CrossRoadsNews, December 13, 2014

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Community

CrossRoadsNews

December 13, 2014

“We have to rebuild credibility in District 1. I’m going to offer a new level of accessibility and disclosure.”

Jester takes seat as District 1 commissioner after runoff win By Ken Watts

Nancy Jester took her seat Dec. 9 on the DeKalb Board of Commissioners as the District 1 commissioner four months after her predecessor, Elaine Boyer, resigned in disgrace. Jester, a former DeKalb School Board member, won the seat in a Dec. 2 runoff in the special election to finish the two years left on Boyer’s term. She defeated Holmes Pyles, an 86-yearold retired state government employee who ran as an independent. The runoff election was needed because none of the five candidates in the Nov. 4 election received the required 50 percent plus one vote to claim the seat. Boyer resigned from the board days before pleading guilty to federal charges of defrauding county taxpayers of $93,000. Jester attended her first full BOC meeting on Tuesday at which the board, among other things, voted to cancel the county’s contract with Green Energy Partners and its controversial biomass gasification plant. She abstained on that vote and on the vote to seat George Turner, who was nominated by interim CEO Lee May to replace him as the

Ken Watts / CrossRoadsNews

Nancy Jester takes the oath of office from DeKalb Probate Court Judge Jeryl Rosh on Dec. 8 at the Maloof Auditorium in Decatur as family, friends, constituents and elected officials look on.

interim District 5 commissioner. After taking the oath of office from DeKalb Probate Court Judge Jeryl Rosh on Dec. 8 before a crowd that included her husband, Stan, her children and other family members, friends and constituents at the Maloof Auditorium, Jester made indirect reference to the Boyer scandal.

“We have to rebuild credibility and trust in District 1 and I’m here to do just that,” she said. “I’m going to offer a new level of accessibility and disclosure. I’m looking forward to putting initiatives together for taxpayers and families in communities in District 1 and across all of DeKalb.”

May, who officiated the ceremony, said he’s eager to work with Jester, who will represent an affluent swath of central and north DeKalb that includes nearly 150,000 residents in Brookhaven, Chamblee, Doraville, Dunwoody, Tucker and surrounding neighborhoods. “Today shows us that the county is beginning to move forward in the right direction and I’m excited about it – to have permanent leadership in District 1,” May said. “Nancy and I planned to talk yesterday and we ended up going back and forth and exchanging ideas for about two hours. I look forward to working with her and more conversations like that one.” Jester’s husband was elected in May to the District 1 DeKalb School Board seat. Like Boyer before her, she will be the lone Republican on the Board of Commissioners. Jester says she is working on a new Web site that will keep constituents up-to-date on BOC business. She also wants to help improve certain county services. “I’ve heard complaints from the business community about the permitting process and from residents about customer service at the Water Department,” she said.

Green Energy Partners says it intends to build plant despite county action PLANT,

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Lithonia Mayor Deborah Jackson, who long opposed the plan, called the vote a positive development for the county. “It was not a good project for the environment and people’s health,” she said. “Now there is an opportunity to work with the county to bring a project that is really about green energy such as solar or wind.” Green Energy’s proposed $60 million facility got its air permit for the 79,710-squarefoot plant from the Georgia Environmental Protection Division on April 26, 2013 but never began construction. The plant, who will be built at 1770 Rogers Lake Road, just

outside the Lithonia city limits, was to process wood chip biomass fuel to generate 11.5 megawatts of electricity to sell to Georgia Power. In Feburary 2012, it secured a guarantee for $53 million bond funding Deborah Jackson from the DeKalb Development Authority to build the facility on 21.12 acres, just outside the city limits of Lithonia. Its contract with the county would have remain in effect through December 2030. CHASE, which has accused DeKalb

County government of contract zoning, sued the county on July 13, 2011. It says that the county contracted with Green Energy Partners and then approved the zoning to allow the plant to be built. The non-profit group Neville Anderson of citizens is seeking to overturn the DeKalb Board of Commissioners July 2011 approval of a special land use permit to allow the plants construction. Neville Anderson, Green Energy Partners’ president and CEO, said Tuesday that he was unaware that the contract was the BOC’s

agenda. “I did not have a chance to be there,” he said, adding that when CrossRoadsNews called him Tuesday afternoon, it was the first time he was hearing the reason for the cancellation. He asked for more time to make a full statement and on Wednesday sent an email saying that they plan to proceed with building the plant on Rogers Lake Road just outside the Lithonia city limits. “The project is not dependent on the yard waste generated by DeKalb County as its primary fuel. Green Energy Partners-DeKalb LLC remains committed to the project and intends to keep moving forward.”

Show Your PRIDE, South DeKalb! Show Your PRIDE, South DeKalb! R Don’t Litter R Mow, Trim & Paint R Clean to the Curb

A PUBLIC SERVICE MESSAGE FROM CROSSROADSNEWS


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