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submitted by Dan Reuter, AICP
I have lived in many areas of Georgia. I was fortunate to spend my childhood through college years in unincorporated eastern Clarke County. My first job was selling cokes at Georgia football games and years later I attended UGA. I was employed first as a city planner in 1989 at the Athens-Clarke County planning department. I moved to Savannah in 1992 and worked for the Savannah-Chatham planning department, which was also a joint city-county department. My first planning director job was in Glynn County in 1994 and later as planning director in Douglas County west of Atlanta. I became employed with the Atlanta Regional Commission in 1999.
There are many areas of Georgia I have explored, camped or traveled by train, bus, car, bike and walking. I have crisscrossed many state highways, swam in Elberton rock quarries, walked River Street and seen Rock City (which is located in Georgia not Tennessee). Once for a presentation I did a slide show of photos from the Georgia Secretary of State’s website. It was difficult to believe that so many pictures were all from our beautiful state.
We have amazing and important natural resources in Georgia. We have diverse and important animal habitats, parks and species of plants. Tourists can visit the Seven Wonders of Georgia (state parks), camp in the Cohutta Wilderness, go hang gliding on Lookout Mountain, canoe the Chattahoochee River and walk the beaches of Tybee Island.
We have Fortune 500 companies such as Coke, UPS, Home Depot, AFLAC, Delta and Southern Companies. We have tremendous resources in higher education at UGA, Georgia Tech, Georgia Southern, Emory and others. CARE International, United Way and the Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta as well as many other non-profit agencies serve human needs locally and internationally. Georgia has Boys Clubs, YMCAs and homeless shelters.
Georgia has many cultural strengths and attractions including the High Museum of Art, Georgia Aquarium, community artists and theaters as well as convention and concert halls throughout our state. We have important national facilities including military bases, Center for Disease Control and Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (FLETC). We have professional sports teams and Atlanta Motor Speedway.
We have had great cultural and political leaders including: President and Nobel Peace Prize winner - Jimmy Carter; Dr. Martin Luther King; Jackie Robinson; Richard Russell; Ted Turner; William Hartsfield; Juliette Gordon Low; Margaret Mitchell; Sidney Lanier; Johnny Mercer; Tony Dorsey and Andrew Young to name a few. Georgians have been influential throughout history and we should be proud of those achievements.
Georgia is a wonderful state with diverse citizens. Georgia has great leaders in neighborhoods, city and county governments and public school systems. Georgia has leaders who are rich and poor, male and female, young and old.
Georgia has problems with health care, education and criminal justice. Georgia has a concentration of jobs and population in the Atlanta region, which is an economic asset to our state. Georgia has farmers, laborers, cooks, nurses and teachers that are not appreciated enough. Georgia is sometimes portrayed by the national media as a redneck backwater, but Georgia attracts many newcomers from around the U.S. and the world.
So why the perception of two Georgia’s? It is somewhat reality and somewhat political strategy. There are poor, rural counties and cities in Georgia. There are counties that are losing population and have unequal access to healthcare or higher education. There are more jobs with higher average salaries in our cities. There are counties in Georgia that believe they have gotten an unequal share of state spending and counties that believe they generate most of the state tax revenue.
So how can we begin to change the perception of two Georgia’s? First it starts with an appreciation of both Georgia’s. The urban areas of Georgia have resources, universities and generate many jobs and revenue. The smaller cities and rural areas of Georgia provide important exports, tourism and jobs. Once we truly understand and value the small towns, farms, history and people who live throughout all Georgia we will be closer to living as one state.
Food is another connection to rural areas and farms in Georgia. The urban areas of Georgia must knit a close connection to the areas of Georgia that can produce more of our food. We send too many of our dollars out of Georgia that could support local food production. Much of our food travels across the U.S. and the world. Current food production and transport is heavily dependent on oil. Rural Georgia has the capacity to feed our state and we must support the organic and local food movements in Georgia.
Finally, we must stop trying to transplant the urban and suburban problems of Georgia into our valuable rural areas. We often believe that the problems of rural Georgia are resolved by the same actions and investments that created the urban and suburban areas of our state - more roads and development. Many strategies are need in the new economic realities of 2009 including educating our future workforce or access to high speed internet. Retaining more of our natural areas, history and rural lands to produce benefits for future generations is also an important role.
Georgia is a wonderful state. We share its history, its triumphs and its problems. The challenges for our country and state are tremendous. We spend too little time celebrating our state’s commonalities and interdependency. Our challenges are too great to continue to let our differences subdivide our great state.
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