Alex Wan Now Ranks as Least Progressive Atlanta Councilmember
(APN) ATLANTA — Following two votes at the Full Council meeting on Monday, October 17, 2011, Atlanta Progressive News has revised its scorecard of Atlanta City Council Members, which now includes eighteen votes on legislation or other matters.
APN first issued a scorecard in 2009, and has re-issued the scorecard with additional items twice previously.
Of note in the current scorecard:
– Councilman Alex Wan (District 6) has emerged as the least progressive member of the City Council of Atlanta, with a score of 25 out of 100. Wan only joined the Council less than two years ago.
– Councilman Kwanza Hall (District 2) continues his rise in the scorecard as one of the more progressive members of the Council. Mr. Hall had a score of 0 in the 2009 scorecard; a score of 50 in the 2010 scorecard; a score in the high 50’s in the first 2011 scorecard; and now has a 64.29 in the second 2011 scorecard. This makes him now, the fourth-most progressive Councilman, ahead of Felicia Moore (District 9).
– Councilwoman Felicia Moore’s (District 9) score continues to decline. She is now the fifth-most progressive Councilperson, behind Natalyn Archibong (District 5), CT Martin (District 10), Michael Julian Bond (Post 1-at-large), and Hall.
Wan’s score of 25 is based on twelve votes or other actions that Wan participated in since the beginning of 2010.
Wan’s votes and actions were rated as non-progressive on nine items out of twelve:
(1) Wan voted to limit public comment at all Council Committee meetings during the secret vote of February 2010 [according to Georgia Voice magazine].
(2) Wan refused to disclose his vote to Atlanta Progressive News. [Wan sent an email to the Law Department asking whether they were prepared to defend Wan’s position in refusing to disclose how he voted. Wan is partially responsible for spending thousands of dollars to defend all the way up to the Georgia Supreme Court what Wan perceives to be his right to a secret vote. The vote took place at a lunch at the Council’s Retreat, which was technically open but poorly attended by the public; the vote details are not recorded in the minutes.]
(3) Wan supported the sale of City Hall East. [Atlanta sold the building for a song. Councilmember Wan defended the developer’s secret building plans for the property.]
(4) Wan supported waiving affordable housing requirements associated with funding requested for the CHE redevelopment from the Beltline Affordable Housing Trust Fund, ensuring that any affordable rental units at the redeveloped CHE would not be affordable to anyone making below 40,000 dollars per year.
(5) Wan supported Mayor Kasim Reed’s veto of Council legislation for a sewage treatment contract because the Mayor failed to send a proper representative to the Council Committee when it was being vetted, despite the fact that there was nothing substantively wrong with the contract. The veto, which Wan supported, cost taxpayers money, as they had to extend a more expensive existing contract.
(6) Wan supported the Yolanda Adrean (District 8) City of Atlanta employee pension reform proposal which would have changed the pension plan for existing employees, as opposed to solely new employees. Impacted employees include police, firefighters, garbage workers, sewer workers, and others. [Wan also upset several Council Members by making a motion to approve the pension plan in Finance Committee, even though Moore’s alternative plan had not had enough readings to be considered yet. A compromise between the two plans ended up passing.]
(7) Wan voted no on re-extending bar hours to 4am.
(8) Wan voted against providing a speaker from People TV with two more minutes to address the Full Council.
(9) Wan voted a second time against providing the speaker with more time.
The scorecard is available as a public Google spreadsheet at http://bit.ly/omIDju.
The current Council Member scores are as follows:
ARCHIBONG 100
MARTIN 83.33
BOND 72.73
HALL 64.29
MOORE 61.11
YOUNG 44.44
SHEPERD 42.86
ADREAN 41.67
SMITH 38.89
WINSLOW 35.29
WILLIS 35.29
WATSON 33.33
BOTTOMS 30
SHOOK 27.78
WAN 25
(END/2011)