MARIETTA — The Cobb Board of Commissioners seemed poised to approve a countywide stormwater fee before a room packed with more than a hundred residents Tuesday evening.
That is, until Commissioner Jerica Richardson, whose district was battered by flash flooding in September 2021, expressed hesitancy to support the fee Tuesday evening after nearly four hours of public comment, interruptions, presentations, discussion – and more interruption.
Richardson, who is running for the 6th Congressional District this year, said she wanted to see the county do more to educate businesses and residents about what the fee would entail. Specifically, she asked county staff to develop the manual for businesses detailing credits they can receive from the county for meeting certain benchmarks and taking steps to reduce stormwater impact.
Richardson also requested stakeholder meetings with different groups throughout the county. Last week, the Cobb Chamber of Commerce asked the commission to delay a vote on the code amendment, the most prominent Cobb group yet to weigh in on the issue.
Before Richardson asked for the delay at about 11 p.m., there were multiple interruptions throughout the meeting, which began at 7 p.m. Residents in the audience who were against the fee yelled out and verbally derided the commission during its discussion of the prospective fee after two hours of public comment.
“I’ve never seen this kind of back-and-forth from the audience before,” Cobb Chairwoman Lisa Cupid said as audience members shouted, “We’ll shut it down,” and, “Call the question.”
She called a brief recess after that exchange around 10 p.m. to request additional Cobb Police officers enter the board room in case more interruptions occurred.
Cupid then told the audience upon resuming there would be no more warnings, and that police would remove anyone who disrupted…
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