Damn. I still remember standing with my parents at a poorly attended rally in a windswept field, listening to then Labour Party leader Hugh Gaitskell quote Churchill's original line, "Democracy is the worst form of government, until you look at the others." How far we've fallen since.

When I say Atlanta's TADs are boondoggles, I'm not exaggerating. Diverting $5B from schools and public services for grossly padded contracts with no accountability.

How much did that stretch cost per mile, does anyone know? Timely info as mayor seeks to keep the $$$ for another 25 years.

'Lifelong troublemaker' ain't a bad epitaph. I only knew Tom in his city arborist role. He bravely tried to protect the tree canopy as City leaders bent over backwards to let builders ignore tree protection. Before Housing activists get mad, you can have both homes & trees if you're smart.

I'm attending Kelsea Bond for Atlanta's event, “Atlanta for the 99% Town Hall” - sign up now to join me & chat about how the 99% would prosper if commercial trophy towers & data centers paid their fair share and if TAD taxes came back to schools & public services. www.mobilize.us/kelseabond/e...

In Fulton #GApol, data centers don't even need tax breaks (though most get them). That's cos County Assessors only value them at 10-20% of what data center developers say they are worth. Correcting this raises $48M this year. Another ~$140M/yr as $10 Billion more come on line.

We also disproportionally did better in precincts south of Ponce - esp o4w. We won every precinct by majority except for one with 48% of the vote, still a plurality.

We won all age groups and demographics, but young voters turned out more than normal. Hard to compare exactly to previous years because of redistricting

Very interesting numbers. Way more under-50s voted than over-50s, despite the elders' usual higher turnout rate. It's a young district. Probably much higher 18-30 and 31-50 turnout percents than in past D2 elections, too, thanks to the vigorous ground campaign.

Do we have any age breakdown on voters who gave @kelseabondatl.bsky.social that smash win in Atlanta D2 - or @peterhubbardga.bsky.social statewide? #GApol Be nice if Atlanta & Georgia Dems woke up to last week's results, quit their cronyism and gave folks more reason to support them.

Key to note that no rent gets paid to the development authority, no money is ever paid by one party to the other,and the authority's balance sheet shows no asset for the property. Because the entire thing is a sham.

More accurate if they'd said "bonds where no money changes hands, 10-year leases with a $10 anytime get-out option for the developer and a govt body holding paper title that never has any ownership of the project." @joshgreenwriter.bsky.social

Rent inflation for low-end apartments is crazy high. Are construction & land costs in working-class burbs too high to add new supply economically? Cos the lobbyist's line 'Luxury Vacancies Will Filter Down' is let them eat cake . @danimmergluck.bsky.social #GApol www.ajc.com/news/2025/11...

It definitely would! Low valuations are corporate welfare. Additional tax revenues could provide more affordable housing, a better school system, and lower costs for everyone. Valuing data centers at only 10% of real value for tax purposes creates a massive misallocation of our tax resources.

It would be nice if Fulton County GA valued these data centers for property tax at more than 10% of what they're worth.

It might have gone differently for him in England - where the case would have been sub judice.

Please fix the Y axis label to read what it presumably should: Dem Margin 2025

Amusing how close these cynics came to getting it wrong. Rohit would have put them all on Utilities Committee! #GApol

Ah, Georgia is a Blue State. Let's try to remember that. #GApol

If Echols is a great supporter of renewables, why is GA the laggard on solar, why is GPC extending life of coal plants & adding huge amounts of gas? Not to mention Echols rubber-stamping 6 recent increases in residential bills and GPC's sweet deals with data centers that put residents at huge risk.

Hey, CIM, if you really cared about affordable housing, you'd have provided the 61 units in your new Atlanta Gulch apartment tower that you promised. This sounds like a grift. #GApol www.bizjournals.com/atlanta/news...

If you're going with 'Cuomo the progressive', maybe go a little deeper with your analysis of his gubernatorial record? Not just the obvious sex-pestery & Covid mistakes. Whose side was he on when he ran the state? Which progressives felt that he was on their side? Bloomberg is not a progressive.

What these pols are saying is "I like sports-team billionaire campaign money & other favors."

Track record Exhibit A: Andre pours $58m (and counting) of TAD money into rat-infested, obsolete 2 Peachtree tower to convert to affordable homes. Now begging MARTA to move into it. Extending TAD slush funds means hiking taxes, because that money would otherwise return to schools, county & city.

The track record is one of the biggest arguments against TAD extensions. Many projects were advanced recklessly at extraordinary cost with marginal benefit, and of course Dickens’s habit of canceling or downgrading widely popular transit projects undermines public trust in ANY future agenda.

It is NOT a $224M incentive, FFS! It's at most a $10M tax break over 10 years. Which won't happen because the developer is weird and won't get this thing done. Even if he builds the hotel, Fulton values hotels at half what they're worth, so the tax break would be $5M. NOT $224M!!!!

In Georgia, we only do Corporate Welfare. Sorry, kids. #GApol

In case anyone was wondering, this gentleman is absolutely right. I spent many years consulting to biotech pharma firms. They won't funnel their enormous profits into the basic research that the NIH has hitherto funded. That research may improve our health but not their share price.

4 Fulton #GApol data centers worth a total of $3.7 Billion are appraised by the county at an absurd $143M. They're under-paying school, city & county tax by $46M/yr. Many hyperscalers coming to S Fulton will also escape fair tax unless residents put heat on their county commissioners.

A better question. Do you know someone who isn't getting an affordable apartment because Fulton under-taxes trophy towers and data centers by half a billion a year?

AI has peaked www.ft.com/content/89a0...

A pol who has been working against the public interest for years finally has to face voters. Quelle surprise: his Georgia-Power funded campaign waves the race card! Let's hope voters realize that racism is the last refuge of scoundrels. #GApol

It's interesting that a highly-contested race for mayor in 2021 had fewer early votes than this year's mayoral snoozer. Hoping the difference is that voters are mad about their electric bills and tossing the PSC bums out.

If residents understood that it's not just *using* their taxes this way, it's *hiking* their taxes by $5-$8 Billion, we know what they'd say. You siphon those taxes from APS, County & City funding and tax hikes to make up for it are inevitable.

Glad to see my e-blast pestering is getting out the progressive vote in D6 and D2!

He did high school in Gwinnett. The scandal of it! Clearly disqualifies him, right? What really burns them is that he says 155k signatures on the Cop City referendum petition should not have been thrown in the trash to placate the donor class. #GApol

You know, if Fulton County GA just taxed commercial trophies and data centers on their fair market value, as the law says, we'd rake in half a billion a year from entitled real estate billionaires. We don't need to pass a wealth tax for that. #GApol

This piece's focus shows Georgia Recorder is not in the pocket of Big Power. The rest of local media, well ... Vote Peter Hubbard & Alicia Johnson. Tell the powers that be what you think of secretive manipulation that hits your power bill & the planet. #GApol georgiarecorder.com/2025/10/22/p...

So the City *has* updated the in lieu fee, though they keep it excellently hidden. h/t Center Civic Innovation. The updated fee shows that the Gulch bros got away with $6M less than they should have been charged. Where are the 61 units the Gulch should have provided?

This admin only talks about affordable housing. Where did the $8M go that Centennial Yards paid (way under-paid) in lieu of 61 affordable units? Where are the 61 units? The City *still* has not updated the 2017 in lieu fee, as legally required to keep pace with the cost of housing.

Out on bond, happily. Prosecutor said his bosses insisted that she surrender her passport, "since she might give secrets to China". Georgia Power's real secrets at the PSC are how little they charge data centers and how much they load on the rest of us. #GApol www.wabe.org/a-vocal-crit...

Hoping Patty is all right and has a good lawyer to get her out of the Fulton Jail hellhole. #GApol www.ajc.com/news/2025/10...

Only 27 grievances? The irony of making the slogan 'No Kings' is that we'd obviously be far better off with King Charles III - or with George III or even with King John.

@danimmergluck.bsky.social spells it why TAD extension would be so bad for Atlanta. #GApol www.ajc.com/opinion/2025...

Courtney Smith wants to raise a new consumption tax because she won't hear of trophy commercial properties paying their fair share. See her answers to Atlanta Civic Circle's candidate survey.

The TAD grab would fund boondoggles and do little for affordable housing while hiking taxes on Atlantans. Look at the irresponsible $58M of TAD cash the mayor has spent on the rat-infested ruin at 2 Peachtree, with no affordable apartments to show. www.ajc.com/news/2025/10...

Fulton's chief commercial appraiser told County Commission leaders last week "data centers are just warehouses". He valued this one at $31M, 12% of its sale price. Fulton needs new appraisers to capture the tax these things should be paying. www.bisnow.com/atlanta/news...