The Official Atlanta Thread: Roswell Residents Need Not Respond

at how empty the stadium is

 

That was about 15 mins before kickoff. To be fair, it filled in nicely to I'd guess 75% of capacity at kickoff.

 

JUST LET ME LAUGH AT THEM MATT GOSH

 

Protesters ‘defend Stone Mountain’ against proposed MLK monument
The debate rages on over whether to pay tribute to a civil rights leader on top of a Confederate monument.
November 15, 2015 Max Blau

On a beautiful Saturday afternoon at Stone Mountain, as families laced up their boots and joggers hit the pavement, Williams Phillips had a different mission. After traveling an hour from Griffin, Georgia, the Army vet embraced his First Amendment right, brandished his oversized Confederate battle flag, and hiked up the 825-foot-tall granite landmark to announce his displeasure about an effort to build a bell tower honoring one of the world’s most revered civil rights leaders atop the world’s largest monument to the Confederacy.

“It’s a smack in the face,” said Phillips. “Martin Luther King has had his image all over the world. This is a Confederate memorial.”

Phillips stood among three dozen other participants in the “Defend Stone Mountain” rally on Saturday to protest the plan to build an 18-foot arch in honor of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. at the summit of Stone Mountain. The idea of an MLK monument, which would reference a line from his most famous speech, became the subject of a fierce outcry among Confederate sympathizers and King’s contemporaries alike last month.


William Phillips, a protester at the 'Defend Stone Mountain' rally, shows off a pair of tattoos on his arms.
MAX BLAU

Governor Nathan Deal initially expressed support for the monument proposal, but the Sons of the Confederate Veterans soon pushed back, calling the monument illegal due to a state law that requires the park to commemorate the Confederacy. They threatened legal action if the monument moved forward. In a statement, the group compared it to “flying a Confederate battle flag atop the King Center in Atlanta against the wishes of King supporters.”

Then, in a somewhat surprising move, both the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and NAACP joined the SCV in opposition to the monument, arguing that its erection would tarnish MLK’s legacy through its association with the state park once home to Ku Klux Klan cross burnings. For individuals like Charles Steele, president of the SCLC, the MLK monument was nothing more than an attempt at amelioration in a park filled with symbols of hatred.

“It’s something that was a dark past of our history, and it needs to be buried in history,” Steele said last month. “We want to eradicate it. We want to blast it. We want to paint over it. Whatever it takes, that’s what we want to do.”

Civil rights leaders John Lewis and Andy Young eventually came out in support of the concept. But the backlash prompted Deal to step away from his early support—causing all parties to tap the brakes on the idea. Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed, following the storm over the statue, suggested that MLK’s contemporaries convene a summit to discuss the best way to honor the slain activist before moving forward.

As those politics played out in subsequent news cycles, organizers of the “Defend Stone Mountain” rally prepared for this weekend’s rally. In a Facebook group, they asked supporters to “stand with us against the traitors who wish to tarnish our Ancestors Heritage by placing a Monument celebrating Martin L. King on Stone Mountain.” On Saturday, a Kennesaw resident Joseph Olah, who runs a group called Rebel Yell, doubled down on the notion that a MLK monument would only continue an ongoing assault against a symbol that represents his Southern heritage.

“Fuck civil rights, this is a Civil War mountain,” Olah said. “They want to take our flags down from everywhere else. If they want us to put them in a museum, this is the museum to put them in. It’s not for Martin Luther King.”

Throughout the afternoon, Stone Mountain police officers, who expected hate groups to protest alongside the Confederate flag supporters, provided flag holders with an escort up the mountain, and even walked with them to the concession stand at the top, where a few demonstrators noshed on popcorn and purchased souvenir cups. Another group, dressed in military fatigues and clenching assault riles, walked with the protesters in case of a potential conflict.




No KKK members or white supremacists made their attendance known, though some people were later photographed making a four-fingered salute in front of the Confederate flags flying near the base of the mountain. Likewise, no counter-protesters stepped forward, as they had done at a similar rally last August, where they tore up and stomped on Confederate flags.

Many visitors who came to the park simply for recreation were startled—and visibly dismayed—to see Confederate flags being hoisted up the mountain. London native Noreen Sumpter, who this week was visiting Atlanta from her home in Brooklyn, called the demonstration “bloody ridiculous” given the park’s history and affiliation with hate groups like the KKK. For her, the notion of a bell atop the granite structure wouldn’t just help Stone Mountain move past its beleaguered image, but would be a step in the right direction for the state, helping to place the symbolic reminders of old injustices even farther in the past.

“It would be awesome,” Sumpter said. “It would be [MLK’s] dream. It would be rung all over Georgia and ring out into the rest of the world.”

- See more at: http://www.atlantamagazine.com/news...t-proposed-mlk-monument/#sthash.ekDoseoD.dpuf

 

Perfect opportunity for a smart bomb

 

heard some of these folks interviewed on NPR this morning. they sounded exactly like these pictures look.

 

I like people like that. Sometimes, I'll screw something up at work or do something dumb when I'm drunk and think "God, I am so stupid." Then I see people like that and I think "Wow, I'm basically in fucking MENSA."

 

so Oakhurst Market has some of the best smoked wings I have ever had

made a last minute decision to grab their All Pro package for the game on Saturday (had to call it in friday morning)

60 smoked wings, with housemade blue cheese
3 bags of chips with a quart of housemade salsa (was also some of the best I've ever had)
2 six packs of A Night on Ponce

all for $75 and I didn't have to fire up the smoker.

they also have a bigger package that includes a pork butt w/ buns and sauce

 

God Damnit I spoke too soon.

Apparently Kasim vetoed the use of the funding today.

I'm sad.

 

Dinner and Dead and Company tomorrow night...with a girl! What's a handful of dinner spots in buckhead and how should I get to Phillips? MARTA?

Smokebelly BBQ, Thirteen pies, Farm Burger, King + Duke

 

so now we know where bryix lives


Georgia underground bunker hits the market for $17.5 million




TIFT COUNTY, Ga. —

The only privately-owned underground bunker in the United States just hit the market in Georgia for $17.5 million.

The hardened bunker, known as The Facility, is listed by Sister Hood at Harry Norman Realtors’ Buckhead office.

The Facility is located 45 feet underground in Tifton, Georgia. It's on a parcel of more than 20 acres and has eight bedrooms and 10 bathrooms, according to Harry Norman.

The two-story bunker is certified to withstand a 20,000-ton nuclear blast.

The first level has a large home theater with seating for 15, a kitchen, recreation area, conference rooms, a Decon shower and more.

The second level has four luxury apartments. Each apartment has two bedrooms, one bathroom, a kitchen, dining area, living room, Internet with its own security, modern HVAC system and environmental monitoring sensors.

The bunker was built in 1969 and renovated up to government standards in 2012.


http://www.wsbtv.com/news/news/loca...-million/npPP3/?ecmp=wsbtv_social_twitter_sfp

 

shit. I'd turn that bitch into the biggest fermentation cellar in Georgia. but then I'd have to live in or around Tifton.

 

also, I must be missing something here.

 

Going to the Spence with the best friend tonight since she won a Concentrics gift card. Recommendations?

 

Supposed to be some glorious weather this weekend. Low 50s/high 40s dipping into slightly below freezing temps at night. About damn time.

 

Made it to Revival last night and holy shit was it good.

Probably the best pork chop I've ever had, grilled to perfection, fat melted in your mouth and perfectly sauced with "KG" masterpiece. Fiancée got the Coca Cola braised short rib and that was equally as phenomenal. Al the side were amazing. Mac and cheese, roasted carrots in butter and dill, grits with sautéed onions. Local kale salad with apples started us off. And the cornbread. Oh my good lord the cornbread.

Go at your next opportunity. It's a different setup than most good restaurants you'll see. Basically like a Victorian home with a bunch of tables set up with a bar in the middle of the house. The porch would be amazing in the spring.

 

I get a strong feeling of Sodosopa with the new Suntrust Park stuff.

http://blog.wbassociates.com/?cat=18

 

Need a date night suggestion tonight since the botanical gardens are closed on fucking Monday's.

 

http://www.myajc.com/news/news/loca...re-support-for-braves-stadium-will-cos/npNGt/

Infrastructure support for Braves stadium will cost millions

Spoiler

As the concrete and steel of SunTrust Park rises in the Cobb County skyline, the amount of taxpayer funds that will be invested on the ground around the stadium is coming into sharper focus.

An Atlanta Journal-Constitution examination has found that the baseball stadium and mixed-use development will require tens of millions of additional taxpayer dollars for roads, bridges, public safety and foregone property taxes — expenses beyond the roughly $400 million for construction and maintenance.

Construction continues on the Braves’ new Stadium in Cobb County.
In fact, road projects in Cumberland conceived since the stadium announcement will amount to more than $41 million. Those expenses — and others — will be paid by a combination of local, state and federal money.

And that is an incomplete total that does not include the $3.4 million for buses or $1.2 million annual operational expense for a new people-moving tram around the stadium area; and only allows $9 million for the bridge over I-285 for pedestrians and the tram.

The AJC has reported that construction of the bridge alone could exceed $9 million, and has identified additional expenses with that project not included in the estimate — $3.5 million to reinforce a parking deck, an estimated $2 million for land purchases, and $1 million that has already been spent for design and engineering. The bridge project is currently on hold for further study.

When asked if there could be more infrastructure costs associated with the stadium between now and its opening in April 2017, Cobb Commission Chairman Tim Lee responded: “Do you anticipate more rain in April than we have had in November?”

There could easily be additional projects, some with big price tags.

For example, it is still unclear how the county’s $14 million commitment of special purpose sales tax revenue will be used. That money is in addition to the county’s funding for construction and is dedicated to infrastructure projects around SunTrust Park.

“To date, neither the infrastructure projects nor the funding sources have been … identified,” Cobb transportation director Faye DiMassimo said.

Then there is the $10 million in property taxes from the Cumberland Community Improvement District for infrastructure improvements. The Cumberland CID is a 6.5-square-mile business district that raises funds by taxing property owners there. The CID’s annual budget is about $5 million.

Tad Leithead, the CID’s chairman, said its contribution is being provided in annual $2.5 million installments directly to the Braves, and the team is not required to report back how the money is used. The district will make its second payment in December.

“Our requirement was that the funds be spent on purposes for which CID funds can be spent — essentially infrastructure … in public right of way and in keeping with our purposes,” Leithead said.

Unreported costs

Cobb isn’t alone in shelling out big money around a new stadium.

Harvard Professor Judith Grant Long’s 2013 book, “Public/Private Partnerships for Major League Sports Facilities,” found that infrastructure, public safety, operations, foregone rent and other “unreported costs” have added an average $89 million in public cash to each of the 121 stadiums and arenas in use during the 2010 seasons.

That’s an extra $10 billion in related costs not typically associated with the country’s biggest stadium projects.

“Public partners pay far more to participate in the development of major league sports facilities than is commonly understood,” Long wrote in the book. “… The partnerships underlying these deals are in fact highly uneven, with the public paying an estimated 78 percent share of the costs.”

Leithead acknowledged that much of the investments made in the Cumberland area will benefit the Braves, but said “the infrastructure is there for use by everybody, every day.”

“By making a $1.2 billion investment in the community over a three-year period, which is just unprecedented, that has had the impact of drawing a lot of economic development and a lot of additional infrastructure investment,” Leithead said.

In addition to the $672 million SunTrust Park, the Braves areprivately funding a $450 million mixed-use development called The Battery Atlanta.

Lee said the type of development originally zoned for the Braves site would have required similar, if not more, investments in infrastructure. But that assumes the entire site would have been sold and developed all at once.

“Infrastructure improvements associated with this development would have been required for any development on this site,” Lee wrote in an email.

Spoiler

The controversial $500 million bus rapid transit project is another example of additional spending that could happen because of the Braves.
One of the county’s contracts with the team requires it to use “best efforts” to secure funding for rapid transit, which would build new stations and a dedicated lane for buses down Cobb Parkway, past SunTrust Park and on to MARTA’s Arts Center Station.

The county would need a federal grant to cover about half the costs, and Lee has promised a ballot referendum before moving forward with the project. The county is currently awaiting the Federal Transit Administration to finish review of a report on rapid transit’s environmental impacts.

J.C. Bradbury, a sports economist at Kennesaw State University, said related stadium costs are difficult to count accurately because it involves projects that sometimes have been planned for years, but which take on greater priority when a stadium is built.

“But there’s no doubt that SunTrust Park is influencing the timing,” he said.

An example of that is the plan to build a $4.3 million firehouse in Cumberland. That project had been stalled since the Great Recession, but will now be constructed with 2016 special sales tax revenue.

“The station was planned since 2004 when we anticipated growth in the area, but due to the economic slowdown we held on to those plans,” Cobb Public Safety Director Sam Heaton said. “Now that we are seeing that growth, which does include the mixed-use around the stadium and additional offices and hotels, we need to add that station.”

Long counts foregone property tax revenue as a cost to municipal governments that help build stadiums. In Cobb, the stadium would generate about $7.9 million in annual taxes if it were not owned by the government, which is common in stadium deals.

John Vrooman, a sports economist at Vanderbilt University, said it’s fair to count foregone property taxes as a cost.

“The total amount of tax liability in a local economy is constant and so the tax exemption for one firm results in the zero-sum increased tax liability for someone else,” Vrooman said.

But Derek Schiller, the Braves executive vice president for sales and marketing, said the development has already paid off for the community with increased property values and about $500 million in planned development.

Leithead, of the Cumberland CID, agreed and said the team’s mixed-use development will generate millions in revenue for the county and school district, because the Braves have not requested a standard 10-year tax abatement for which they would surely qualify.

“There’s a payback,” Leithead said.

Lee recently sent out a newsletter claiming that the county would receive a 60-percent return on its stadium investment. But that calculation only looks at the annual expense of $6.3 million in county-wide property taxes, and ignores the additional $10 million a year in public money that will go toward paying off the debt.

Likewise, the county’s calculated return does not include the $24 million in cash for infrastructure around the stadium that was part of the deal.

When asked why he is claiming a big return on only a fraction of the county’s annual contribution, Lee called the question “ridiculous.”

“Your line of questioning continues to make it clear to leaders all over the metro region that you — and perhaps the AJC — have a blatant bias against everything Cobb County accomplishes,” Lee wrote in an email. “It is hard to continue to take your questions seriously.”

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has produced the most complete coverage of the Braves’ move to Cobb County, and the complex issues surrounding the effort to recruit the Braves to the suburbs and the mammoth undertaking to build a stadium and entertainment district. Learn more at myAJC.com/bravesmove.

 

got this bad boy delivered over the weekend

 

Yes I want that

 

came with a CD filled with a bunch of good tracks too

think I might get an extra to frame for my future man cave

 

the GE HQ will not be in Georgia. bummer

 

Mark Toro, the dapper mouthpiece of North American Properties,wasn't pulling punches at a recent Bisnow event when he blamed suburban Atlanta's 40-year pushback against MARTA on the R-word."It's racism," Toro told a roomful of hundreds of real estate officials and other key Atlanta players. "We've got to recognize it and call it what it is … The train runs both ways, and we don't want those people out here. That is the prevailing theme in suburban communities." Event organizers Bisnow described Toro's claims as "shocking" while recalling evidence to support his assertions, including T-SPLOST'scrushing 2012 defeat, which was largely the result of suburban naysaying at the polls. Toro, whose company built Avalon and reinvigorated Atlantic Station, is also ULI Atlanta's Livable Communities Council chair; as such, he's rallying North Fulton cities to get on board with a potential heavy-rail expansion funded by a half-penny sales tax. It sounds like Johns Creek, for one, will be a significant hurdle.

 

I want to work for that man.

 

Heading to ATL for NYE and am looking into possible events. Currently looking at "Buckhead NYE Block Party". Tickets include access/open bar to East Andrews Courtyard & Terrace, Cellar 56, Stillhouse, Stout, Prohibition, and Czar Ice Bar.

Any opinions on the above or other good ideas to check out?

 

I have no idea what's going on but I wouldn't do that.

 

Navy going to bring in all their hot women for the peach bowl

better hope FSU is compensating

 

East Andrews would be my last choice, if I was going to do Buckhead, unless I was going to see a comedian.

 

I feel like 40% of FSU grads are already here

 

I'd rather be looking to fuck a current student on NYE

 

2nd largest population of alumni after Tampa according to the seminole club president here

 

tickets to the FSU/GT game were over $125 on StubHub just to get in and GT blows

 

Any of y'all have a spot you like to take parents when they come in. Town for some good food. Coming back to Cobb for turkey day, going to Try something new and get my parents away from dt Roswell/Marietta square for a change Saturday night.

 

Any recommendations?

 

credit to soulfly

 

My parents thought Decatur was just the bees knees when I took them. Go to Revival or Iberian Pig or something.

 

should have tried the lemon glazed sweet potatoes ..damnit need an excuse to go back. family style for 2 people is a bit much though.

 

Thanks guys think that settles it, headed to the factory.

Price doesn't really matter not really looking to drop $75 for an entree or anything either. Parents are creatures of habit and I want to mix it up a little bit. Iberian pig is p solid went there for my buddies birthday a couple years back. I'll check out some of the places mentioned and report back.

Playing Stone mountain on Friday will be a first as well. Heard it's a decent track

 

now now, don't be a sore loser...

 

If you have Instagram I recommend following 5ps_