Jason Carter Announces State Senate Run
Decatur Metro | December 3, 2009Earlier this week we learned that former Decatur commissioner John Ridley was considering a run for Georgia Senate seat that’s being vacated by David Adelman. This morning, everyone is talking about how Jason Carter, grandson of former President Jimmy Carter, has announced he is running for the glorious seat of District 42 power.
Michelle sent in the link to Carter’s website, which is honestly pretty sparse at the moment, but luckily both CL’s Thomas Wheatley and the AJC’s Jim Galloway are already talking about the announcement.
Galloway has the note that was sent to supporters and speculates that Carter might have trouble in the 42nd District, which includes Decatur, Chamblee and Stone Mountain, due to his grandfather’s recent stance on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict and the area’s large Jewish population. In Galloway’s words, “Jimmy Carter’s approach to the Middle East does not draw applause in these neighborhoods, and it will be worth watching how his grandson approaches the dilemma.”
Galloway also reports there are rumors that Tom Stubbs – of recent political yard sign fame for a Superior Court seat – has also expressed interest in the seat.
Oh! And the most Decatur hook of all! From Carter’s email to supporters…
To kickoff the campaign, I am going to have an event at Twains in downtown Decatur, next Wednesday, December 9 at 6:30. You are cordially invited. My kids are going to be there, and your kids are certainly welcome. If you are willing to be on the host committee for the event, please let me know.
P.S. The image above was lifted – with great relish (and mustard) – from the Fresh Loaf post.
Will they serve some Billy’s Beer at this Twain’s shindig?
Glad he is kicking it off in Decatur!
It should be an interesting race for this seat. From Carter’s website and Facebook pages I don’t see him using his family connections. Although I’m a big fan of the 39th President of the United States, I am very glad that no one judges me by my Grandfather’s politics.
It will be interesting to get to know all the candidates. So far I know Jason Carter was in the Peace Corps in South Africa and wrote a book about his experiences. Look forward to hearing more!
He also works at a kick ass law firm, so his cred there is strong wiht me!
http://www.atlantageorgiatriallawyers.com/attorneys/trial_litigation_lawyer_carter.html
Amen to not being judged by your grandfather’s politics. My grandfather thought FDR was the Antichrist and that the blue eagle was the “sign of the beast.”
If Tom Stubbs runs (again) I’m sure it will be an entertaining race. He’ll have to try to do better than the 25% he got last time around though. At least he has found someone other than an African American woman to run against this time. Stubbs has a questionable reputation around these parts, to say the least.
Don’t understand what you mean by “At least he has found someone other than an African American woman to run against this time…”? Are you slamming Tom Stubbs, African Americans, or women or what? This must be a controversy I don’t understand.
I think Pete’s implying that every time Stubbsy runs he picks what he thinks is the weakest opponent–of course Linda may have been a bad choice, if you look at the results, but I think Tom may be out of his league without including race or family history of his opponents.
Tom’s previous attempts at running for public office (all failures by the way) were against Valarie Wilson for Decatur School Board, Kecia Cunningham for City Commission, and Linda Hunter for judge – all African American women.
So the election results would suggest that African-American women are worthy opponents, no? The phrase “At least he has found something other than an African-American woman…” seemed to suggest that a photogenic white male is a worthier opponent. In my humble opinion, while there’s plenty of racism and sexism in the everyday work world, at the higher levels of politics and power, no one can assume they are a shoo-in based on their skin color, neighborhood, sex, family background, neighborhood, etc. What makes the biggest difference is political skill and money.
That’s not what I mean, Karass. What I meant was that it is interesting that when Tom has run it has always been against African American women as if he has a problem with African American women being in positions of authority. I believe even Judge Hunter questoined this very same thing about his background in the campaign.
If your challenging and attacking Tom Stubbs for being racist because of his elections then your sorely mistaken. The school board race was between Valerie Wilson and another gentleman; Tom came in as a write in candidate towards the end of the race. The City Commission race was an open race, he did not choose to challenge Kecia Cunnigham directly. In last year’s race for Judge, he was asked and encouraged by attorney’s throughout Dekalb to please run against Linda Hunter. If you knew Tom then you would realize that his history is just the opposite of what you are saying Pete. His work and service around Dekalb has benefited people of ALL races.
That’s right. Tom wasn’t running against Valarie Wilson, he was preventing Steve Monroe from winning. In that race, the registered candidates were Valarie Wilson who was uncommitted on school reconfiguration vs Steve Monroe who was in favor of partnering the high performing elementary schools with the weaker ones at that time, e.g. stronger Westchester preK-2 with weaker Oakhurst 3-5, stronger Winnona Park preK-2 with weaker Glennwood 3-5. (Don’t know what was supposed to happen to Clairemont, maybe close it, which may have been why the north side went for Valarie). The race was tight, so Tom Stubbs entered at the last moment as a write-in candidate to prevent the preK-2/3-5 from happening, he split off some votes from Steve Monroe, and so Valarie won. Of course the end of the story was that the School Board reconfigured to preK/ECLC, K-3, 4/5, but closed too many schools, enrollment rose, trailers came but weren’t enough, more reconfiguration was needed, the first reconfiguration committee wasn’t allowed to suggest new options but the second one put the 4/5 Academy at Fifth Avenue but then some folks suggested Beacon Hill…..wait, that’s a different thread again.
“Of course the end of the story was that the School Board reconfigured to preK/ECLC, K-3, 4/5, but closed too many schools, enrollment rose, trailers came but weren’t enough, blah blah blah blah….”
Enrollment rose. Period, end of story, that’s the big thing in there. The reconfiguration was such a huge success that the market loved it, and families moved in droves into Decatur’s formerly underperforming school districts.
It was a smashing success. Thank you CSD!
Now the same CSD that made such a hugely smart and beneficial decision is in place to deal with the challenges that result from such a success – enrollment increases. I like their track record so far, and I think they’ve got the stuff to deal with this.
“Enrollment rose. Period, end of story, that’s the big thing in there. The reconfiguration was such a huge success that the market loved it, and families moved in droves into Decatur’s formerly underperforming school districts.”
Are you kidding me? I am galled by this sort of attitude. People were moving into Oakhurst in droves BEFORE the reconfiguration. I got my family into CSD by the skin of my teeth for the schools–back in 2001. It has always been the only option for good intown schools other than Mary Lin and Morningside, which are more expensive areas to move into.
That is true, CSDMom. And there was a massive failure on the part of the school’s consultancy company to account for that during reconfiguration!
In droves? People *with children*? That seems odd because in the 02/03 school year, Oakhurst Elementary enrollment was in the neighborhood of 99% African American. Are you saying that only African American families with kids were moving in in droves? Because the larger demographic trends of Oakhurst would dispute that.
In ’03, a tiny collection of white families (representing 6-8 kids total) agreed together to look past the snap judgments many made based on race and commit to the school and its leadership. Of these families, the bulk as I recall were not newcomers but had been in the neighborhood since the mid 90s — before they had children.
So where were these droves? They were predominantly gay, single, double-income childless or other risk tolerant people who aren’t presently concerned with schools, that’s who. It wasn’t until the 04/05 school year, when CSD balanced out the schools racially, that Oakhurst became a magnet for families with children. TeeRuss is not saying anything even remotely controversial.
Agree that it was so neat that a group of parents decided to invest and enroll in their neighborhood school rather than assume it was inadequate. My understanding is that that also happened at Glennwood, just a few years earlier. I’ve even heard that something similar happened at Clairemont and Westchester even before that. At one time, many families avoided those schools too and sent their kids to private school. Can’t say when that happened but my guess is the late 1980s.
In fact, at the time of 03/04 reconfiguration, a bunch of Oakhurst parents spoke up and told the Board that there were tons of babies, toddlers, and preschoolers in the neighborhood that would soon be coming to Oakhurst and they were concerned that Oakhurst would soon not have the capacity that CSD was counting on. This was similar to what parents with young ones were saying all over Decatur. The response from a Board member who has since left was something like “I don’t care how many baby carriages are out there, many of those folks aren’t going to send their kids to public school”. Parents begged the school system to try to find a way to measure existing children in Decatur rather than relying on local hospital births which may work well for population projections in other areas but not in Decatur. So I think at least some of the overenrollment was indeed predictable. Of course, Oakhurst’s continued success and increasing popularity (it would be my first choice if I were moving in right now) influenced enrollment too. Renfroe’s improvements helped and maybe other school improvments too. That’s all a good thing. But it would have been even better if we had used better measurements to predict future enrollement. That’s why we should be sure that all reasonable options have been evaluated going forward. If so, enough said.
My guess is that those posting on this Board about CSD value it and want the best for everyone. If not, they wouldn’t spend their time thinking about issues, posting, and reading. They’d use their energy to either leave Decatur, get into private school, or stay and concentrate on conniving for their own children to get the best of everything, no matter what happened to others.
Karass, I hope one day you get a hobby and stop obsessing about CSD! You’re like a one-trick pony and it’s getting old. You’ve got the Stubbs thing wrong. Valarie wouldn’t commit to doing either cause she wasn’t on the board yet and didn’t all the facts, so he ran on a pure “leave everything the same” platform. Clairemont was not slated to be closed either. Clairemont was to be partnered with Glennwood, a 50/50 school at the time, WP with College Heights, and Westchester with Oakhurst. They decided to do nothing because it really wouldn’t have saved the district much $ since all the buildings were still in operation. Plus, they didn’t have the confidence in Dr. Love to pull anything off. It wasn’t until two years later when Dr. Edwards and the new board came in and had the courage to reconfigure and redraw the obviously racist lines that had been drawn decades prior, but never touched. Had they not closed schools then and continued to operate with 6 elementaries, you would have a much higher tax bill and the mileage would now be dangerously close to the 25 mil cap. Plus, you wouldn’t have the wonderful programs that you have now or integrated schools, thus you wouldn’t have attracted all these new families to Decatur for the schools – since remember, CSD was losing people left and right and the enrollment numbers were dropping.
And all this talk about Beacon Hill as the 4/5 site is quite humorous to me. It was definitely discussed in the 2001 Study Circles as well as in 2003 and even in this recent capacity sort of. The city staff, as you know, was very involved in the process and came out strongly to open 5th Ave. (and were not in favor of Westchester). Beacon Hill is their property and never once offered it up. Why should they? The city needs it and they have big plans for it. Not sure what those plans are cause they haven’t been very vocal about it (I’ve asked a few times). But in the old discussions of 2001 and 2003, it came out that the city would never put the police station at either Westchester or Fifth Ave. because they want the station to be centrally located, and both of those properties are near the DeKalb and Atlanta lines.
So, can we please just move forward and stop rehashing the past all the time? We can’t change it. Unless of course you want to move backwards to the old days of segregated, unequal elementaries, inept leadership and quite a few bad teachers, a crappy middle school, lots of folks in private school as compared to now, spending money on empty classrooms resulting in higher taxes, crappy facilities, horrible communications with parents and community, etc, etc. The list goes on cause I’ve lived here for decades. Is Decatur and CSD perfect? No! But compared to where CSD is now from just 7 short years ago, I’ll take it in a heartbeat.
Having concerns and suggestions about CSD and how things move foward is not a vote for the past. I’m real glad CSD isn’t still the way it evidently used to be in your day. I was never impressed by Dr. Love’s performance . And you seem to remember the exact details of the Wilson/Monroe election; the point was that Stubbs wasn’t running against Wilson, he wanted her to win.
As long as Decatur Metro is willing, I will continue to respond to postings and comments. I try to be respectful and not attack a commentor. I’m real sorry if you don’t enjoy it.
So, Stubbs wanted to keep everything the same back in 2000, right? De Facto segregated schools on the southside and the northside.
When a solid plan was finally put forth to end that system of segregation back in 2004, Stubbs sided with the nearly all white Westchester parents attempt to keep everything the same. He even filed a lawsuit on their behalf to try to keep everything the same, right?
Shows quite a pattern …
John you make many valid points, but I’m pretty sure following local education politics can be considered a “hobby”.
What does all this have to do with Jason Carter and the fact that he needs Crest White Strips on the double?
I hate that this conversation has devolved into a racist diatribe. But I am so not going for the “all-white Westchester” parents thread. This was a PERFECTLY good school, had just been renovated, and heck had a lot of land surrounding it (that was for preservation, not parking) yet when it was all said and done Clairmont, another “all-white” school, IF YOU WANT TO GO THAT ROUTE–got the goods, and Westchester parents were left to go across a busy highway to Oakhurst. I’m so glad it worked out for you all, and that Oakhurst is now a thriving school, but seriously, folks, this was about the use of our resources, good and bad–and those who chose to call it about race, then you all are stuck in reverse. And happily, the children have adapted, and hopefully so have the parents who send their kids there. Still, this is still a misunderstood and sore subject about how we use resources wisely, or in Westchester’s case, and in my cranky opinion, not so wisely. It is still something we should all look at when we see how we’re handling Fifth Avenue.
I’m not voting for him — because of his grandfather’s wrong-sided approach to the Middle East.
jason needs to prove he is not like his grandfather. he needs to admit that the carter center should not accept money from holocaust deniers; that israels condut is not worse than rwandas (killing 750,000 in a few months in 1994) and that the jewish community in america doesnt control the media. after he makes it clear that he doesnt hold his grandfathers anti-semitic views than he should be judged like all other candidates.