The Norcross City Council debate on Tuesday, Oct. 6, is cancelled after one of the two candidates running in the Nov. 3 special election had to leave town amid a family emergency.
Norcross PDC, a weekly community forum organized by Chuck Paul, organized the debate before early (or advance) voting in the special election begins on Tuesday, Oct. 13. Both candidates are former elected officials and well known in the city of about 19,000.
Paul told Rough Draft Atlanta that he is working to reschedule before the Nov. 3 election, but “the calendar is closing in.” Because voting at city hall starts next week, ballots could be cast before candidates sit down for a moderated debate on community questions, aspirations, and controversies.
Family and health first
Former Council Member Jeff Allen notified forum organizers and his opponent about the late-breaking family emergency on Monday, Oct. 5.
“My father-in-law may be in his last hours, and family takes priority over the city,” Allen wrote in an email. “We are on our way to see him, and I will likely be out most of the week. The current plan to reschedule is not solidified.”
Allen and Johnson are vying for one of the city’s four council seats, which opened after Council Member Marshall Cheek died of cancer. Council members officially adopted a resolution naming the Norcross Public Safety Building’s plaza after Cheek at the Oct. 5 meeting.
Cheek in Norcross
Mayor Pro Tem Bruce Gaynor, whose item formalizing the city’s asset-naming policy was also approved, said Cheek was instrumental in ensuring the project came in under budget and on time.
“It’s been such a successful project, and he was a key person in making that happen,” Gaynor said. “Honoring him by naming the public safety building plaza after him then forever his name will be associated with that building.”
Once that project is bid out and completed, Cheek’s name will be on a couple of buildings in Norcross: the plaza of the public safety hub along Buford Highway and the Jefferson Plaza office building.
Paulson-Cheek Mechanical, co-founded by Marshall in 1998, leases space for its metro Atlanta headquarters within the 7-story building at Peachtree Industrial Boulevard and Holcomb Bridge Road. The company’s logo faces the intersection at the Norcross-Peachtree Corners border.
