BOC MEETING SPEECH
September 22, 2026 — Paulding County Board of Commissioners

Good morning, Chairman Estes, Commissioners, and staff.
I am a resident of Paulding County.
I know I have spoken on this topic already. But it needs to be repeated—hopefully this Board will finally hear it and take action.

I want to begin with a fundamental question:
What is corruption?

The most widely accepted definition is straightforward: the abuse of entrusted power for private benefit.

True corruption does not always arrive as a dramatic cash-in-a-briefcase scandal. More often, it quietly appears through limited public notice, private coordination with developers before citizens are informed, text amendments that bypass traditional rezoning, and decisions that leave residents feeling the outcome was predetermined.

Most of you ran on a platform of transparent government.

Chairman Estes, you told the people of Paulding County you were "committed to serving with integrity, transparency, and dedication." Just this past June, you publicly assured residents on data-center issues: "They'll know all of the stuff when we know all of the stuff. They will get all of the information and all of the data. As soon as we get it, we will give it to them."

I think it's apparent that was not honest. Through open records requests, emails show a different story—records we had to pay for to figure out.

Commissioner Galloway, you said: "I believe in transparency in government." You are the only Commissioner with a challenger in November. Your actions on this issue will decide your fate.

These campaign promises are now being tested by the very process that produced the Technology Park Overlay District.

I am here today because the public trust is at risk. My call to action is clear:
This Board must completely repeal and throw out the Technology Park Overlay District.

It was created in an unconstitutional manner, it denies residents due process, and it constitutes illegal spot zoning.

Look at how this overlay came to be. While the text was still being drafted in July 2025, the drafting process was handed to Attorney Brandon Bowen—the lawyer representing the private data-center developer. Mr. Bowen wrote our code. He sent drafts to Ms. Lippmann, who simply reviewed and signed off. There is no public documentation showing that our own county attorneys made protective edits to shield citizens. The data center's own attorney wrote our local law, and project-specific accommodations like increased building-height limits were baked into the text.

The overlay was then pushed through in September 2025 as a text amendment. While that met the bare-minimum publishing standard under Georgia law, it stripped residents of due process.

No public notices were mailed to affected property owners.
No yellow rezoning signs were posted.
No public-notice signs were placed on our roads.
We received exactly one hearing. Most residents only learned of it months later.

County employees have indicated the Board has no intention of changing this overlay, despite public statements made in this room. We also recently learned of an almost $3 million residential real-estate investment on Wimberly Way under a newly formed LLC. The owner of this LLC is tied to one of our Commissioners. This only deepens public concern.

When a text amendment is used to bypass traditional notices, when a developer's attorney writes our code, and when public processes align so seamlessly with private interests—citizens are right to demand clarity.

Who does this Board truly serve?

This overlay is textbook unconstitutional spot zoning. By carving out special industrial privileges for a single developer's project while ignoring surrounding residential areas and the comprehensive plan, this Board enacted an unconstitutional taking of community rights.

These exact process failures are already triggering lawsuits across Georgia—in Jones County and Coweta County. Under Georgia Supreme Court precedents such as Cross v. Hall County and Olley Valley Estates v. Fussell, zoning actions can be set aside when the power is manifestly abused or when an official holds a financial interest that is more than remote or speculative.

We cannot afford to become the next costly legal battleground.

Our temporary moratorium ends in a few months. It has zero value if it is used only to tweak a broken, unconstitutional overlay.

We demand that you completely repeal and throw out the Technology Park Overlay District.

Start over. Work with the citizens—not the developers' attorneys—to ensure our zoning protections meet both the letter and the spirit of Georgia law. That is the transparent government you promised.

On the wall in this chamber hangs your Mission Statement: to enhance citizens' quality of life and make Paulding County a better place to live, work, and play. A massive industrial project that has not been properly studied, placed near thousands of families, does nothing to fulfill that mission.

The power you hold is a public trust secured by your oath and the official bonds you posted. Violations of that oath are not merely political — they go to the validity of the seats themselves. I ask you to treat that oath and those bonds as sacred, completely strike down this overlay, and I request that these comments be entered into the official minutes.

Thank you.