Election on July 15th!

Answers to questions you may have about the election on July 15 for the evil Cobb County Commission.

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Every single incumbent voted against the Column's issue and none spoke favorably on cycling during the two contentious hearings. I would say they are all anti-cycling.

Concerning District 2, Bob Ott has done triathlons in the past and has done loops on Columns. I do not know if Ron Sifen cycles. Bob has a much better graphics designer. I do not know who designed Sifen's signs, but they really blow. You almost have to get out of the car and walk over to see what they say.

Vote for either and hope we can hold Thompson under 50% so we get a run off. Then vote for whoever is not Thompson during the run off.

Remember, to vote you will need a picture ID now. When you arrive at your polling place, you will be asked which primary ballot you want. You can take either a Republican or Democratic ballot. In Georgia you do not declare your party when you vote- although your choice in the primary binds you in case there are any runoff election. Thompson, Ott and Sifen are on the Republican ballot. If you wish to vote against Thompson, it is advisable to take the Republican ballot. Some guy is running for District 2 on the Dem ballot, but he will never win in Cobb County District 2, and to my knowledge, the Dem has not even campaigned. (Nothing partisan implied, just the facts.)

Basic Map:

http://www.cobbcountyga.gov/boc/index.htm

FAQs on voting here:

http://www.lwvga.org/elections/index.html

Sample Ballots:

http://www.cobbelections.org/

Vote, and get everybody you know to vote. If cyclists can help take out one incumbent, other politicians will be much more likely to listen to us.

Hyde Farm Saved!

According to the AJC, a deal has been reached to save Hyde Farm. This could be very significant to cyclists in Cobb County, and Roswell, if we act. Now that Hyde Farm becomes a public park, bike trails could connect many current cycling areas. A little over 1 mile of trail could connect Johnson Ferry to Hyde Road, which connects with Lower Roswell. And with a few miles of bike lanes, which some East Cobb residents have sadly been fighting, we could connect Northside Drive at 285 to Azalea/Riverside Drive in Roswell.

Think of being able to cycle from Northside Drive, through Cochran Shoals, up Columns, through Hyde Park, up Hyde Road, turning onto Lower Roswell Road, onto Willeo Road, right onto Azalea, which turns into Riverside, past Martin's Landing all the way to Eves Road. This would be almost 15 miles of paths and bike lanes, many very family friendly and safe. This would not only increase property values in the area, but most like decrease the bike traffic on Columns- I think many folks would rather have a longer ride than doing repeats in the same area. Map of possible route.



Naturally, there would be some resistance to such a bike path by non-cyclists. However, I think pointing out the benefits to families, the possibility of less cyclists on streets without bike lanes and paths, and the possibility of increased property values, can remove a lot of the resistance.

I think this is a great idea to push to Cobb County and The Trust for Public Land.

Commissioner Thompson Gets Challengers!

Remember the big Columns Drive Flap when Cobb District 2 Commissioner Joe Lee Thompson tried to restrict, if not ban, cycling on Columns? Remember how he basically refused to listen to cyclists and ended up getting a bill rammed through the commission that is probably unenforceable and certainly at odds with state law?

Well, Thompson has two Republican challengers for the District 2 election, Bob Ott and Ron Sifren and one Democrat, James Royal.

Bob Ott is a former president of the East Cobb Civic Association, was a member of the Cobb County Planning Commission & Board of Zoning Appeals through the first of this year,is president/owner of DBO software and is a Delta Airlines Pilot. More information can be found at his website, www.bob4cobb.com, which sadly has music playing when you go there. (He has a picture of his children on bicycles during a slide show- perhaps he would be interested in family friendly bike paths?)

Ron Sifen is a former president of the Vinings Homeowners Association and the Cobb County Civic Coalition. I can find no website for his campaign. Update: Ron Sifen's website is http://ronsifen.com, sadly it resizes some browsers. He has been corresponding with cyclists on the Cobb Cycling Yahoo Group. He was against the Columns ordinance.

I can find no information at all on James Royal, other than he has filed and is running.

There was a candidate forum for the 3 Republican candidates Friday evening- it looks like James Royal was not invited. Joe Thompson declined to participate, and Bob Ott and Ron Sifen squared off on Development along Johnson Ferry Road. Article here.

If you are interested in sending a message to Commissioner Thompson, perhaps you should support one of these other candidates. Bob Ott seems to have the best chance against Thompson. Cobb County tends to keep incumbents in office and Republican party does not take kindly to people challenging its old guard, but this is a chance to send a message.

Great Article On Who Pays For Roads

David Neiwart writing in the Seattle PI:

Indeed, most bicyclists in fact also own cars, so they're also paying the licensing fees and gas taxes as well. But by using their bikes in place of cars, the wear and tear (and subsequent maintenance costs) they inflict is exponentially less than that caused by cars and trucks.

A 1995 study titled "Whose Roads?" by cycling advocate Todd Litman laid all this out in detail. The study estimated that automobile users pay an average of 2.3 cents per mile in user fees, including fuel taxes and vehicle registration fees, while they actually impose 6.5 cents per mile in road service costs. Who pays the difference? It's picked up by general taxes and property assessments. So while bicyclists pay an equal share of those taxes, they impose costs averaging only 0.2 cents per mile in road service costs.

The amount bicyclists overpay leaps out when you look at the costs of local roads, the roads cyclists use most. Litman found that only a third of the funds for their construction and maintenance comes from vehicle user charges; local property, income and sales taxes pay the rest. Automobile user fees contribute only about 1 cent per mile toward the costs of local roads but simultaneously impose costs more than six times that amount.

Read the entire article! Some great information to use against those folks who feel that cyclists don't belong on the road because they do not pay for them.

Only a third of construction and maintenance costs of local roads come from "vehicle user charges." Only a third!

Assault on Columns

From Sadlebred (Southeastern Cycling) and the Cobb County Police:

Columns Dr. From the Cobb County Police: "PENS Alert Aggravated Assault (05/17/07 @ 1130 hours in Zone 3) The Cobb County Police Department’s Crimes Against Persons Unit is investigating an aggravated assault on Columns Drive in Marietta, Georgia.

According to investigators, the white male victim was jogging along Columns Drive when he got into a short verbal dispute with the black male suspect. The victim continued on his way and was later confronted by the suspect in a blue/green pick up truck. The suspect got out of his vehicle and ordered the man to apologize. The suspect then produced a handgun and fired a shot at the victim as he ran away. As the victim got the tag number off the truck, the suspect tried to run him over. The suspect fled the area before responding officers arrived. Suspect: Black male, light complexion, 6’00”- 6’03” tall, muscular build, close cropped hair, and armed with a stainless steel semi-automatic handgun.

Anyone with information about this incident should contact the Cobb County Police Department’s Crimes Against Persons Unit at (770) 499-3945."

Support Bike Racks!

Drive Your Bike To Work Day!

It’s Bike Month!

You’ve got a bike, right?

The purple Schwinn mountain bike you were were going to ride every day. The one you crammed into the back of your car when you drove out west from Minnesota, now collecting dust in your garage.

Or the 1980's Bianchi Pista fixie conversion you bought pre-built off of Craigslist and walk the two blocks from your $1,800/month studio to Ritual every Tuesday night.

Or the Giant OCR that cost a pretty penny, but felt so light when you picked it up in the store that it seemed crazy not to buy it. You know the one.

Well, it's Bike Month, and it’s time your bike got the fresh air and exercise it deserves.

That’s right, Drive Your Bike to Work Day is almost here! On Monday, May 14th, hoist that bike onto the roof of your car and drive it to work!

C'mon everybody, show your support!

License Check on Columns!

Very strange going ons indeed! There was a drivers license check on Columns Drive yesterday. When I drove home from work at a little after 5 o'clock this picture was taken of officers stopping all cars and checking for licenses and insurance/registration. This caused about a 15 minute delay.

When I cycled out to join a group ride the Cobb County officers were still checking. They were not bothering any cyclists, and just waved them on through. At a little after 6 o'clock there were 8 officers checking motorists. They were also writing tickets, and had a few people pulled off the road while they wrote.

I cannot remember the last time I saw a license check and I have certainly never seen one on Columns Drive. I wonder if the residents are experiencing some unexpected blow back for harassing the Cobb County Police concerning cyclists. I have yet to hear of a cyclists getting a ticket- warning yes, but no ticket. I have seen many motorists getting tickets due to the increased police presence.

Last year I did see police out with a radar car and several motorcyclists getting speeders midway down Columns. I would love to see the Cobb Police do this again. In any case, I am glad the police are being more visible there. After the BS ordinance was passed, many residents got very aggressive towards cyclists. This should help them rethink that attitude.

I would love to hear how many motorists got upset over the delay and gave the police grief for stopping cars and not cyclists. The officer I talked to was very nice and waited patiently while I dug through all the crap in my glove compartment looking for my registration. He even chuckled at all the stuff I had jammed in there. I have a very visible bike rack on my car, so he knows I was a cyclist. I was very polite and nice to him, and he checked my stuff and sent me on through.

May is National Bike Month!

Check out AtlantaBike.org for tons of activities! And remember that May 18th is National Bike to Work Day.

Article in SFGate About Bike Advocacy

Bike advocacy evolves from Critical Mass to political know-how

The political influence of San Francisco's pro-bike movement has risen steadily over the past decade to the point where the chief advocate for cyclists sits on a powerful city commission and elected officials rarely tell them no.

It's a long way from the early days, when bike enthusiasts could barely get city officials to return their calls.

But a series of attention-grabbing street protests that started 15 years ago in the form of the monthly Critical Mass rides, which attract hundreds to thousands of cyclists, put bike interests in full public view. Elected officials took notice.

"We've achieved a lot. There's no doubt about it,'' said Leah Shahum, executive director of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, which boasts a membership on the plus side of 6,000, making it one of the largest advocacy groups in the city.

It was Shahum whom Mayor Gavin Newsom tapped last year to serve as a commissioner overseeing the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, which is in charge of transit, traffic and parking operations in the city.

Cycling activists have successfully lobbied for more bike lanes -- even when they result in the loss of curbside parking and traffic lanes. They persuaded lawmakers to require secure bike parking in new commercial developments and fought for bike racks on buses. And despite a two-time loss at the polls, advocates pushed through a plan to ban cars along some roadways in Golden Gate Park on Saturdays.

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More here.

Reelection Dates for Cobb Commissioners

I was asked on a bike forum which commissioners were up for reelection next. Here is a summary of the current commissioners, dates of their next elections, their last elections and my opinion on possibilities for defeat. You can check your election ID to see if you are represented by any of these folks. If you do not have a voter ID card, get one because you are voting in the next election! If you are in any of these districts and would think about holding public office, this is a good level to get in on. Remember, the religious right assumed great control over local governments by running inexperienced people for this level of office with strong grassroots support. We can use their model to accomplish the same thing. We may have to reach across party lines to do it, but it is certainly possible.

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It looks like the Chair, and Districts 2 and 4 are up for reelection in 2008. The primary will be in July and the general in November.

The Chair is Sam Olens. He won the Republican primary in July 2004 with 81% of the vote. He ran unopposed in the general. His seat is voted on county wide, so it would be hard for a Democrat to unseat him- the country is trending back to the Dems but Cobb County is more like Alabama than it is the rest of the country.

He is a GOP golden boy, holds many elected offices, holds an appointment from Gov. Perdue, sits on many boards, has won many awards, and works as a lawyer. He seems like a pretty decent guy except for this boneheaded vote. He will be hard to oust. It would probably be hard to get any decent Republican to run against him since I am sure the GOP would make a serious effort to dissuade a challenger. Of course, if he is being groomed he may seek higher office in 2008. With the number of posts he holding now, I tend to think he may stay where he is.

On Olens I will say that he did inquire about adding additional lanes on Columns and did talk, for all talk is worth, about building other bike lanes in Cobb in the coming years to try and relieve some of the bike traffic on Columns. When I mentioned that if Columns has been such a hot button issue for so many years as some commissioners and homeowners were suggesting, maybe they should have been planning additional bike lane before now, he got rather hot and testy. It may be possible to encourage him to become a bike friendly ally. Still, his vote for the ordinance was a vote against cyclists.

Primarying him would be tough and beating him the general election tougher. Of course nothing would be impossible.

District 2 would be Joe Thompson. He is the guy who brought the ordinance up for the folks on Columns. He is very old. He ran unopposed in the general and won the Republican primary 70-30%. If he runs again, and from some sources in the Cobb GOP they were surprised he ran again last time, he is beatable in the primary. He is not well liked at all and many longtime GOP contributors did not donate to him in 2004. He is arrogant and dismissive. (He even refused to be interviewed by an scout who needed an interview with an elected official for an Eagle Scout badge. And this scout was the son of a wealthy, long-time GOP contributor.)

He is very beatable in the primary with a good candidate. He is the guy I would most like to see defeated for bringing up this ordinance.

District 4 is Annette Kesting. She won the Democratic primary with 63% of the vote and in the general she beat Republican Woody Thompson in the general by a razor thin margin of 51-49%. From one of the anti-bike homeowners on Columns I heard that Woody Thompson is planning to run again. However, he almost certainly would not be pro-bike and might actually be anti-bike like the folks on the commission now.

I heard Kesting speak at one of the commission meetings. She does not seem to be very bright at all. She gives constituents 8x10 glossies of herself and puts her picture on t-shirts for kids on some after school program. I think a good candidate could clean her clock in a primary. Although West Cobb leans Dem, if we could get a pro bike Republican through the GOP primary, we could beat her in the general as well. She is easily the most endangered commissioner during a re-election.

Up for reelection in 2010 would be Districts 1 and 3.

District 1 is Helen Goreham. While she ran unopposed in the general, she did face 5 challengers in the GOP primary, which she won with 53% without a runoff. She is beatable in the primary with a good candidate. With 5 challengers last time, I am sure she would be challenged again in 2010.

District 3 is Tim Lee. He ran unopposed in the GOP primary and won the general 72-28%. I have no idea how he would fare in a primary battle. It would take one heck of a Dem candidate to beat him in the general.