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Man On the Move: Kelly Girtz Announces His Candidacy for 9th District Commissioner

by Meghan Jones
04/01/2006



This election year, Tom Chasten will be vacating his position as 9th District County Commissioner, which he has held since 1991. Vying to fill the spot are Ed Vaughn, Alvin Sheets, and Clarke County teacher, Kelly Girtz. This is no easy task, as the 9th district is also known as a "superdistrict" since it spans the entire eastern half of the county. The county line runs from Hawthorne Avenue all the way to the Oglethorpe County line, and it encompasses both urban and rural areas. The newly elected commissioner will find himself facing the wide variety of concerns that accompanies representing such a diverse populace.

Kelly Girtz was born in Norfolk, Virginia, and has been a resident of Athens for the past 10 years. He received his degree in Sociology at Old Dominion University, then went on to receive an MAT degree in Secondary Social Studies Education from Piedmont College. He has been married since 1995 and has been teaching in Clarke County for the past eight years.

His current position is at the revolutionary Classic City Performance Learning Center, a school designed to ease the transition back into high school for students who have dropped out of the public school system. There are only seven teachers, and the program includes a learning-through-service component. He was the Teacher of the Year in the Classic City Performance Learning Center's inaugural year.

His current involvement in the community includes the Pulaski Heights Neighborhood Association and a citizen's participation in the Partners for Prosperous Athens initiative. We had a chance to ask him a few questions, and here is what he told us.

Æ: You have said that, if elected, you would aim to ensure appropriate land use and viable transportation options. What would you consider appropriate land use to be, and are there any sorts of public transportation programs you are looking to implement?

KG: Among our challenges is ensuring that we do not exceed the ability of our infrastructure to sustain our needs. When we place stress on things like our roadways and fire and rescue operations, everyone in the community experiences a diminished quality of service. Expansion must occur in such a way to keep this from happening. Folks also need to have easy access to jobs, schools, medical care, shopping, dining and entertainment, rather than being isolated from these needs and amenities. This limits unnecessary time spent traveling, the amount of money that has to be spent on fuel and the amount of pollution we face. As commissioner, I will promote exploration of innovative opportunities for land use and economic development. We can improve employment options while preserving our natural environment. When we make land use decisions, we have to imagine Athens in twenty years or in fifty years and feel proud of what we are passing on to our children and grandchildren.

Public transportation is an investment in our community; it has been estimated that a dollar spent there returns at least four dollars to the community as people are able to gain access to a greater variety of work and obtain more goods and services. Athens Transit staff does a wonderful job getting their buses through town on time. However, their scheduling options are hampered by funding restrictions. Because their service ends at 7:00pm, they are not able to serve a huge portion of workers in positions that require them to work later in the evening. We could be assisted with a change in state law, which currently bars localities from using sales taxes specifically for public transit. If the General Assembly changes this, Athens would be able to easily offer expanded evening services through a half-penny on the dollar sales tax. Whether or not this change takes place, as more local funds are generated through economic expansion, they should be directed toward improvements in our bus service.

Æ: District 9 is known as a "super-district" because it covers such a wide variety of concerns and demographics. How do you plan to reach out specifically to the underprivileged and overlooked of your district, such as the African-Americans and Latinos?

KG: Abraham Lincoln's famous definition of a democracy is a government "of the people, by the people and for the people." In referring to this, I must make it clear that "the people" means all the people. To illustrate this principle with a current example, we can look at the Neighborhood Notification Initiative, designed to inform organized neighborhoods about zoning changes. The Initiative is a great idea at its core: residents should be informed about what alterations have been proposed for the area where they live. However, the process is being set up to notify residents exclusively through email. For people working in an office or an academic setting, it is easy to imagine that "everyone" has access to email. Unfortunately, this is not true, so the Athens-Clarke County government must make notification available to those without computer access by posting information in places that people frequent: libraries, community centers, churches, grocery stores, etc.

Many people are not in an easy position to find out about government services or proposals. They are busy working, raising children, and coping with the challenges of everyday life. As a commissioner, I will respond to this by reaching out with regular newsletters and seeking input from residents, rather than waiting for them to contact me. This will be true throughout my district, regardless of race, language or economic status. The more residents that have input into decision making, the stronger the Athens community will be.

Æ: You are very involved in the Partners for a Prosperous Athens initiative; how did you become so involved, and are there any concrete ideas the group has come up with to put the plan into action?

KG: My involvement in PPA is as a citizen, not as an organizer. I have highlighted this initiative, though, because it does what must be done to move Athens forward: it draws together a wide variety of organizations to address a critical issue – our high poverty rate. All too often, those facing common challenges fail to communicate. Sometimes this is merely an oversight, sometimes it is because of friction between institutions. Either way, the people lose out. When there is regular communication between the ACC government, the University of Georgia, the Clarke County School District, members of the business community, and residents, everyone benefits. It is this spirit of collaboration that I will encourage as a commissioner. This takes continual effort, but it is worth it to make life better for the people of Athens.

Æ: I was doing a little bit of reading about the Classic City Performance Learning Center where you teach, and it sounds like an amazing place. How did you get involved in it, and what has been your favorite experience in your time there?

KG: After I had taught for five years at Coile Middle School, it was clear to me that many students needed options they were not being provided. By this point, many kids I had taught as seventh and eighth graders had dropped out of school. Many needed to be in smaller classes, in a smaller school, and needed different kinds of lessons. When it was first announced in the fall of 2002 that there would be a non-traditional high school opening in the Clarke County School District, I jumped at the opportunity to participate.

At Classic City, students get a chance to experience learning in a variety of formats beyond lecture-based instruction. Some lessons are built around educational software. Others are based outside of the classroom, from an Entomology class that spends hours each week comparing insect habitats across the county to Economics assignments that require students to evaluate the quality of local businesses.

A powerful aspect of the program is a requirement that students complete at least one credit in Service Learning to graduate. Students work one day a week at a nonprofit or government office. We have students now at WUGA radio, Sandy Creek Nature Center, The Red Cross and dozens of other sites throughout town.

One of my favorite experiences in the program relates to service work. Two years ago, when the World of Wonder playground (on the corner of Lexington Highway and Whit Davis Road) was being built with volunteer labor, the entire staff and student body spent the last day of our week together doing construction work there. It was wonderful working shoulder-to-shoulder with our students, everyone sawing, digging, and assembling the park. Students had such a good time working that several spent the weekend working there on their own. It was a perfect reminder that kids want to be productive and live meaningful lives; they just need the opportunity and encouragement.

Kelly Girtz can be reached by e-mail at kgirtz@yahoo.com.

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