CBA Results

Scores by Race

CANDIDATES PRE-INTERVIEW QUESTIONNAIRES

How the evaluation process works
To provide the best possible information on issues important to voters, CBA developed a detailed questionnaire for each city of Atlanta election and conducted personal interviews that probe candidates about high-priority community concerns. You can find the candidates' responses to the questionnaire on the CBA web site.

Committee members used a scale for scoring the responses to the questionnaire and the interviews, and an average was calculated for each candidate: 88 or higher is considered “excellent;” 79 to 87 is “well qualified;” 70 to 78 is “average;” and below 70 is “not qualified.”

CBA strives to make the evaluation process as fair as possible across all races and only takes into account responses provided to the questionnaire and in the interview process. Interviewers were provided extensive training to ensure consistency in evaluating candidates. Prior voting records were not considered for this purpose but may be included in future CBA processes. Finally, any outstanding ethics issues were not addressed by this process as the City of Atlanta Ethics Committee has its own process for addressing those issues.

What we look for in a candidate

Vision
what is the candidate's vision for Atlanta? What does the candidate want to do while in office and what problems must be addressed in order to achieve those objectives?

Qualifications and experience
Why is the candidate running for elected office? What makes the candidate qualified for holding an office? Who is supporting the candidate?

Ability to implement initiatives
Having a clear vision of the future is important, but it means nothing if the candidate cannot accomplish anything. How would the candidate tackle the problem he or she has identified as critical for the city? What opportunities does the candidate see in working with other cities and counties in the metro area and how does he or she define his or her role in city government?

Issues we expect to be addressed

Managing Government
Tax revenues are declining at a time when the population is growing and the demand for new services and infrastructure is growing. The next mayor and City Council can use this crisis to focus on the provision of critical city services – and transform the way these services are delivered. Which services do candidates consider to be the city’s “core services” and how will they be delivered better, faster and cheaper in the next four years?

Public Safety
The most important thing a local government can do is make its citizens, workers and visitors safe. There are many reasons crime rates rise and fall, but one reason is firmly in the city government’s hands – the size and management of its police department. There are other things that can make a city safe – well trained, equipped and managed fire fighters and paramedics, for instance. What would candidates do to make Atlanta the nation’s safest big city and how they would expand the police force, strengthen fire and paramedic services – and finance those improvements – and make public spaces safe for citizens and visitors?

Economic Development
The past decade and a half has seen a remarkable turnaround in Atlanta’s growth. Atlanta has also become a better city, one that is attracting national attention for its transformational projects, like the BeltLine and the Peachtree Corridor. These two projects promise to make broad sections of the city more appealing to residents and visitors and attract billions in new investments. How will candidates make city government a reliable partner for economic development?

Mobility
Atlanta became a business capital for two reasons: its openness to ambitious people of all backgrounds, and its position at the crossroads of transportation, which made our city accessible to businesses. Atlanta’s crown jewel of transportation is Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport and we must be sure its management remains the best in the business. But we must also look to other ways people will come to our city, from intercity rail to regional rail and buses. The keys to success will be transportation funding and political will. If additional transportation funding becomes available from state or federal sources, the tasks of the next mayor and City Council will be to ensure Atlanta gets its share of the revenue and spends it in ways that increase mobility.

Infrastructure
If we don’t take care of our infrastructure – the streets, sidewalks, water lines and sewer lines – we cannot have a growing city. We got a lesson in 2002, when Mayor Franklin faced up to a problem that previous mayors had avoided for 40 years: the need to repair Atlanta’s sewers. But there are other examples of critical infrastructure in need of repair, replacement and expansion. The best estimate is that there is $500 million to $800 million in “deferred infrastructure” today, not counting the sewer repair program. We need candidates who will support infrastructure development and come up with innovative ways of paying for it.