Bill White, the man pushing for the wealthy Atlanta enclave of Buckhead to form its own city, told a House panel on Monday that rising crime rates and lack of arrests and prosecution have made residents feel like they are “living in a war zone.”
“Criminals feel emboldened to come,” he said. “They know if they get arrested, they will be out the next day.”
White, the CEO of the Buckhead City Committee, placed the blame on outgoing Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms.
“There is a 100% lack of leadership from the mayor,” he said, adding that “the great people of Buckhead feel like we’ve been exploited for way too long.”
White made the remarks during a lengthy House public safety committee hearing on the rampant rise of crime in Georgia’s capital city.
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He also took aim at Todd Coyt, assistant chief for the Atlanta Police Department, telling lawmakers Coyt misrepresented the city’s crime rate.
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, who spoke in front of committee members Monday morning, said he planned to ask the General Assembly to take up crime during a special legislative session this fall. Kemp also faulted “local elected leadership in our Capitol” for creating an “anti-police, soft on crime environment” during his four-minute speech.
He also said it was his “intention to include the work of this committee and solutions from other concerned stakeholders in my call for a special session of the General Assembly.”
In 2020, Atlanta authorities investigated 157 homicides, the most the city had seen in more than two decades. This year, as of June, homicides had increased by 60%, while shootings rose 40%, compared to the same time period in 2020.
In Buckhead, the numbers are much higher. Homicides have increased by 133%, while shootings have gone up 164%.
The numbers have terrified residents, threatened property values, and prompted a push for Buckhead to form its own city.
Supporters say a new city would finally give residents control over issues such as infrastructure and crime and allow police officers to go after criminals without the fear of retribution.
Critics claim that crime isn’t unique to Buckhead and argue that forming a new city isn’t a miracle cure. They also believe it could stoke racial divisions between Buckhead, an overwhelmingly white and wealthy area, with the rest of Atlanta, which is known as the “Black Mecca” of the South.
The bill to create Buckhead City was sponsored by state Sen. Brandon Beach, an Alpharetta Republican, and state Rep. Todd Jones, a Republican from Cumming, on the last day of the 2021 legislative session, making it one of the first agenda items when the General Assembly meets in January. Neither Beach nor Jones represents Buckhead.
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“If we can get a couple of hearings done … We get into session the first week in January, then we can have a final hearing on it and get it out of committee, then get it to [the] rules [committee], and then we can get it to the Senate floor pretty quickly,” Beach told the Washington Examiner.
The bill would have to be approved by both the House and the Senate before it is sent to Kemp. If he signs it, the question of cityhood then would be put on the November ballot for Buckhead voters.
The new city would be made up of nearly 90,000 residents, take nearly 20% of Atlanta’s population, and become the 10th largest city in the state, according to an Atlanta Journal-Constitution analysis using 2019 demographics from the U.S. Census Bureau. About 74% of the new city’s residents would be white, 11% black, 8% Asian, and 5% Latino.
