FANNIN, Ga. — Donna Whitener is running for re-election as Mayor of Blue Ridge. She has been incumbent mayor for 12 years. She spoke with FYN to discuss her  experiences as mayor, and her goals for the future. She is running against Rhonda Haight, an incumbent on the city council. 

On infrastructure:

Whitener says, “We’ve actually done quite a few infrastructure projects … we spent about 18 million dollars in rehab on water plants, transmission lines, two new million gallon tanks.” She clarifies that those projects took place in the beginning of her time as mayor, and that more recently: “We’ve done probably another 20 million in different projects such as water line replacements, streetscape projects, renovation projects, so you know we’ve done a lot of things that have taken care of the … infrastructure and the structures in our community that are important to us.” 

On city sewer: 

“You know we’re just now starting to do a lot with sewer. We’re starting to see some sewer issues pop up, and we’ve seen those all along because a lot of the lines are terracotta,” Whitener explains, “Our sewer system is so much smaller than our water system, we have over three thousand customers on our water system, but we have just a little over a thousand customers on our sewer system.” She also explains that while the infrastructure is dated, the capacity of the system has only recently become an issue: “That’s starting to happen because those lines just can’t handle it, they’re caving in, and they’re needing to be … replaced.” 

On building heights: 

Whitener says, “I know the big one that everybody ask about is the 60 foot in height. That’s been there since 1978. Over the years we’ve had a lot of tall buildings, some of those have burned, been torn down, changed over the years, but its always been that. In the last two terms … there has been a lot of talk about changing the height.” She says that two Planning and Development administrations have recommended that the height limit be reduced to 45 feet, but she says the council never wanted to take action: “They never wanted to change the height at that point. Never even talked about going to the 35 foot … it’s been through planning commission, its been through council members, and you know they’ve now made it 35 foot, but in the last time that we had a discussion about it … it didn’t happen.” 

On city manager form of government: 

Whitener says that the biggest challenge with any form of government is “Nobody’s actually studied the city manager form of government.” Whitener explains when she was first elected, she was in favor of a city manager, but soon changed her mind: “As I started talking with other mayors and council members, city manager form of government is only typically done in larger cities. We only have about, well we have a population of a little over 1200 people.” She notes a small number of small towns who have a city manager, while the vast majority favor a mayor. 

Whitener also cites a high turnover rate, a high level of control, and the impersonality of a city manager: “In our little city, a lot of our folks are my age … those folks like to pick up the phone … they like having that person they can talk to, they’ve got my phone number, they’ve got me on speed dial, if there’s anything going wrong at their house, if a tree fell, if they’ve had a storm, I get a call.” She says her personal connection with citizens is important, and it is lost with a city manager. 

On zoning: 

“I’m the only council member that has done any planning and zoning training,” Whitener says, “Planning and zoning involves people’s property, and it involves dollars, it involves their money, their livelihood and the people around them, it affects their livelihood too.” She says that training for the council would help them handle the increasingly difficult issue of growth and overdevelopment: “I think that planning and zoning training would help them look at it from a bigger picture, as to what it does to the entire neighborhood, rather than just ‘that’s a frame of mind’ or ‘that’s somebody I know’ or ‘that’s somebody that talks a good game’ … I think it helps you to sort out what makes sense and what doesn’t.”

On the City of Blue Ridge Police: 

Whitener first explains that growth in Blue Ridge is causing an increased burden on police. From more wrecks to small incidents in town, she says the uptick is putting stress on the city’s officers: “We only have 10 officers, we’ve got 4 part time, we’re really needing to staff up.”  

“We put money aside to hire two new officers. The problem is finding those people … with all that happened in the last few years, the defund the police, the ugliness that they were having to go through … a lot of people said ‘you know, I’m not putting my life on the line for everybody anymore, I’m tired i want to go home and enjoy my family,’ and I understand that. So, a lot of folks have gotten out of that field, so we’ve got to find those folks that we can recruit from somewhere that are still interested. 

Whitener also says, “Maybe if they have the support system from the mayor and the council, as to we want good police officers, we’re not gonna tell you to stand back, we’re gonna tell you to move forward. You’re a police officer, you know what to do and you know when to do it. So, … we’ve got to make sure that those officers know that we support them.” 

On affordable housing:

“There’s a lot of gossip that affordable housing didn’t get passed. Affordable housing has not been on any kind of yes or no vote. What did not get passed was they wanted to rezone an area where we already have some sewer issues. We thought some of those had already been resolved, but its not … three days before the vote came up, they had had another blow out in that area that had caused some problems, and so we had about a million dollar repair on the line and a pump station before any major housing at all could go in there. It was 15 acres that they wanted to put 170 units in. If we had rezoned that to R3, we would have been obligated to put them on our sewer system, which would have not worked. It would … have been a problem… we couldn’t have done it, it would have ruined the entire sewer system for everybody else in the neighborhood.” 

Whitener clarifies, “It’s not that I’m not for affordable housing, and for workforce housing, because I know it’s needed. I get calls … pretty often, but I have rental properties myself, and so I know that there’s a need out there. But, the problem you have is a lot of people are trying to sell the affordable housing, that that was … voted on, but it was not, it was actually the area they chose.” 

In the future, Whitener says: “That’s my goal with affordable housing, I want to make sure that we’re not selling out our affordable housing to folks from the Atlanta area … I want to make sure that we take care of the people in Blue Ridge and Fannin County first.” 

To voters: 

“I’ve always supported my citizens. They’ve been able to reach me 24/7. I’ve had to say no to some citizens, but I’ve always given them the reasons that I couldn’t do what they wanted. I’m approachable, I’m reachable … I want citizens to know that I’m there for them, and I’m there to make sure that we have a secure and safe community.” 

 

FYN made an effort to contact every candidate, but we were ultimately unable to speak with Post 1 candidates Herald Herndon and Jack Taylor; Post 3 candidate Christy Kay; Post 4 candidates Jacqueline Brown and William Whaley; and Post 5 candidates Bill Bivins and Nathan Fitts. Early voting is already underway and Election Day is Nov. 2, 2021.