'all have gone there. It's a hidden one. I think Um, and it's amazing because right you go to these places no matter if it's the Morton No matter if it's wilson's the brick factory or any of our historic neighborhoods That history is there you get that you get to interact with it even for just a moment you get to actually imagine what this was like Um, you walk through the big brick factory ruins where there they are ruins like everything is falling over Although you'll be just wandering through it down a trail and you'll just come across these random bricks And it's so amazing you can touch it like somebody made that brick Like who know generations of go built this thing and these bricks were taken and made into the buildings and the roads that we have here in our community Um, and it's really amazing and that's why it's so important for us to be holding on to those things So that we can interact with it's not just us but in the future Because I think another important thing that like the history we get to think back in the past But it also reminds us that we are creating the present Which in the future will be the past and so what are we doing there the other people will come After me we'll think about too so Well as a historian when I got this question it was like well, which is your favorite child? Um, and and so I really had to think about And for the work that that I do um and a professional level, you know the area that we're in right now Um hill street. We're talking about a corridor of power That affected a nation that affected and not only just this community but on up and and dealt with Different people in places Um, so yeah, this is this is my place right here um, you know the cobblemaria And uh, the other ones are just as fine. Like I said, it was just like trying to pick my own child Um But you know if I had to pick a spot this would be it this area right here Oh, uh So that's a whole class But yeah, but I got I got two minutes. So, uh, let let me let me try My my philosophy is that history belongs to the public It belongs to all of us, right? We don't have a dictator who tells us how our past was or how it should be it belongs to all of us and we need To have representation in there We need to be able to take a look at the different places and have an understanding of all of the people that were there And so, um, my philosophy is is that we can do more with public history. We should do more As a charter system we do nothing with public history And that is a crying shame when I watch what other counties do with their charter We we sit here. Honestly, I can't tell the difference between What, uh, Atlanta public schools is doing and what we're doing. It's the same stuff Right, we need to take the bull by the horns And begin really focusing on some of the aspects of our history And making it accessible to our children in fact have our children have a deeper understanding Of the locality and community that they live in Same question. All right making sure. Um Yeah, I think my philosophy here is that you have to be thinking about this that our history Guides so much it guides our decision-making going forward It guides how we um digest Our world around us and our community how we see our community Um, and it's extremely important And I think one of the biggest problems that we've had is that Uh, we've had here in Athens and across the United States and across the world Uh, we've had a lot of history, um, preserved that has been of wealthy white men And that creates the way that people interact with the with their world around them That feeds into that It it it in some ways oftentimes glorifies it and it kind of puts it on a pedestal while the history of Of you know, the black communities and indigenous communities and and and the brown communities here and then also of women and especially also of of of No lower wealth people It's forgotten and it's not glorified And it's not taken into the way that we digest and interact the world And those people oftentimes are forgot about and looked at less or so than by the entire society um, and so I think it's a preserving history and and especially whenever you're given, uh, note the the The seats that we're all running for here now where you are given some power to actually to do that I mean, we are given the responsibility of preserving the history and so it's extremely important about Whose history are we going to be really prioritizing when we're given those opportunities to? um And I think in the past there's been a lot of errors all across Every single level of government and authority and power Um, and so and it makes it difficult right because then it makes it even more fragile that a lot of that history That said has been forgotten a lot of it's gone A lot of it's a lot of it's been burned away and destroyed So the the the bits that are left. We really needed an equitable way prioritize those parts Um, because there's not a lot left right now thank When I got this question first thing I did was I just jotted down the definition of history And I got two definitions the first one was history is a study of past events particularly in human affairs And the second one was the whole of past events um and The what my philosophy is and the reason I went to the definition is because Uh, something stuck out to me in that second definition And it was the whole of past events and I think that's something that we're not privy to here in Athens-Clarke County We're just getting a Short condensed story or summarization or you know, we're definitely not getting the full whole story Uh, 40 some 41 years ago a man by the name of michael tharman wrote a book called the untold story and it was a compilation of essays just depicting life in the history of Local Athenians black men and women. Um, and I thought it was Very interesting that he entitled that book the untold story because it couldn't be any more true And that happened 41 years ago. And if you were to ask the average student here a high school student in clark county in 2022 Are they familiar with michael tharman in his book? They probably would tell you no And so, uh, I think that speaks volumes, you know, when we talk about the philosophy of local history It's so much history that is just a story untold and I think that's important that we go back and and we embrace the whole story Of of Athens and it's important that we build awareness and educate Ourselves about it so that we can pass those stories along so they won't be untold stories and 41 years is a long time You know for someone to you know, just go without notice of recognition And I think we need more untold stories to be brought to the mainstream. I think when I look at the My philosophy of Athens, Georgia I think it's a mainstream history and then it's like an underground history And I think that shouldn't be so I think everyone should be aware of every all the sacrifices that were made For this classic city Grief they they've taken everything Um, it's this is hard to be the last person on this one But I I agree with all of my panel mates And in addition to that I would say that history is what creates every one of us like it's it's like I'm gonna go to art or music. It's like the foundation. It's the base. It's the painting It's it's it's the backdrop of Where we're going where we've been Part of the reason I think history is so important Especially in clark county and and part of the reason I think it's important in education and and And in selecting our next superintendent Is that they understand the history of athens, georgia and that we have a better understanding of the history of athens, georgia And not just our history our present, but our history is what has created our present, right? And it's critical and it's important and the different facets, you know athens is a very unique place to be Because we have so many different cultural facets that have moved into this town. We have the university of georgia. We have Our black history. We have You know, we have old farming history in athens georgia. There's agricultural history here and it's just similar to what you're saying things stories that are not told And I think it is critical that we all come together and understand our where we're from Isn't that everybody wants to know where we came from where where our basis is? And I think it's it's important in education, especially telling our kids like this is where you came from This is where you live. These are the people that That basically have have form formulated Your your surroundings and that goes into like buildings everything, you know architecture Places historic places historic parks Um, I'll go back to the music again the Morton theater and how important it was and how important that music was to the culture And the history of this town the arts all of it So I think it is critically important and they pretty much head on everything else So what role do you see historic preservation playing in your life? Well, again, I'll go back to the education of it. Um, there's a lot of talk about There's a lot of talk about History and true history, I guess for lack of a better word. I don't want to hit a sensitive topic here But there's a lot of talk about What's what's being talked about and what's not being talked about and I think in education knowing the facts of where you come from knowing the facts of How a community was built knowing the facts of what what the basis of this community was Is clearly critically important to the education of our children like we need to be able to tell them Truths and and understand and honesty not not that it's all bad It's we have beautiful history too, but just understanding all the history of our culture and where we've come from And again, there's such a diverse population in this county that I think it's important to know Back to my what I answered earlier to know the basics of where we come from in order to educate And move forward in education. I also think on a on an art level, you know, not not just art, but on an art level and a A cultural multicultural level. There's so much that has happened in Athens-Cart County that isn't talked about from musicians to artists to um Inventors to to all kinds of agriculture that has come out of Athens-Cart County And it's really critical and important like it's something to be proud of And and kind of instilling that in our students and in our education system I think gives them a sense of like this is where I'm from its ownership of of who we are and what where we came from The role that historic preservation plays on school board Well, aside from building awareness, I believe Probably over half of the students if you were to ask them one fact about the person that their school was named after They probably could not come up with a correct answer Um, so it's time for just building awareness I think the school board can also help identify and expand the significance of local historical buildings um in in efforts to foster a more Inclusive environment uh take beryl elementary for example, um Growing up, I heard more about booker t washington. I did about john c beryl But as I became an adult and in doing research investigating, I found out a lot of information about mr Barrow, you know, he was a chancellor at the board of georgia regents And he was a chancellor for life And then aside from his educational accomplishments, he was good friends with booker t washington and Upon request of booker t washington. He actually joined the genes fund for Rural education to help rural uh rural african-americans Is Excelling education and so I when I go when I mentioned the whole story That's part of the whole story that is that part was untold And so I think you know that building that awareness giving kids something to identify with and in all cultures all races You know across the board, you know, it goes back to hey I know what john john barrow did and not just he's the name of my school You know, I can identify with something that he did. It had a direct impact on my community. So I think it's very important Yeah, uh the way historic preservation. I think that can play in with the elected position of school board is um I mean one of the most obvious ones is being stewards of all of the clark county school district properties And the historic nature of those properties um So that that that no, that's I think that's one step Obviously uh situations around the west broad school week I think that was a big example that you could see of of how historic preservation interacts with uh with a selected position And so I think that's that's one that we are the stewards to protect and preserve that and and also ensure that it is uh being presented accurately To the community and also in a way where people can engage and interact with it. Um I think the other part of this is right is like, you know history History and education are tied together How you how you how you share that history? How you how you communicate it? Um Is an educational component and so I think there's that whole part of it too is like how can clark county school district Find ways and I understand it has to have to be very creative ways because of all of the uh The limitations that are put there about what has to be taught and what at this time is means hold can't be taught and such But still finding creative ways that we could be sharing that history of athens clark county of georgia In a way that's not being presented right now to the students of clark county school district Um, you know in in the past Uh, we have we have a lot of historic buildings right around this here You know the the cob house the taylor grady house But again those those places present a very specific slice of history And I think the opportunity is just as much there that we could be sharing the history of of linden town or of Again, the the indigenous nations that that gathered around the spring that uj is built upon That that was was a gathering place for indigenous people these things could also be and should be shared And so I think that uh being in this position, uh You know finds put a situation that we can try to find creative ways that we can actually try to get that history Communicated to our children Yeah, it's terrible being last You know because I know they they they took all of my good points, but I I I will say that You know as an elected official one of the things that that you have to do is is you have to find balance And my my son goes to whitehead road elementary go qualis Yeah, and and my daughter goes to bh l bernie harris lions out there and um Whitehead road elementary school the original one is gone It's just gone Everything's it's erased. It's it's as if there was nothing there Now they they they left the one quonset hut there for some sort of board You know, I I guess that's where if you're bad, that's where they stick you Um, so I'll probably have my office there. Um Because I I will meet challenges head on and um You know, uh As an elected official you you have to make the hard choices and and You have to be able to say no We're not going to get rid of this particular building because it has such an important historic idea to this community right And the idea in education right now the the biggest fad is new is better right new is great We're just going to knock everything down and we're going to rebuild and I'm not you know Whitehead road is a beautiful school ogle floor avenue beautiful school Right, but what do we lose? Like when you want to have your 25th reunion can you No, because that school is gone You know and so part of what we need to do as elected officials Right is way what is best for our community And not just the community now, but the community in the past and the community that's coming forward So this is where the charter is important. Um, and again, if you haven't read the the the charter for Clark county, you really should um, and We have an untapped resource called our history teachers and our teachers in general And we can empower them to do a lot of that research In fact, you know the things that I do at my position right now at the university is You know getting teachers ready to do that sort of work because that's what's important And you know, so what I would do is I would clear the way for teachers to be able to do that type of work And then we can take that work and we can do lots of things with it I mean we could turn it over to historic Athens for instance and let them run the ball so that way We can get some markers up there and maybe declare some historical sites I mean there are all sorts of things that we can do that we just don't And the reason we don't is we just haven't had the political will to do it And we need board members who are going to show that political will and we're going to say hey This is what's best for athlen's cart county And uh, that's that's what I plan to do Yeah, I think that the key part is that we have to be able to Accurately recognize and understand the value of preserving Historic buildings that are that are controlled by Clark High School District When we're talking about growth and having to build new schools build new facilities Right, there's a lot of priorities that we have to deal with there a lot of a lot of sometimes they're they're conflicting We have to think about safety. We have to think about cost effectiveness We have to think about longevity And those things are valued and oftentimes have a a a dollar Amount put on to them, you know, we can actually we can vary we can find out very quickly How much is it going to cost us to build? A school on this property with this many classrooms with this capacity It's a lot harder to come up with the the cost and the value of what a school that's been around for generations that Uh that had so many of our people of this community to go through it It's hard to find the value of keeping that and what that is. It's hard to put a dollar amount on that And so I think that's one of the big challenges And I think that anybody who's on the school board is I'm going to take that on of like How can we really come up with that value and place that because I And until we recognize that If and if we don't recognize that well, then you're going to keep on having old schools torn down and new ones built Because it's very easy to understand the dollars and the numbers behind that But again as Mark said, what do we lose there? And I think we lose quite a bit. So we're gonna have to go about this I think in a different a new way when we are talking about expansion of schools and building new schools How can we preserve these things? I mean any of us who have walked gone to the west west broad and you walk into The the atrium area there and you see those ceramic faces That were made by students Who went there and how they make this amazing art and those are the faces Of children who who live here and grew up here That you can't put a dollar that you can't put a dollar amount on that You can't put a cost savings on that of tearing that down and building up a new school instead So we have to find that value. It's going to be tough. But if that's that's what this job comes with One of the ways well I believe children are the future. I believe that the the kids Uh before they graduate high school, whether through the school district itself or just on their own Or groups or organizations these every child needs to visit all 44 landmarks all 16 districts So they understand what significance is so they understand what the history actually is The children are their future at 10 10 for 20 years from now the high school students are going to be sitting right here Given answers as to how they're going to preserve something that they probably don't even know about right now And so I think it starts as as low as we can go on a totem pole and build our way up I intend on to listen to the the stakeholders Do my research Use discretion pray about it and use my vote take a stance on something and and stick to it and but consider all of the all of the perspectives and Like my colleague said over here on the end, you know, we have to really understand You know the significance of it and and we have to we have to Just basically We can't erase a history So we have to by any means I would preserve before we tear down we could we could turn some of these buildings to museums We we could look at what it was originally used for and try to tie it into that But if there's no way possible or feasible that we still could at least keep The exterior structure and just completely renovated and turn into a grocery store on the inside or just consider all of the possibilities Before we just say hey, let's just start demolition. You know, I think it's very important And if these children have a tie to it if I know that my My mother and my grandmother and my great-grandmother all went to this school Then it don't even matter if I don't know nothing about it I'm I'm connected to it just because of that history my lineage tied to that and it's a lot of that going on Right now and people just aren't aware because we're ignorant system things I'm gonna touch a little bit on what elder just said You know, I feel like We need to take these kids to these places I think until you have been there and you felt it and you've experienced it and you've seen it It's as not just sitting in classrooms. I think historic preservation is so important And I think our history is important, but bringing that into a classroom You can bring it into a classroom, but there are students I don't want to give away my my character Mr. Morton here, but that we'll talk about later But there are stories within this town these incredible stories of people who have built our community and being able I'm I'm all about hands-on. I mean, I'm an art teacher So I like to get my hands dirty and hands in things and I think these kids need to Not just hear about the history of our town, but also visit it We need to make it a part of our curriculum where you my son did get have an opportunity to go see a play at the Morton theater and he was you know, like, I'm gonna go see a play He's a 14 year old boy and I was like you're getting a piece of our history The Morton theater is incredible Like do you know the story behind the Morton theater and those types of things but he got to experience that firsthand So I do think we were missing out on an opportunity To have these kids actually visit these places and see it put their hands on it and feel it There's an energy I think you gather from history about being surrounded by it not just talking about it And I think that's something we could implement into our school systems Like bringing our history in a hands-on way to our students Assessment on all the historic sites Say that question one more time. I didn't get these questions ahead of time Um, I think a district-wide Preservation assessment is important. I think it goes back to what what you were saying about these buildings and how we're tearing down these buildings I go back to Um the farmers market the the oldest black school that we were talking about, you know tearing down and we're gonna You know, these are important things. I think that it is a discussion that needs to be to be made The second part of that question was implementing a policy I think there should be policies. I think there should be just like in any other historic preservation I worked in architectural design for a while and I I know that there are certain rules and and Not rules, but like design. Well, they're rules. They're desires and rules about historically Preserving an area or an old building it goes back into that, you know These again are the hands of people who crafted our history And we're just going to take that away when it's actually another visual and experience that people can have Based on our history. I go back to that tangible part. So we should have policies that We're you know, there are certain areas and certain buildings that we don't tear down because it is a Vital part of our history and I use that That that one school as as a good example, you know, it's this is vital part of our history So we should have policies in place to maintain that and maintain the architectural and historical Integrity of these incredible places that we have All right Considering the assessment i'm a hundred percent for the assessment. I think it's imperative. I think to just to gauge the necessity of preserving it the significance of it the impact on the community how the community responds or feels to Uh renovations or preservations or even demolitions However, when it comes to policies, I think we need to be careful careful about Blanket policies and what I mean by that Every structure has its own story has its own history That may resonate with A demographic that may not be in the position to make the decisions of its future And so when we talk about policies, I think we should Do the assessment as a broader thing, but when it comes to policies, we should you know minimize the The blanket policies and look at it individually and consider Each individual structure each individual Community how it would affect it Moving forward so that's that's how I feel about The assessment and the policies Yeah, I don't believe that you can be a good steward of what you don't understand And so I think that a historic assessment is absolutely absolutely necessary I've advocated for it For countywide through the county government also I'm hoping that that's something that that will be budgeted and I think it also needs to happen with the school district Because again, we don't actually understand sometimes, right? Uh, how many of us Think about your favorite, right? We had that question think about your favorite historic building here in Athens-Clarke County everybody When did you realize that history? How many times did you drive past that building before you actually even knew what was so amazing or historic about it a lot of times? I know the same thing with me because you don't until you understand the history is there You can't appreciate it and so it's absolutely necessary that we we stop We analyze all the properties that we have we do an assessment there have that really a very third one Have it understood and have it in a way that is understood by the school board that is understood by the Entire all the CC as the employees but also in the entire community have it be very transparent open and a resource To the entire community and then once we've done that Then we can decide Well, hey, we need a new school in this area Do we tear it down this the school or not? Or do we keep it where it is and really put extra money into preserving that history because did you know this about this thing? Look at the look at the assessment. So I think it's a necessary tool And I would definitely support it moving forward At all the questions. This was the most depressing one to me because we don't have a policy in 2022 is ridiculous and and it's absolutely Backwards and how we should be presenting our community and how we should be teaching our children You know, of course Again as a historian the one thing we're going to do right off the bat is we're going to we're going to have to assess You know, what's what? And then do things with it, you know, I you know and and figure out Okay, hey, you know, what can we save what what are some of the things that we need to do because of growth? You know, how can we keep the spirit of this building if we can't keep the actual building? What are some things that we can do? You know, uh, you know, one of the perfect examples of that is what they did at the career academy If you go into the boardroom there, you will see Um all of the regalia from the african-american schools that were closed because of desegregation All that stuff's there and you can visit it And when I taught there and when you know, I would take the students into that boardroom And for them it was as it was as if their eyes were open to a brand new thing You know and some of them were like, oh, that's my grandma You know and she was the prom queen You know, um and it's it's things like that that honestly we should We shouldn't even really have to be debating about because it should have already been done So that's a hard question But it's a good one because it's important, right? We need to be honest with ourselves, right that inside of the school district There have been forces inside that have that really don't care about our community They don't live here They drive in and they drive out And so they don't know who we are and they don't care know who we are What they care about is their paycheck at the end of the day All right as a board member one of the things that I I'm gonna do is work with the with the central office And show them why they need to care You know, uh the the buildings that have been raised, you know, let's be honest. They are schools where predominantly african-american, latino and poor white children go and Those communities are have been silenced for years And we've done it in a systemic way where it's almost piecemeal and we're like and we're okay with it Because that's just how the things go and that's how just things are Well, if I'm elected, that's just not how it's gonna be All right We need to protect our history We need to protect our community because when our community loses this history, you're no longer a community your vassals Yeah, I mean kind of kind of what we're talking about before I think that the approach that we've seen with The demolition of some of the schools and the rebuilding of the schools Yeah, like like you said, why I live right next door to whitehead real elementary school. It's a beautiful school. It's a wonderful school But the history has been set aside a little sliver of it over in the southern hill with the annex um, and uh, I've looked up pictures to understand, you know, the history and what it was mean, I've talked to uh Neighbors and community members about that that went to that school who live around the corner from They tell me the stories about their old school and stuff that was there But most of that's gone and and again, I I understand I could I see how that happened Uh, I've I've been faced with these same situations as as as a county commissioner Um, uh, like the cost of building downtown that used to be the police station right over next to um Next to city hall You know, it was put forward to do a whole renovation of that of that historic building It was part of sploss and we're finally doing like I got the tour. It looks amazing But you know, it would be a lot cheaper Just to tear it down and build a new building you can build it higher You can build it wider you could put more many of these in there all courts of things But you completely lose that history And it is more expensive It is it's more expensive To build it up in a way that preserves that history But the thing is that we recognize the value of it and it's worth that additional cost And we have to be looking at when we build these schools when we have these these schools that are already there We have to be looking at it from that dimension We can't just be looking at how much is it how many years is this new new build going to give us And how much is it going to cost per year? All right, that's cheaper than the one we keep it there. Okay, that's what we do We have to have a more nuanced discussion there And we have to find a way and I think that the assessment is one of those ways that we can do it We have to find a way to really value The history that's there because there's a way to do it both ways. There really is Um, but it's kind of it's going to take extra work. It's going to take extra money And I think a big thing is and we have to be intentional about it You don't preserve this history unless you are intentional about it Thank you Just like mr. Denson just said, um You have to have an importance on the value in order to consider Keeping something if I don't care too much about anything. I'm not going to be That adamant about making sure I keep up with it. Uh, I kind of look at It's sort of like this The conversation does need to be had and it's not just in one ideal thing A lot of people have different perspectives and opinions um, but I would much rather see A higher graduation rate out of a sub par facility Than a state of an art facility and we have kids that can't read on grade level And so we have these discussions about you know, how much money we're going to put into something and I'm running for school board I want to see these kids to sell, you know, and of course who doesn't like a good school a nice school I remember when I went I graduated from cd shows in 2004 my first year. I spent in the old school and I remember it, but I'm I I cherish that because my mom went to that school my Her her all my aunts and everybody went to that school And everybody told me about how you could just hit the wall and the person next door hit back and yet But it was like that was history, but all that's gone now and it's like there's no They could that could have took something from that school and just all these schools that they're going to tear down and renovate I'm it's good, but In order to preserve something we need a museum We need something to where some people can go back and see a part of their childhood Instead of hey, I remember when this building used to be here and is no longer here, you know And all we have is memories, you know our ancestors didn't have facebook so they don't even have pictures of a lot of these things and so Preserving it is very important more so to older people than it is now, you know We can just take a picture of something to keep it forever. It'll be on a post 10 years from now But unfortunately that wasn't the case 20 years ago And so I think it's very important that you know in order to value something we have to see the importance Again, I'm at the end Same touching on what elder said, you know, he was talking about the schools that his aunt and uncle went to your auntie and whatever I have a Now cedar shoals stepdaughter who went to the old building that is now the early learning center over on Gaines school road And when hillsman middle school was built the brand new middle school She pined that building She loved that building with the the wooden floors and it felt like home and it was secure not I am a firm believer that There's energy in every space we go into And we need to preserve that energy it goes back to the Morton theater and the feeling I get when I walk in there It's not just about it's not just about brick and mortar. It's not just about the new niceties or whatever Again, I go back to the history, but it is a feeling And and that's something that we don't think about sometimes and you know We're trying to educate these kids and we're trying to get them on grade level But you have the social emotional aspect, you know Hillsman middle school has been painting murals all over the school right now because it looks like a hospital It is so stark and it's so cold and I think that's what she loved About that that old building that the trailers she had to walk out to sometimes sure But those old wooden floors that made her feel secure and kind of like You know nostalgic Nostalgic it's a feeling and it's important and I think in education in general We have taken the the emotional and the feeling out of it like it's not about It's not about the best building and the best test scores and the best grades and the best whatever again, it's about It's about a feeling and history is such a part of that and so Our buildings I think are critically important and like you said even if if a part of it is restored You built off of that building, but you still have this historic part There are ways we can get around, you know, we we have new codes for schools and whatnot I get it but there are ways to get around that and I think it's important Finally This is a tough one. Um, I'm just gonna go to a figure and I'm gonna I'm gonna make this quick because I don't want to talk too much about him, but um Monroe Morton Monroe Morton was raised by a slave owner He came to Athens, Georgia He started doing a newspaper and then through that developed a theater and in that theater The theater was on the top floor the bottom floors. He took other african-american Entrepreneurs doctors one of the first female doctors in the state of georgia black female doctors in the state of georgia had an office there He took his vision and his passion and his love and he turned it into something that benefited the whole community He basically created that hot corner in that community I'm gonna go back to education for a second That's why when my son went to the Morton theater and I was like, do you know what that building stands for? Here's this guy who had to go to a secret school just to even have an education Comes to Athens, Georgia develops a newspaper builds a building supplies jobs for for several of his People just people. He loved his community members And that's that's incredible and it's huge and that's why that theater is so important That's important that when we go there and we see a play that we tell those stories to to our kids that they understand Where that came from and the importance of it because I think if they can see it He did this look at what you did they can do it as well It just continues that that history and that I guess and I'm gonna go again to that emotion and that feeling of being in that building So I'm gonna say um Monroe Morton Would probably be my favorite Um mine was excuse me mine's Michael Thurman. I mentioned him earlier and the reason why is because um He grew up with my dad, you know, and so he was close to the family and aside from that He was intentional about not just education, you know being a former superintendent here in Athens-Clarke County But authoring a book about you know telling a story that was untold preserving that history, you know Being a voice to the voice list, you know, that inspires me It's so many people in my community that you know, they expect me to be their voice But you know, I can only you know, listen and and formulate a intelligent Uh conversation for them, uh, but I can I can't I don't have all the words I don't have all the thoughts So I have to listen and god bless me with two ears and one mouth So I can do twice as much listening than I can speaking But I want I like to thank and and and consider my thoughts before I speak And I see that quality in uh Michael Thurman as well So that's where I draw my inspiration for for running for school board. Thank you. Um I think for this I would I would go with uh for a figure Yep, um Miss Hattie Whitehead With who did so much Bringing about and not letting us forget The history of Lennon town and what happened during urban renewal and really shining a light on it Um, I see commissioner Davenport back here I remember whenever me and commissioner Davenport sat down the first time with Hattie and Bobby and other residents of Lennon town and um You know Heard these stories saw these pictures And now if you walk those roads there Which are now just student dormitories off of Baxter street just complete erasure complete erasure And again, that's what goes back to We've in the past we've intentionally Preserved what we wanted to preserve All right, we can drive up and down Prince Avenue look around. I mean, there's there's some old old buildings There's an old building as much older than the houses that were there on Lennon town People want the people in power wanted to save those buildings But when it came down to You know working class people working class black people Living their homes having their families Uh, that wasn't valued that history was not valued. I'll come back to that get over never again value That history was not valued by the University of Georgia That history was not valued by the city of Athens or the federal government They saw more value there if they could build skyscrapers student dormitories and that's what they did and I am It is such a blessing to have somebody like Miss whitehead stand up and not to say don't forget. Don't forget. This is what happened But fight and advocate for us to look at the way we preserve history in a completely different way and we are The fact that she was able to her and the other residents are able to push through a resolution Through the the county commission that we passed unanimously saying not only are we going to recognize the history But we are going to do things to preserve it and to honor it moving forward and have reparations in place Um, that is intentional preservation of history And that's the kind of intentional preservation that has to happen on all levels including the school board When you leave here today, you're going to go down Prince Avenue And if you take a look at your right at at a manual church over here, you're going to see this big white house And 180 years ago almost to the day, right? There was a young girl. Her name was aggy Carter And on that day she was being auctioned Now that's a story we don't tell in our schools We don't talk about aggy Carter mills. We don't talk about how She is uh, she is uh, she's bought by the cob family and uh, she becomes a Confidant of Marianne cob probably one of the most influential women in the united states in the antebellum period She's going to travel to washington dc with the family to take care of the children She's gonna She's going to learn how to read and write because it's going to be important for Marianne to be able to communicate her wishes back to the house when The civil war ends and people are emancipated She's one of the first people that starts the knock school She empowers her children Who were born in slavery to go to college they go to atlanta university. They become teachers See that's a story we don't tell Because it makes us feel icky and when I say we I mean white people it makes us feel icky But it's a history that needs to be told And with historic preservation, you know, we we've preserved the big white house, but what about aggy's house, which is over here It's still there And you can visit it But our kids don't know that Heck if I took if I took a poll inside of this room here the majority of you probably had no idea who even aggy carter mills was so you know Her story is what's important to me and the stories of others Who built this city and they did it in bondage that needs to be told Thank you Okay ladies and gentlemen, this is part two We had a great part one. Here's part two. All right. Here we go At this time the candidates you see before you now are our candidates for the board of commissioners For athens clark county, okay We have to my far left here my far left here miss asia thomas district three We have mr. Jared bailey commissioner candidate for district five Mr. Allen jones commissioner candidate for district seven Mr. Dexter fissure candidate for district five. We've got miss tiffany taylor. All right a candidate for district three Mr. Patrick devaport commissioner patrick devaport incumbent district one We've got matt pover Okay, candidate for district five and over here you can all you can barely see i'm going to try to say out of your way As much as possible. We've got miss ardrey hughes a candidate for district one So we've got eight people up here. Everyone's vying to represent this great county athens clark county. Is that right? Y'all give them a big hand. Okay Good afternoon. What is your favorite historic site? building or neighborhood And what is your personal okay your personal connection to that particular site? Well, i'm a fan member fan club member of the morton theater just like everybody else and In the previous panel and and i think After I'm used to this all day So I think probably after listening to everybody when i was asked that question There are a lot of beautiful old grand buildings in town Homes and that sort of thing but the morton theater is unique because It's something that athens saved and it was a community effort And it was regular people doing their thing in that building. They were going to plays they were going to hear music They were going to the doctor going to the dentist. Um, they were living there. So That's what makes it unique and it's so special when you walk in that building you can Still kind of feel that in there and the fact that the community did rally In the 80s to save that building and it's now owned by the county, which I think is absolutely fabulous is Is remarkable. It's an inspiration Just the way the community came together to save it and and we hear what a difference that makes just by all the people Here tonight who are just like it's awesome It truly is um a personal connection Is i've gone there with my children we've seen a lot of plays i've gone there for um a lot of music events a lot To hear a lot of speakers With my own children and then i've also drugged my own kids and students in there for different things I've had kids compete in the ripple effect film festival and for the last couple of years This is where we have it and I think it's absolutely perfect for the students to Showcase their films in that building because it's such a part of our history It's also where I heard a female that inspired me to run for office and I sat through that conversation with my daughter and it was her first election season So it's got a it's got a lot of really special memories for me with My own children and and students that I've worked with over the years and some of the parents I see in the audience I've been there with your children and it's a remarkable place and i'm glad we saved it Oh boy 60 seconds all right to 90 let's i'm i'm i'm i'm probably gonna push this toward 90 All right, uh same question right Oh, oh stand sure Yeah, so my uh Might sound funny, I guess maybe but my favorite historical site here in Athens is a parking lot Um a parking lot Um right now It's off of willow street Sort of a humble quiet little parking lot in 1871 it was 243 bridge street Bridge street and all the houses there all through licks skillet are now lost to history White supremacy did what it did and um And and um, it's a it's a tragedy that we lost all that but In 1871 243 bridge street is where alfred richardson The first black elected politician here in Athens. That's where he had to flee to After uh getting into a uh one man War with the kukluks clan multiple shootouts And he um eventually kills one of them After they had the Temerity to to come into his house. Anyway, he has to flee to a black neighborhood. Um, he seeks safety in numbers And I finally uh, I've been researching this for years. Um, this my sort of personal connection with alf Alfred richardson I've spent um years now writing thousands of words About this hero who should really be uh recognized in athens time end. All right So my um, uh favorite um historical spot it will be billops grow back to church Obviously, that's my home church where I grew up at and we just celebrated our 154 anniversary two weeks ago. Um So the church is not historic, but the um the property and the people are um, of course, my people are from dunlap road That's where my family, um Have come from and that's What my favorite historic spot because of course his family is wet What I got my history and my roots at um as well, you know, especially in the african-american community Preserving our churches is very important because it's it's pretty much our foundation of where we come from And how we keep and preserve our history And i'm glad that um michael thurman wrote a wonderful book. Um, as a gentleman spoke before that stated, um What a book about um, what the was title a story i'm told That mentioned bill grow back to church and all the other historic churches in athens. So that would be my favorite spot Stan my favorite historic building would be morton theater Being born and raised in athens, georgia Being a third generation My grandma would tell us stories about morton theater and how they fought I'm to keep morton theater. Um, and I was also blessed to be in the miss black athens pageant as a preteen at morton theater So it it has a lot of significance to me and my family for my grandmother fighting for it and me being able to Um, I guess go into one manhood Um, and so that's why it's precious to me and that's why it's my favorite historic building Well, I see everybody took most of everybody's um The morton is a great place and the thing about the morton theater that um, we happen to talk about with how much commerce went on in um at the mom morton theater at that particular time pink morton started the um morton theater Somebody had talked about it earlier and the thing about how much commerce was there. We had doctors lawyers Entrepreneurs that was coming out of that particular building and that helped build a hot corner And what we see today that is still preserved in our community. So I do also have one more favorite place It's ebony the baptist church west Which is 143 years old Well, a lot of people don't know ebony the baptist church west started on the university joy of the campus It was moved to west park and billet street now. So I got two favorite places in this town that means a lot to me well, um I'm going to avoid giving a single place, but um I would say the the entire athens music scene owes itself Partially to the locations that they are in and the our music scene is in the historic buildings our new brewery scene That is developing are in historic buildings. They're revitalizing their buildings They're using them and they're they're part of the experience They're they're part of the solidity the part of the place that makes people want to enjoy That type of a thing in athens. So that's one favorite but I live off timothy road in district seven And there is at the corner of timothy and epps bridge. There's a little white school house the chestnut grove school house which was built in the late 1800s And it was built by the black farmers in the area which was predominantly what the area was at the time And it was for black children And it's just a small building for most people But those of us that live in that area and I walk by that every night. It kind of reminds me What our area was and if you go up to the front of that building, there's a little plaque that lists I think it's about 54 people that were lynched in athens between 1870 and 1964 and It's part of our history. It's something we need to remember and something we need not forget Well, it would be very easy to follow the The lead of all these other folks by mentioning the morton because I've got a very strong connection to it I own two businesses right by the 40 watt and the engine room And I've in there when rem filmed video there before it was restored I've still holes in the ceiling and I was on the board of directors for morton theater for six years And we used it for athvest, which is an event. I created We used it for years and it was a wonderful venue But since everybody else has talked about the morton I'm going to mention another favorite area of athens is a Historic couple of the historic neighborhoods and they were in my district when I was a commissioner for eight years Well, they're the first couple of years and then they redistricted me but Cobham and boulevard historic neighborhoods would probably be my answer because Everyone's done such a great job of elaborating on the morton and it is truly a jewel. Thank you Yeah, so he's better than I I'm going to talk about the morton theater Um A part of what I've done with the youth is talk to them about economic development and entrepreneurship and I think a lot of times Even with our work With mentoring young men is a lot of african-american young men and a lot of times when you ask Then what do they want to be when they grow up? It's I want to be a football player I want to be a basketball player because that's where they've seen the most success But when we look at the morton theater We get to see a black man that was able to Entrepreneurally build this building but also Be able to provide for his family But also be a place where he was able to empower his community as well And so um, and so for that I appreciate the morton theater I've also had the opportunity of visiting there and going there for plays and different things and so So, yeah the morton theater I believe that local history a lot of times if you want to look at an identity or origin of anything You must start at the the beginning of it the origin of it How it started and I think a lot of things that we're even facing today Is rooted in our history it's rooted in things that have happened before and I think even as a community as a society With history a lot of times it's covered up Or it's forgotten or it's overlooked and what we find ourselves doing is repeating history And I think history is not there for us to go back and relive it But for us to learn from it from us to grow from it for us to To identify the things that we need to keep in history And also to identify the things that we need to grow from and we need to develop from history And so I think a history is something that needs to be told And even as the first panel talked about earlier, it's not just one side of the history It's the ugly parts of history It's the it's the systems and the structures that were set up in history that we are now still today You know Looking at and evaluate and things that need to be changed and things that we need to grow from So when I look when I think about local history, I don't think of it Just in terms of building, but I also buildings and property although that is very important I also think of it in terms of people as well History is what happens in your community century to century Day to day and it's very important And we don't do enough to celebrate it here or educate people about it here You know our history here goes back to the creek muskogee tribes the name of americans And then of course we had the university founded and Beautiful buildings and everything else and it wasn't until the 1960s When people started to realize and point out that historically black neighborhoods like linen town was were being destroyed So there were some efforts and there are continuing efforts to preserve History that that you didn't hear about every day and we need to do a better job of educating our community about The the rich history we have here one challenge of course is we have a A group of people students basically they come in and droves and then they leave town It's it's hard to get them to uh to have a grasp of our local history because they're transient But we need to let people know the amazing history of Athens I wish I was a history major My philosophy of history is is really that on Athens has some great history and it's got some Not so great history We need to be able to realize both sides bit. We need to not let things like linen town disappear We need to learn from our past and we need to make sure that the next generation is aware of those things We also need to realize that history and our historic structures that we have are a great asset To this city. It's what brings people here. It's what again brings a sense of place for people People don't want to come to a generic looking town. They want to come to a place that resonates That that that feels like it is got some structure and some past in it So I think we need to to make sure that we keep our history well known We need to celebrate it. But as historic Athens would say we need to protect it and we need to make sure that Our our structures not only that are in historic districts, but that are just cool-looking old buildings that um, we still remember them and Make sure that we're keeping them going and for the next generation and for our own economic benefit Of course, my philosophy of history is one of um culture One that should be um sustained It's one that should everyone should take pride in That particular history or in this particular town Athens Clark County was um incorporated in 1806 So from that time to the time now, you know, a lot of that history was mainly white history Our story wasn't told at all. It's beginning to get told. I'm glad that historic um Athens is beginning to tell that In years past when historic Athens was founded some years ago Our history was not included in that. That was unfortunate Moving forward though with the new administration and what they're trying to do here now is to bring our history to life I think that's really important and for me We got to make sure that we sustain our history along with other history too We need to make sure also our children know what our history is about Um moving forward what Athens is about how we found it and also what the african-american community has provided On the course of the number of years. So that's one of my philosophy about history in Athens Clark County My philosophy on local history Is that you can't know where you're going unless you know where you've been And it's very important that We preserve our history for the generations that's after us not picking and choose um, what history is preserved but all of the history of Athens and because it shapes us into the people that we are It shaped The generation before us and it will shape the generation after us. So to preserve all of our history not just certain history So when I first started college my first major I went through several unfortunately um Was a history major. I wanted to study georgia history But um when you when I got to the 1800 got very depressed until I changed my um Changed my major, but in a way the best my philosophy on um on Philosophy on history on local history The best way to you can't preserve history if you don't know it So we got to teach it and we have to preserve it because History is pretty much our foundation of where we where we have been and where we're going And we need to educate everyone and especially the people that because we are a transit community On how far we've come the african-american history in the athena is very phenomenal A lot of people in this room probably don't know how phenomenal the history of the african-american people and culture Even with the indigenous people my great great three four great grandmother and grandfather were creek indians and they married into the african-american um community and It's just people don't know that but if you don't know your past it's hard for you to detect your future So preserving local history, especially just telling a more broad diverse story of our local history is very important Yeah, i'm gonna sort of piggyback off of what uh tiffani and commissioner demoport said Yeah, I mean we don't know where we're going if we don't uh know our past Um history isn't something that you put behind museum glass and it's like that's what happened back then like history is still happening History never stopped So you know if you don't know your past if if you don't know for instance That north of downtown north of darty out toward the river were two Historically black thriving black communities at the bottoms and lick skillet If you don't know that then when development is gonna come and trust me it's gonna come there You won't know that it's being built on the graves of two neighborhoods that were like raised that were just entirely bulldozed by white supremacy and urban renewal So you're not thinking about how do we make that part of town inclusive? Um, it can't look like the rest of everything that's happened around downtown, right? I mean there's enough of that We have to be maximally inclusive in that part of downtown The future of that part of downtown has to reflect its past And if you don't know that history, um, then you're doomed to to repeat the same mistakes of the past Get situated with all these water bottles and stuff down here. All right, so um I think local history is important I think um when I moved to a new place and I have had the privilege of living in Some historic communities over the years. I lived in savannah for a while Which is first city in georgia jonesboro, tennessee first town in east tennessee has totally unique character Winston salem north carolina, which has um a unique flair with moravian culture there So I think local history Needs to include everybody Um, I know we often forget and I think the world is changing and that's a good thing Um, we're hearing more about women. We're hearing more about native americans. We're hearing more about the role of um african americans, we're hearing more about the role of um new immigrants that were Of all sorts of things not just white immigrants So I think that's important and um So my view is that everybody who's been in a place has left a mark And we need to know what those marks are and no matter who they were And I know I'm probably getting the next question so I could roll into some examples But um, I'll stick with the seconds that I'm given what 90 seconds. All right, so there is Okay The future of Athens quarry camp. Okay. I think we have a goal mind here that we're not utilizing and Just from living in some of these other communities like johnsboro is if you're not familiar with east tennessee It is a small mountain town, but they have the world's best storytelling festival and that brings in thousands of people multiple times a year and they've also so that brings in lots of tourism and lots of Dollars and we need that in Athens and that's part of my platform is We need to get some more money in Athens because our number one problem when I surveyed people before running It's poverty Our kids need help our older people need help our regular people need help So bottom line we've got to get some dollars into this town We've got some things we could do like johnsboro tennessee had the storytelling festival They also had a really neat place with old school and I took notes about chestnut grove They have an old school setup and you can bring kids on field trips there from all over east tennessee And what they do is they role play what life would have been like if they were students back in that day in era So they they spend a day there. They have to they can't have their phones They have to oh, which is like torture for some of them um And they they actually have to live and go to school as if they were around back then and if the field trip is in The winter time, guess what they have to go get wood They have to keep things going. They have to go to the well and get water. So it's it's Well, we are talking about modern children and so They do send them to the library next door. So they didn't want to go that route But they they sit at the little tables and they use the ink wells and the the old fashioned blackboards And it's really an experience. So that's that's something that we could do um Storytelling festival. Um Oh my time is up, but I could go on and on about this Yes, sir. Um, yeah, like like audrey was saying I think um, you know, uh, we have a lot of historic Assets in this town. Um, and they can certainly be leveraged for you know tourism and and and whatever sort of economic benefit we can derive from them. I think, uh History can be enjoyed And studied and preserved for its own sake Um, but I'll go back to what I said before it is also Um Should be a guide for us. Um, it's not something that I'm his you know history never stopped History was yesterday in the in the yesterday before that And it is a way that we understand our present and um understand, um Adjust an equitable future So while, you know history is is um Is valuable and it's in its own right. I mean, I enjoy old buildings as much as as much as the next person Um It's not simply that It is it should serve as a guide For us going forward All right, just keep in mind everybody Georgia is one of the one of the first 13 colonies and athens is is in course in georgia So the history and athens is very long and pronounced and the the history just not only black and indigenous white Is a very vast history Um, and I think the government is doing a good job in trying to preserve some of that history And with our partnership with um historic athens and with some of our community groups Um history is very important like like some of my colleagues and colleagues Sorry, I'm not on their commission right now. Um, some of my um mates up here have stated We we got to preserve that history because if that history is lost we're not going to know, um We're going to lose uh a sentiment of who we are as individuals and how far we have come But the government should always play a role in preserving its own history because you know for the future generations to understand How far we've come and where we are heading towards the future Historic preservation is Very important, um Because without the preservants of history then how will the children after us know how far We've come So it's very important to me So I I guess one of the things that I want to talk about is that Historic preservation is essential to the charm And also the history of our city, you know, we need to make sure that when we're looking at historic preservation that All of the structures that we have especially the architecture structures that we have in that We want to maintain those structures in some form or fashion We need to make sure that if we're going to look at Maintaining that building how are we going to maintain that building and what does it going to mean for us going forward? So I think the charm and the beauty of the architect structures that we do here in this community I spend most of my career at uga working with architects and trying to preserve those buildings on campus So for me, I think the charm The preservation of those particular buildings how we maintain those buildings so we can Prefer for the future of our children and for the future of this community Thank you. Um I'm a big fan of the rescue reinvest and revitalize concept of Historic preservation. I think we need to do that. We need to Not feel that history is our buildings have to be locked in time but Continue to develop that for the best of the the future generations But it's not just about protecting the pretty things. It's There's a lot of cottage neighborhoods in Athens And some of them are in places like five points But others are in areas like east Athens, which right now is a powder keg for gentrification Being able to protect those neighborhoods and those small cottages whether it be through historic preservation Zoning or what have you and we've all seen it and the people that they Buy up a piece of land and they either build a two or three They take down the nice cottage put a two or three story building on top of it Or they buy two pieces of land and slam them together so they can put a McMansion in what used to be a historic Neighborhood that drives up the the prices which which may be okay in five points But for somewhere like east Athens people that want to stay there people that have been there for generations It makes it very difficult Historic preservation is a really important tool in placemaking and placemaking Is something that creates helps create a community Where people want to live Work and visit That's really economic development right there. You want these people to stay that are That have skills And you want companies to move here you want people to come here and visit and we get a lot of Benefit from tourism already So we should think of it as an economic development tool and I happen to be Trained formally trained in economic development work for the economic development foundation for years so Besides the aesthetic quality that we see and enjoy We should think of it in a broader sense too that we're creating This place that other people are going to be attracted to And they'll just benefit us all it makes a better community a better place Awesome, so I you know when we talk about historic preservation, you know, I even going back to the buildings Um, I think that even as our community there is no buildings without the people And so I even going back to preserving, you know, even the neighborhoods as as he mentioned I think it's so important But I also would like to see how we can take some of these buildings and address some of the problems that we're facing today Like affordable housing There are or are dealing with this mental illness issue, you know over there at north school where the encampment is located at now There's a north school there that was one of the schools that um were segregated where only blacks are only black school there How can we take that building and preserve it? But also use it to solve some of our problems to you know, make it a affordable housing building that that could possibly Be a place of housing for the those that are experiencing homelessness or be a place of housing for those who are dealing with issues of mental illness, so how can we preserve these but also Use them as solutions to the current problems that we are facing And so I definitely think that um that that is a role that historic preservation plays can play in the future And I know I have that next question Right So um as a commissioner, I believe that my job is to be uh a ear to hear what the community Um needs are and to be an advocate for the community So I think when we're looking at changing policy I think in order to be a voice you have to first be a ear And so I think that involves getting the community involved in some of the in the policy being able to you know That education piece even as the panel talked about before a lot of times people don't know They're they're they don't know that so making sure that they understand and they're getting the information You know, I talk about some of the things that are happening even that go forth Um during the commission meetings and a lot of people are like well, we don't we don't we didn't know about it You know, we didn't know that this happened We didn't know that these decisions were being made and so how do we make sure the community is getting this type of Information I believe that my job is to be a bridge and also be an advocate and be a voice To hear what the concerns of the community are and and what what issues they're facing in order to make these policies that are going to benefit the community as a whole thank you As a former county commissioner, I've seen Struggles firsthand for neighborhoods trying to get historic designation And it's very divisive and part of it is that Homeowners don't always understand the benefits Of all they see are the costs. They don't see the benefits. So I think one of the things we need to do as a community and historic Athens could do a little better too Is to educate homeowners landowners property owners about the benefits of historic preservation Like I said before We make the town a more pleasant place if we can preserve its history Where we can better educate our children about the history too if the buildings are still here And can create tourism and just a really strong community. So we just need to educate folks better One neighborhoods are trying to go through this process. It's it's can be very it's can be a very heated thing that People pick insides and never talking to each other again because they disagreed on The attempt to get a historic designation I'm also going to say, you know as a commissioner My goal is to be listening to the people not only in my district, but throughout the city So as far as having all the solutions to the historic designation problems I'm I don't have those but we have great organizations like historic Athens That should be the people that we are working with on a regular basis for things like this and it should be Not just that but other community leader groups. It should be businesses. It should be groups of people that are the urbanists the Racial justice advocates a number of people that should be working together on these things as as we forge these relationships Um, I would say that it would be great to have a little bit stronger Just urban design guidelines to answer the question a little bit more specific because as we're about to redevelop Bethel homes for instance and the mall and other areas I'm We can do what's been done around the downtown area where we've got these you got retail on the bottom and you've got Stucko a few levels up Or we can say we want Athens to remain having a sense of unity a sense of place And we want to put some guidelines to say here's some good ideas not right not regulations But here here's some things that we as a city think would work So I have to sort of agree what mr. Jones has just stated I think you know, we have a rich history in this community And I think it's important though as a commissioner though Each community is different. So I think we need to pull those communities to see what I do. They want, um Historic preservation in their particular room. I don't think it should be forced on them I think we as a commissioner should listen to the people that we represent And if they if we make the suggestion or they make the suggestion that they want to have Historic preservation in the community then we should move forward to that But we need to have the proper policies in place and we need to make sure that if we're looking at historical preservation for that particular Neighborhood then we need to make sure the people that live there won't that they have money. It should not be forced on them So I believe that the community should have that responsibility if they want to have historic destination I believe that it is up to the community How it will benefit them um in their surroundings as far as Historic preservation While I do think it is significant I also think community is significant as well and the residents how it will benefit them um And how it can how it can create a sense of belonging to everyone that's In the community so inclusiveness and um Yeah I gotta listen wait. Sorry about that. Um First we need a kind of wide assessment of what's historic and of our historic property not only just in buildings But on roads streets cemeteries buildings neighborhoods um Do a kind of wide assessment to see what's the story Secondly, I think we is very important to educate the public and those who live in those surrounding areas Of the important significance or significance of those street cemeteries public buildings And then start working with our community partners like historic Athens to preserve those neighborhoods preserve those Those structures and those facilities because it's important for us to to keep our history And to understand our past and I believe just What the work that accounting has already done with um with We put some money into funding a study. I think we just need to proceed with that But my main concern would be to to do an assessment kind of wide Of our historic places and educating the people on it and then continuing with that process by getting those Those sites historically designated Yeah What I have is is maybe not exactly policy But I would urge us to focus on More recent historical structures, you know, I think it's easy to look at the big pink thing over here and say well, that's historic, right? But that house Were to be owned by someone who wasn't some big fancy confederate guy Might have been torn down before it had a chance to even be Historic, right the national register of national register of historic places and other preservationists have what they call the 50 year rule If if something is 50 years old and has cultural significance, it is technically historic So in that context, I think of like the frank seamatics center on magnolia, right? Um Should be um preserved But it hasn't um But it hasn't been I mean this is uh, this was a place where james brown bb king performed. This was uh A concert hall a meeting place. Um, it was it was a greater Bethel AME had had church services there for a while when their church burned There's a daycare center. Uh, also james brown Played there y'all I mean so like if if if there was a Time end all right All right First thing I would do is listen to the constituents You know, this is their community. What do they want? And and that's something I do go around and ask people a lot now is what do you want? Tell me what you want and and let's see what's really going on and I've done so much homework lately It's uh, I'm boggling but anyway, this is fascinating town to learn way more about in a different way So I talk to people first and find out what they want and um because I'm a science teacher I would say we need to have some sort of measured way to do that on top of that Let's let's track it. Let's have a record. Let's just don't really nearly do this Let's let's find out for sure And then let's once we find out what people want. Let's work with experts and we have a wealth of resources here in this town Affiliate with the university gentleman running for school board. That's a historian I would love to sit down and just talk with him one day Is that for me? No, okay. So I would work to make sure once we had all those things in place That places that people wanted protected were protected and I'm not just talking about Buildings we have the potential for little villages like Whitehall village is absolutely amazing and it was a meal um We had a debate today at school about the Barnett Scholl's power plant But it's right across the line in Oconee. So it's technically not Clark, but it's pretty cool It's got a neat history and maybe we could team up with Oconee for something there. I don't know Thanks, okay But I get the next one We're going to shift gears a little. Okay. I know all of you all would do a county-wide assessment I know that we all know that somebody's going to ask that question But I am going to ask you there's been a great deal of discussion about the impact of short-term and long-term rentals In our historic neighborhood I'm going to talk about short-term and long-term rentals in our historic neighborhoods If elected, ma'am What approach would you take to navigate this issue? Well, that's an issue in neighborhoods that are not historic mine in particular So what what I would do is I think And the perception that I've gotten from many is that they feel like these investors And some of them are investors that don't live here are driving the price of properties up for everyone whether you're historic or not um And I know this is tough because I know in our neighborhood We have covenants and our covenants were written 25 years ago before air b&b and vrbo and Any of those things were even around so that's something i'm on the hoa board for my neighborhood And that's something we are in the process of trying to do is get started on some covenant revisions to address these issues that are now like Before us and and we have to address So I I think what our mayor and commission could do is they could set up some ordinances Restricting short-term rentals They could set some parameters for long-term rentals and that's an issue in our neighborhood people that Sell their home or or they're they're moving they have to move for a job and they they need the flexibility to be able to Rent their house until they can sell it. I mean right now People are selling homes before they even hit the market, but that's not going to continue Reality is going to hit at some point. So thanks Yeah, I think If by short-term rentals we mean college Student rentals. Um, yeah, that could certainly negatively affect, you know historic properties I mean, I wouldn't want a 19 year old college kid near anything a store I wouldn't want a 19 year old college kid near something brand new Um, so yeah, we don't I mean, you know, so, you know, like Audrey said, I mean, I think some sort of ordinance might might be considered You know limiting at least short-term um, or you know, I don't know how we would exactly design that but um Uh, they break everything. So, um, keep them away from the nice stuff. Yeah Okay, so Currently the government has two Policy-making committees the GOC as the government operations committee as well as the lrc legislative review committee GOC last year the government operation committee for the last year kovat two years ago We review short-term rentals one of the one of the hinders is is We are a state the state pretty much controls local control of what we can do But I am when I first came on one of my biggest one the one of the first Projects that I worked on was the party house. I don't know if y'all remember the party house or have heard of the party house Uh, but it was in a nice neighborhood where this gentleman who lived in colorado colorado He went out his house to parties and most long game days had a nice pool blah blah blah and I remember me and commissioner Late commissioner niece Smith worked on the policies to regulating The noise and street parking and stuff like that, but um, we are Currently still working with the state and working locally to fix short-term and long-term rental I'm on long-term and short-term rentals, um I didn't really think much about the Historic districts. I thought about Athens as a whole And I thought about the effects that it has on communities and homes a lot of us have children and these short rentals um They aren't um, the best Solution, um to Our neighborhoods It it's a distraction more than anything. Um, I know from my neighborhood It causes More policing in my neighborhood than usual because we do have these short short term Rentals, so I would think that there should be ordinances put into place where um The short term should have to act the same way that the residents do That's pretty good So I think all of us agree up here that we need some type of ordinance in place and what for us to deal with short term and Long-term rentals. Um, I think the problem is though. We have started something and We can't get hold of it. So now it's going to be up to the mayor and commissioners to get either working with our state local election elected officials or with someone who can help with long term and short term um rentals We have um at um CCSD right now in Clark County school. Yeah, we got two Um proper two houses on our property right now We got to figure out what we're going to do. Are we going to sell those two properties? Are we going to rent those properties out? And I'm not going to tell you what we're thinking about doing but at the same time It could cause a problem if we if we set it to the wrong type of people And they end up renting out the college student and you sit there That's where the board office is then you got parties going on so that could be a problem So we got to come up with some type of ordinance within our local government Is all to make these things go away short term and long term rentals thank you well There as patrick said there's there's only so much we can do at a local level a lot of this is determined for us By the state and there are things that there's the noise ordinance. There's parking restrictions. There's some of those pieces That can be done. Um, it would be great for us to do more I was out knocking doors this past weekend. I went to a house that they said well the people that own the house next door They they live in japan and they rented out and they're talking about how the yard has been ruined and and all these things And yeah, it would be great to be able to say No, no, you can't do that anymore but um We have to obey the the state pieces where we have to One thing we can look at is We have an ordinance in place that says if if more than two unrelated people live in the same house Then they can't do it And I disagree with that. I think if more than two people live in the same house and they're not related There needs to be some constraints on that but if the owner lives there chances are they're not going to be violating the noise ordinance We need affordable housing and there's almost nothing more affordable than somebody renting out a bedroom to to somebody in need So on that case, I think we need to make changes to that policy thanks uh, I think as A former commissioner I know that There's certain things that you can and cannot legislate on people It's very difficult to legislate people telling people where they can live and where they Can't and how many people can rent we did have the Just before I came on the commission. There was a big squabble overt in the past about this unrelated Number of occupants unrelated occupants in one house. It was passed But it was kind of a failure because we really didn't enforce it And you've got to be careful about passing rules that you can't enforce very well And you you've got to let people live where they want to live and And so it's just got to be careful about it This is a very difficult question instead of trying to answer it. I'm going to try and give you a little uh A success story. Okay Well, okay commissioners have to vote on demolition of any house in Athens Clark County that's older than 50 years old Okay, it's not it doesn't have to be a hundred anything over 50 So on sunset area, there were a lot of small houses there were rentals and They went through a phase where there were families buying them and They would I would have to actually make the decision and then make a recommendation to the commission That you know Does not be torn down, but they want to do this They want to expand it and keep it in the character of the house But expand it so a family could live there instead of it just being a rental Uh, so it's kind of a success story in that one area of But working with these people that want. Yeah, sorry. Anyway, there are ways to do it. It's difficult Awesome, there there I go being the last one again. Um, so I think that when we're we're looking at it A part of we have to look at the laws and how people are able to govern their property You know when I thought about it automatically thought about air bnb's and you know That's the big thing and as an entrepreneur I I hope to own some air bnb's at some point And so I think ordinances of how this is going to disturb the neighbors and the neighborhoods and The people that are living in these areas. I think that that needs to be evaluated But I also would like to see a historic site Kind of like set up like stone mountain where you know people can come and bring their families But they can stay in hotel rooms They there's a place that they can come and it kind of tells the story of Athens in this particular horse Historic site. So I think going back to historic preservation I would like to see how we can take some of these buildings and bring more Economy in but also be able to Solve some of these problems in a way that maybe if their short term stays that they're in a particular area Right there they're air bnb's or there's a hotel that kind of we've preserved and we allow people to stay there And it's bringing money into the city. So um, those are my thoughts concerning that So I want to just read the definition of really quickly I'm going to open the definition. Okay, 30 seconds. Okay. So I think that when we dealing with demolition neglect I believe that it talks about how they The properties they allow them to get to a point where they're so old that you can't preserve them, right? And so with that we need to be evaluating what's in our area I believe that there may be some cold enforcement that when we see buildings getting to a place where they're Unrepairable that someone is saying hey look, we need to check this out And be able to contact even the connection between the organizations historic Athens to be able to see Is this something that we need to tear down or is this something that we can save and preserve? I don't think that we need to wait till it gets to a point where it has to be demolished to begin to talk about What we should do about it When I came on the commission, it was just a couple years after the 2008 real estate downturn bust whatever you want to call it and we were starting to see more and more vacant houses because there were a lot of closures And it it was becoming a real problem. So at that time the county commission did adjust their ordinances and put aside some monies to demolish some of these these properties because they were safety hazards and health hazards because They were becoming places where people went to do drugs and whatever So we do have some policies in effect, but we probably need to re to look at them again revisit them If we're talking about demolition by neglect I think the big thing is that you know, there's a number of developers who the buy properties And then they let them go into neglect historic properties properties with story They let them go in and neglect so that they can say no It's no longer economically feasible for for me to do this I need to be able to tear it down and build whatever I can make the most money I possibly can for I'll just say as a as a candidate. I am not going to be taking any money knowingly for many developers just so I don't have to Be beholden to anybody on those types of issues So I think what we need to do is take it by a case by case issue in each Um, particular area based on on where that demolition may take place Um, I think again, if there's in a community of a normal people And it's becoming a blight on that particular community Then maybe that may be the time to go ahead and demolish that particular property But I think you look at by a case by case basis based on the ordinance and policy that we already have in place With the um with the escort kind of government and then if that's the case then we should go ahead and demolish Or we can preserve it then we try to preserve but I think it should be a case by case And I was standing there on case by case basis Piggybacking off of what mr. Fisher said. Um, I think demolition by neglect We first should learn the history of um the building why it was neglected. Um, what's the plan for if it is the limit? Um If it is demolished, what'll um This area be next as well as how does this affect the community around it? Um Will it help the community will it benefit from or will it take from it? So there's a lot of different aspects, but I believe what mr. Fisher said we do have to take case by case I don't believe in demolition by neglect I'm a big person in recycling every piece of wood nail could be reused and be repurposed to To build something new. Um, I believe that we that's something that we should do with all of our structures To be able to grow school houses one of those buildings that's literally deteriorating as we speak right now But the church is dedicated and trying to preserve it and we're using that wood to Repurpose that that building Yeah, I think um when we talk about demolition by neglect I think we're probably really talking about wealth and income inequality wealth inequality um, I mean, I don't see any Beautiful homes on on boulevard or around there being being uh neglected This cob house again. I hate to rag on the pink thing, but um But it was treated better than some literal citizens of Athens Y'all remember when it came in they like wheeled it in it's like a whole big Um, no neglect over there. Um, so, you know, I um I just uh, oh time in okay All right, I totally agree with mr. Fisher It does need to be on a case-by-case basis. For example, if if you've got a homeowner, let's say they've been One example I can think of this that was in the media a while back was a homeowner was sick with cancer And he wasn't able to upkeep his property and you know, basically just talk to the homeowners and find out what's going on What help do they need and then try to help them with some resources? But if it's a developer that's just letting it Go into disrepair I mean the city could slap some funds on them left and right every time so I think that's something that could be done real quick Just tell me one fact or figure one That inspires you Okay, so I had the privilege and honor of uh get to know a lot about Jesse Walton Barnett and work with her great-granddaughter And she was an advocate here in the community and her granddaughter is carrying on that tradition and Really pleased to know both those folks and play a role in Helping Athens-Clarke County get clean water and sewer for everybody in the community Still fighting that battle So what is a historical factor figure, um Yeah, I think um, I'll return to Alfred Richardson. Um, who by 1868 Three years Into his freedom. He had accumulated nine acres Of land out in walkinsville with a nice house and um, I marvel at that. I mean how in three years He was able to build that and that's incredible Not maybe not a historical figure for some of you well, most of you people in this room But dock on a Davenport my father. Um, a lot of people in east Athens, especially african-american knew him He was a car mechanic. He always invited people into his home is where I got my instead my discipline He was a nice person. Fortunately, he passed away made recipes What inspires me is the people of Athens the residents of Athens because no matter how much Um ordinance and things are put into place to block us our resilience It lasts its generations to generations. So it would be us as residents So the one person that I would um from a historical figure would be Adam a Hair who was the first african-american dentist to practice in the um, as the car county In this community. So I think um That's there's a lot about her and her wheel to you know, being practical especially as a woman as an african-american woman Yeah, I had a much longer answer that would take a lot of details to explain So I'm going to make it simple and say uh Leroy luchin jones Um my grandfather. He was a poultry professor at uga um, he eventually opened up jones hatchery and uh kept that going until the 60s and my my family was involved with that organization um, the building still stands Which was historic even back then and um, I'm glad it's there because I can look back and see part of my family As a long time proponent for arts and music in this community I'm very inspired about how we were able to preserve historic preservation The lindenhouse the original building and then The addition to it and use it as a community resource and that was that was spearheaded by two people Ronnie lukashevitz and his wife And and Nancy Nancy lukashevitz. I was dropping by but they've both passed on Nancy just recently But it was their will that created this amazing resource that still has a lot of historic preservation aspects in it um, I would say haddie whitehead And um the story of linden town and just her courage to be able to tell that story About how you know, um her father took all the money they had to buy a house and then had to Be displaced um due to eminent domain and and just the courage for her to come forth with that and To you know seek seek a recompense Thanks, Tommy. Thank you. Hope appreciate very much once again. I just want to say thank you all so much For joining us tonight being with us here tonight. I call this the heavyweight. Okay. That's all right in this corner over here We got pearl hall. All right next to mr. Dr. Fred Mormon right here. He's probably next door He's gonna be mr. Denny Coleman. That's right. And of course over here on my far right over here We got miss my kisha ross, but last but certainly we're in the belt right now They call them the rick flair of athens georgia. Give it up for mere kelly gertz I'm gonna have fun this time. Okay. We've got some fun here this evening Uh, I just like to have humor and you kind of loosen the crowd up a little bit How about that you're losing you guys? So so what better way than rumble roll? Okay. Is that right? Only one distinction here tonight. We're going to talk about historic Preservation. All right. Can we do that? So a lot of courses once again for our candidates night are geared towards sitting around For our purpose here this evening rosemary and that of course being historic preservation Having had the opportunity to serve on historic athens back then athens claude herrington's foundation Uh for a number of years. I feel like I grew bald sitting on that board. Okay But uh, let me tell you I am very passionate About historic preservation Very passionate about what it means to athens claude county What it means for surrounding towns having the opportunity to visit charleston visit savannah visit other cities and see what they have And I say, you know what? Yeah, they got those big buildings in those old buildings But you know, this is athens claude county in northeast georgia y'all, okay? And we should be all going proud of what we got to offer here, okay? And that's why I work very hard in getting people to come to athens, you know in this area, okay? So tonight This last race means so much to you all as citizens It means an awful lot because the mayor Is the ceo Of this operation Okay Some people say so goes the temperament of the mayor so goes the temperament of the community Okay, and I had I was in uh, augustor georgia last week for a little thing down there when people would Tea in this little ball down there And I had an opportunity to spend some time with the mayor of augustor georgia and he talked about athens georgia When I was from athens and in the area here, you know conan athens and he talked about athens georgia and he can't wait To get back to athens claude county So when you get other mayors talking about Visiting your town and you know the the rich history that you all that we have here That's the testament. So tonight It's time to what let's get ready to Thank you, thank you What is your favorite? Historic building or neighborhood in athens and what is your personal? connection to a man um My favorite building and connection would be the east athens development center the mary and mor Center and the reason I have that connection with that is because she's a champion to our community But the heritage the culture that she brought And I'm very well connected with outreach and community that she done So I think to still have that even though we redistrict but um to have that is very important for our Next generation to inherit. So I would say mary and mor center is very much so my answer So the the place that I think about when I think about the historic nature of athens Is the seaboard rail line station on college avenue It's the one you may know as the spot where about half the college kids. You've come to this town Jam their u-haul right right underneath the trestle But more importantly It's a place where if you're standing you're really at the epicenter of so many of the layers of history and culture in athens You can stand there and see things that have been preserved You can see the roof line of the linden house You can see the historic cotton seed oil mill that sits on palaske street across the valley But sadly you can be in that same spot And there are a lot of missing pieces The licks skillet and the bottoms neighborhoods that were almost completely decimated in urban rural Were around that rail line Yes, also of the social history of athens You have people who as part of the great migration moved from Athens to parts north To new york city to chicago You know you have the economic history of athens from that point You know all through the 1800s the cotton culture So there's so much from that one vantage point that you can see that really embodies the good the bad and the ugly sadly of athens history And it it is something that I can see from my bathroom window As I gaze out there and so when I moved on to palaske street in the 1990s Um, it was important to me to know what was around me both present and past Mine would be east athens school And what I remember so greatly about that school where kids especially our black kids Where they loved one dollar they went to school with obedience They cared about one other have respect for one another, but sadly to say integration of that school back then And what's what's going on today in school today? We are surrogating our own selves black against black and The jaw going to eat that in school compared to the jaw going to a school today is no comparison Well, we allow our kids to do whatever and whenever they want to do Well, we as parents do not want to do all the jobs So the joy I have is the rumor of that school building Is when I went to school down Little girl respected themselves and boys respected girls But today I'm sorry. I don't have any joy for anything out right now Thank you, mr. Marvin Um, I don't know if anybody has any wonder As to which building I like best in Athens That would be the fred building I'm kind of partial to that name although as a young child I didn't like being called fred There was fred flintstone and a few other cartoonish characters that Made me not like fred, but as I got older I embellished that name and I Tried to make more of it than than what it really was a four letter word That starts with an F Anyway, um I have been here in Athens I received my third college diploma here In food science department at the university of georgia And I fell in love with Athens at that time and uh Then I became a dermatologist and spent 28 years here seeing Um dermatology patients or people normal patients with a skin problem but uh Athens is such a historic city. I've uh Reading I've been reading more on it lately and uh at one time Well, I did hear today that it was uh The university of georgia has been here longer than the city has been named to Athens So let's let's uh never forget What brought Athens here and it was the university of georgia. I've heard very little about the university of georgia during this uh conference and discussion, but uh How about them damn dogs? We really won the national championship this year and I was here uh in 1980 and too when hersha wanker put us on the map then Okay, thank you First I'd like to say good afternoon to each and every one of you and thank you for coming out today And the question is what is my favorite historical site? Let me tell you my grandmother my grandparents bought a house on handcock and rocks spring And it's the stands today. So I can tell you the history of Athens Clark County You talked about the morton building We was in and out miss morton house and her mother was our dentist Dr. Green where the brothers are donald rell and fredgerill father and their office today was our doctor We had the shoe shine sheets barbershop We had with whiston Whitson soul food We did not have to leave that community for anything Everything we needed from plaza street the educators Hope grandmother one of our principals at our school. So if you want to know the history Of the historic era a handcock and rocks spring see me west broad elementary school That was our school and I pray that it was stand forever And then not only that We had all kinds of people in our neighborhood so That is my spot Handcock rocks spring and my grandmother's house still stands today and family member Still lives in that house. Those are my favorite spot And I know as I listen to some of you all talk about this person and that person Let me tell you about that person. I visit their homes. I walk through their homes. We live in those areas So those are my favorite spot the handcock and rocks spring area as dear to me My philosophy on local history is to keep the west broad and bernie harris high school the only school That we have standing as afro-americas. We've had we watched many schools in Athens But west broad and bernie harris is all we have Let's keep it there Yes, um, thank you The question what is my philosophy on local history? Well, I think uh, you are what you eat and you are Where you came from and uh, if you come from Athens, um You will have The sense of having been here. I've always described Athens, georgia as somewhat of a european city In my travels I have been to 38 countries Some of those were just changing the plane in the airport like in tokyo But uh, it's a great Part of my life to uh, go back or look at another country. It's like they're filming a movie just for me But I don't really believe that I have the uh The ticket to go backstage and watch everything in that country that I want to see Some things I want to do and I think things that are done in Athens are things that I do not want to be in Athens I can get more specifically on those things In, uh, perhaps a private conference Some may not want to hear uh, what I have to say But uh, we've got a great history. Let's keep it going my philosophy on local history is Remembering great people like Dr. Bradford brown And a lot of my high school teachers, elementary teachers, middle school teachers And most of all my grandmother and the people in my neighborhood Who spoke out to each kid kept them out of trouble Make sure they go to school make sure they address themselves make sure they behave right Make sure they became a success In Athens a lot of them have in many ways in my generation became successful because They are still alive today They are making sure that their kids are doing the right things And the history of Athens shows that when black people unite together we stay together But when we separate one another we are separated So we got to guide our lives toward doing the right thing and keeping the history of claud counting In a positive way the way it used to be For us when we did the right thing in our generation So in the united states really for Centuries, you know history was often told through the lens of people with wealth and power And name recognition Certainly people who had you know buildings like the cob house Built for them and named after them But my philosophy of history is that history really shouldn't be that homogenous History should be the history of everyone History of working people history of people across difference and race so To recognize that somebody like elizabeth king who was a teacher at bernie harris high school Or somebody like hattie whitehead who's been mentioned earlier significant is a history we need to embrace And we embrace it not just because we're looking back and we're celebrating The great things done in the past by by waves of people But we're also drawing inspiration from those things and saying to ourselves How can we act now and how can we set our children or our grandchildren up for success broadly? And so I think looking at the breadth of history and asking how can we be an inclusive community is our mission now I've heard a lot tonight about the historic preservations and everything But i'm 34 years old and i've been to athens and i've never stepped foot in the morden theater So they say a lot about right and I say that because Our black and black brown kids don't even get a chance to tour these places They don't get a chance to learn the history and we're forgetting that piece like it's in my philosophy If I don't know about it How how can I create and inherit things? So I've had to study. I had to visit. I had to To do certain things to even gain the knowledge of what the history of athens is And I say that because we're forgetting the part of the educational piece that's not in the school about the history of athens and I'm self-taught self-made. So it's like if we don't know anything about the history of athens What are we saving so is I think it's our responsibility to be able to teach the kids about the history so they can know what they're saving And that's just my philosophy. You have to build history and community to be able to establish development Looking down a road, I think Historic preservation should play a huge role in the art community I am an artist so I just feel like if you look at other models of What people are doing in their community They're not tearing down the history, but they're implementing it Inside of their schools and inside of the things that they want to teach the individuals Just earlier with the commissioners and everybody else Stating the history of the buildings that has been broken down. We can't go back because it's been broken down I I went to whitehead my daughter goes to whitehead. I go I went to burn the hairs My son go to burn here. So we're breaking down those things that our kids want to go and attend and inherit So I just will bring more festivities Get the local artists to paint these buildings Making sure that the local people in art and in history are implemented in these programs Because we don't see much art in athens. It's a I think it's Sculpture, but it's not enough art being brought and our locals could benefit from Development if we implement them Well, certainly no community is going to be preserved in You know every fiber and every iota You know what we don't want to do is become like a strip mall in snelville on highway 78 You know, we don't want to be a place that's completely anonymous And part of our identity is that breadth of history that I described earlier And that's really something that we should embrace as a community We should embrace it for the social ties that it embodies We should embrace it for the economic development opportunity that it undergirds And we should embrace it because that connects us to each other connects us to those who've come before us And those that are going to come after What i'm thinking about when it's in preserving I think athenclaw accounting need to have us sit up where The at will law is no longer in effect contact Governor camp honorable governor can't have that law drop where people can get back to work What people can bring in in con for the whole city of athen Georgia not just those who have it Not that's just the rich but all people have an opportunity And by doing it that way when we drop that law That will tell us as black people we need to get on up and start working We need to get out of jobs going we need to take care of our family So along with white and other races also we need to take particular care Our situation to make sure this never happened again that black people are constantly losing their historic Property because we are not paying taxes on or we're walking away from it That's what i'd say. Thank you Um, what role should historic preservation play in the future of athens clark county. I think uh Many items that we go through or use in our life that we never own them. We just borrow them from god Or the future generation. Maybe we we picked them up from the past generation As I said when I was on american pickers and I hope you review that show The doctor is waiting was the name of it And I met with uh mike and frank and I told them They failed me for about six hours, but they condensed it into about 30 minutes And one item that they did feel necessary to put on the show Was when I sat on my couch and I said everything has value And I believe that to this day from the time I had a Paper routing would pick up bolts and uh pieces of metal and coca-cola bottles at age 10 I've collected things in my life buildings houses apartment complexes cars houses You know, I'm a successful man and I commend all of you who are running today and uh, I hope that we become a team that changes and Changes clark county and keeps a lot of it the way it is. That's all I have to say. Thank you What role should historical preservation play in the future? I feel that we should preserve what we have And continue to grow On what we have And I think that will help the near future for the next generation I see Things that's coming up And I see new ways that affin is growing and we have to think about the next generation And how they're using technology And helping us To gain strength and knowledge through this new historical preservation So let's continue to grow on what we have as well as when we get ready to be a new things Okay, so what what adjustments what adjustment would you make towards the local historic preservation? policy Well My first one would be Is to get back where it's from. I want that policy to be set in place That will be my first because when you got a first love It's hard to get rid of your first love And you want that first love to grow And prosperous So I don't know the policy with the clark county school district But as your next mayor, I will sit down with them and let's see what we can do to preserve Not some of the students will talk about the community Well sit with the community. I'm sorry. I apologize, but due to the fact that I am running for mayor I have to say that that's right Thank you Thank you I'm glad I'm in the middle here not having to do two questions at one time, but uh One thing that I would Advocate that needs to be done differently is how the tax assessors Tax our properties here the buildings that I own downtown which some I've long owned as long as 20 years prior to recent sales They go up 10 to 18 percent a year 10 to 18 percent tax increase a year A man who wants to uh Leave his to demolition They don't touch his taxes That's how you would make him do do something to his down building He'd either sell it or get the hell out of there or renovate it But uh, if you taxed him like you do me, he might be down here as po'd as I am But uh other things Let's see, uh We we do a great Preservation here Athens is a historic city. It is an international city In Europe or I was last in Vietnam for two months with my wife my my new wife Only my second only my second wife, but uh only my second and uh I have uh, even though I've traveled the world looking for another one and uh But um I believe I found one uh with a different culture a different uh attitude and uh, that's what's so beautiful about other countries And uh, there's something you know, we we are an international city walk down on international day and see who's down there on On the college avenue selling stuff or wanting you to know more about their country. Am I is my time up? Yeah, thank you Well, the adjustment I would do took me add to the policy preservation of the local business and history Historic districts. Thank you history district and claud counting would be I will make sure I will go around to every person that I know that possibly have a historic building property uh business That they understand how important to preserve it by Not allowing it to slip out of their hands By not giving away by paying their taxes By making sure their children have something to inherit And by doing it that way It's a possibility that a lot of black Historic building would be saved today Black history Okay Okay, there's Well all are acting when I say history black on business I know Right Okay, when I speak of that I'm speaking of not just only black people. Thank you. I'm speaking on all people. Thank you. Okay. I was getting to that Okay, but what I need to understand and what you need to understand that We as in claud counting who have historic buildings and properties that our family need to continue on preserving them In any way possible legally It's very important to have history and history is good for all Even the bad history is good for people and like good like good history We need to know our past and we deserve to know our path and we deserve to save things And I'm a big person on using the term black people because I'm a black person But we need it So I mentioned earlier that we know that not every fiber of every building is going to be maintained Exactly in the state that it was built So I live in a 1906 mill house. It did not have an indoor restroom What's now the restroom was a back porch And so in the same way that at some point in the middle of the century It was determined that indoor plumbing was something that was reasonable for people to have We're also going to see some transitions in the way that we manage historic properties You know, we've been a leader in Athens-Clarke county in energy efficiency And we need to support those people who live in historic properties as we transition into use of solar And really into insulating those historic properties for all of our residents And it leads into the other thing that we need to do which is really democratize historic preservation And make the tools of historic preservation available to everyone It shouldn't be thought of as the province of just the rich or the people who lived in 4,000 square foot homes with three stories You know, we should make sure the tools are easy to access Whether you've got an 800 square foot mill house or whether you've got one of those grand houses up here on hill street I think for me, uh, moving forward the policy that I would kind of change would be More awareness more education in what the historic properties symbolize As well as implementing If those historic property owners would like to offer tours or museums To be able to know the history So I think the policy for me would to always keep them up Like the upkeeping Up to date but to not Do away with the history piece. Um, so that's that's something I would change in the policy is offering To the city the possibility of the art the history and the education of awareness that it symbolizes So what are your thoughts? I mean, we really would have to know what's all the historic places like Honestly, I'm not gonna lie and say that I went and looked up every single historic place But right, so I'm just Right, but it does need to be an assessment. We need to know our value We need to know what those, um, gold mines are we we're holding a lot of Revenue back economic development back if we don't know that the assessment of those buildings So that's that's something that I would add is adding the value the revenue because with Venues of historic properties you can add more revenue into your community So a challenge of my time in city hall As commissioner for 12 years and it's mayor for three now Has been that oftentimes our approach to historic preservation has been reactive That there's a threat against the building Um, there's a there's a developer who wants to do something that we realize is not aligned with our values And the value of a countywide preservation assessment is to say let's be proactive rather than reactive Let's go ahead and look at the whitehall mill village. Let's look at the puritan mill area Let's look at other neighborhoods new town that haven't been fully assessed and let's look at other assets as well Let's look at our historic cemeteries Let's look at our historic physical resources like kerb stones and belgium blocks that uh, that you can still see on finley street And recognize that there's value in those as well. And so if we do this proactively I think we're going to have fewer of those pitched battles in city hall Where we have last minute desires to put up an activity on hold But instead the opportunity to say how can we in a strategic way roll out a series of new initiatives around historic preservation This is my first time saying that but I agree with you on that um The assessment I believe The historic properties We need to focus on what's feasible Not so much is what we desire Because sometimes things take a long time to get there And we need to be patient with and I'm not a patient person myself So I need to understand as you need to understand Preserving historic property and using the assessment that we have today in the policy we have today Is kind of not on our same track We need to get on the same track of doing all this together Preserving things Thank you I you know every site in uh Athens Clark county and everywhere is a historic site What we can measure by That Is what uh structure may exist on that historic site or what structure might have once existed on that site When the civic center was built The old fire station portion was incorporated into that and that was a great inclusion there They they tore down the big flea market that used to sit in the in the Empty structures that were there But um in the 38 years I've lived in Athens. I've seen a lot of changes Um And I'm sure if I live that long Much more I'll see a lot of changes there too, but uh, there are some things we want to Preserve We're a young country Very young. I've been in buildings that have been over a thousand years old This country, uh, the state of georgia was formed in uh, 1803. I think That was like yesterday We don't have anything as old as other countries to but they preserved those and we should learn to do that Thank you My thought on the Athens preservation to preserve what we have I like Going down getting information On what is history and what is not and I want to commend you all for keeping great records Because I love to read the history and visit areas Where there is history and where there's history to come So I like for us to get together as a community and let's see What is comfortable to keep and what is not to keep There's been a great deal of local discussion about the impact of short Madam mayor What approach would you take to navigate this issue Marvin, let me say this When we talk about long term random and short term random There are some people that only need to be short term And and and I understand that and and We can't look bad on them even though I understand those who are the renter Wants their money, but we have to be a little patient with people But I understand long and short term in historical areas, but why is it only historical areas? I'm not gonna say that Well, I believe the designation of historical neighborhoods is a preface or a means by which Uh The more affluent residents of those neighborhoods want to tell other people you can't come rent in my neighborhood But you can rent down the street Uh, I'm a very hated man by some people in this county And uh I uh asked a man that I've known many years. Why do people hate me? And uh, he said fred when you got here you started doing a lot and you have done it forever You've done it a long time And they are jealous of you uh What I have in my life Was given to me by god and my family and my genetics And uh, I'm just I think I think all three of them every morning. I get up I'm gonna quit talking there. But just on this subject On long term and short term Rentals here in class On long term and short term rentals here in claud county. I have a problem with that in my neighborhood I have both And I had this renter Come up to me and tell me it's okay for her to dump her leads and trash on another person property And I said I said that's that man's property That's his property. He just can't dump anything on his property But she said it's going right away anyway All the things she was concerned about was money And we get those type of people not from claud county mostly for out of county And out of state who would like to come here and do as they please with property that don't belong to them Using long term and short term rental and I hope the current mail Are possible the future mail to be It possibly can But uh, that's not That's not my main focus right this moment My main focus at this moment is that I need to let the people understand How important it is to stop the long term and short term rental here in claud county because they are Desolating our property our livelihood our way of life The way we see things and the way we should see things We need to get that under control now as me running mail. I'm running for mail. That's quite sure I'm running for mail But my main focus is to make sure that any other kid who do or do not have an education can see Hey, I have an opportunity to set up that like mr. Coleman who's running for mail. Let me get myself together That's my main focus. My people is my main focus more important to me as running mail And I had to say that because I'm sitting here. I'm telling you the truth for the whole thing So when it comes to long-term rentals, uh, there was quite a bit that was court settled in about the 2002 and 2003 era Long time claud county residents may remember that there was a pitch to create what was called our rental registration program And that was thrown out by the court So to the greatest degree we can we really need to use our code enforcement powers I think uh earlier speaker commissioner davin port mentioned the party house ordinance that we passed just a couple of years ago to crack down on Really the negative direct behavior I mean nobody wants to try and put their kids to bed at nine o'clock And have somebody from out of town partying until two in the morning and live with that nobody should have to So we've got tools at our disposal As far as short-term rentals, there's been back and forth between localities in the state over the last several years Over whether or not the state of georgia was going to offer what's termed preemption Which is when the state says that localities cannot do certain things. Um, the state has allowed us to collect Taxes on short-term rental just like on hotel beds. And so I'm very appreciative of that state action But I think we do also need to look at the concentration of short-term rentals And make sure that we're not turning some neighborhoods into effectively airbnb ghettos um I'm a little distracted by our panel But for the most part I honestly think um when it comes to long and short-term rentals It's all about values and it's all about standards So having a standard for that tenant when they come in having those values um And as as mayor gurch just stated like Just making sure that it's something in place if you're living here for a certain amount of time This is the standards of this neighborhood if you're living there long term I think there should be meetings amongst that neighborhood patrolling like it's certain things that can be in place Versus what what has been discussed. I just feel like everybody deserves to be in a home long or short But it should be keeping up the quality of that environment Should be a standard no matter if it's long or short term It it should always have that value. So I just truly believe affordable housing Well rich you should if you're in a Home make sure you have that maintenance of that home and that landlord qualifications I would I would honestly look more into before destroying a building. What can we do to renovate it? I don't my philosophy honestly. I don't believe in having to destroy something Especially would it be in historic preservation? Whether it's a historic building or just well really let's stick on historic, but I honestly don't believe that we should destroy. I think we should resonate those things so that Somebody else inherit in it can can have that value of it. So I really don't agree with destroying things because it's It's something that you're taking away from the next generation So I think we need to put a few new tools in our toolbox when it comes to avoiding demolition by neglect One of those things is really Something that could be added on to a program already under existence here at historic Athens And so rather than just looking at exterior supports for Existing particularly low-income neighborhoods I think we could look at all kinds of interior renovations and utility upgrades and insulation upgrades For low-income residents who may be the owners of some of these properties We can also add use of our land bank authority And so one of the phenomenon that you often have Particularly in older neighborhoods is what are termed air properties where there might be 15 cousins that own a property in common And nobody is really the responsible party for that property And what the land bank authority can do is work with those cousins to To steal the title because 13 of those cousins may be in parts unknown And so you need to be able to do that and it also can eliminate back taxes on those properties So that property can be put into functional use And finally, you know, there certainly are some people who own property who are In a sort of craven way allowing demolition by neglect to happen And what we can do is put some strictures Financial strictures on those properties to incentivize them to get off the pot And let somebody use that property in a productive way in a neighborhood that's going to be enhancing to Athens-Clarke County The only way I believe in demolition of any kind of Historic property is that building has to have the roof caving in the walls about the fall over Had to have asbestos or some kind of destructive disorder with it Other than that, we need to preserve Save any way we can Recondition the wood recondition anything we can out of that building But our taxpayer money to gather to save that for history. We need that for history if It is facebook to do it. Thank you Well, I think um, I've mentioned um one one method that could be used to prevent demolition by neglect And that's to bring in uh those aggressive tax assessors that come Uh loose on me for for renovating the building um The fred building had taxes uh one time when I bought it 15 years ago of $10,000 a year now It's $115,000 a year on one building Some of you might remember I took my uh tax money down there one Tax due day on a hand truck in one dollar bills. It was uh 450 pounds of one dollar bills They made me put it on the x-ray machine and I nearly threw my back out but um the uh the taxes have just gone uh out of out of control here and uh You know they they look at all the money they want and then they divide it by the properties they can tax And there goes the tax assessment assessment But uh I've got a lot of uh answers to a lot of questions and uh, I think i'm probably finished with that one Didn't elect Of demolition I just don't believe in i'm sorry I want every historical home to be Rebuild I think the city has enough money Somewhere in a budget that we can get together as a community And rebuild these homes if we're going to continue to have a name called Athens historical preservation