Cap’n Ken’s Homespun Wisdom

This is a bit of a cross-post from Live For Buzz (still building juice there), but it was a big day for Buzzers down at DeKalb Magistrate Court.

The short story (see Live For Buzz for details) is that there is a local perp named Demarcus Buice who is charged with four burglaries and suspected of many more. He has been on the Atlanta Police Most Wanted list for six months and was finally picked up this week. Showing up at court this morning was part of the strategy to get bond denied and keep him in jail.

And it worked. But the awesomeness came from Buice deciding it was a good idea for him to tell the judge he won’t break into any more houses and to apologize to the crowd for breaking into their homes. WSB-TV was there to capture it.

As most of you know, a big wind blew through Atlanta a week ago Friday. The tornado that left F2-level damage Downtown and F0-F1 damage here in East Atlanta thankfully passed about a quarter-mile north of me, so we suffered no damage.

Our yard, however, was littered with all sorts of mysterious debris. Inspecting for damage right after the storm, I found yellow insulation in my backyard and on my roof and big chunks of dense foam in the yard. Most intriguing, though, were four sheets of paper scattered around the front yard. I knew these were not the papers of my neighbors, as no houses close to me were hit. So I picked them up and laid them out on a towel to dry.

Today I set out to see if any of the papers could be traced back to places damaged by the storm. Three of the sheets - a project plan, a memo and a document titled “Daily Posting Register” seemed potentially traceable. The fourth was half a memo dealing with some apparent debt plans for a general partnership and didn’t have enough information to work with.

But the Daily Posting Register was promising. The name of the document’s creator was at the top, and the document itself listed several dozen names. Here is the document with names blurred out:





And as it turns out, this one was easy. The name of the document creator was somewhat unique, and I knew when Firefox auto-filled the last name when I went to Google her I might be on to something. The Daily Posting Register (page 15 of 23) was created by somebody involved with the bankruptcy court here in Atlanta.

She has a website, and her website gives directions to her office at 100 Peachtree Street - The Equitable Building:





I sent her an email this morning telling her of my find and to confirm the document came from her office at Equitable, but I don’t expect a reply soon.

Google Maps tells me The Equitable Building is 3.04 miles from my house.

Here’s the official path of the storm and intensity from the National Weather Service:

The Equitable Building is right on the eastern edge of the first red area (downtown), and I’m just south of the last yellow area in East Atlanta.

I’ve heard stories and seen pictures of Atlanta Hawks and CNN banners that found their way to yards not too far from here, so my little sheet of paper is hardly unique. But it’s pretty amazing to think how far a tornado can carry things - and I wonder what made the little rips in the sheet without tearing it to shreds.

No luck so far on the other sheets.

I reported back in May that the 2006 property taxes owed on East Atlanta parcels owned by Inman Park Properties and various Jeff Notrica entities totaled more than $92,000. And three months later, Notrica has trimmed his outstanding 2006 East Atlanta property tax bills down to $48,831 according to DeKalb County records, but also has a date with the tax sale man looming in October. According to county records, tax sales have been scheduled for 20 of Notrica”s East Atlanta parcels, with the outstanding tax balances for those properties reaching $48,224.90 (including a pre-2006 balance of $7,136.79 for 462 Flat Shoals Ave.). Tax sale notices starting springing up on Notrica properties this week.

Notrica owes 2006 taxes on two additional East Atlanta parcels not included in the October tax sale as well.

Of course, it”s unlikely that these parcels will actually be sold for unpaid taxes. More likely, Notrica will come up with the amount owed before the sale deadline. Then he can start rounding up the $130,047 owed for 2007 taxes. Those are supposed to be paid by September. We”ll see how long it takes to get those paid.

Jeff Notrica properties in East Atlanta scheduled for tax sales:

1257 Glenwood Avenue - $1,030 owed
1267 Glenwood Avenue - $1,072 owed
1269 Glenwood Avenue - $974 owed
1321 Glenwood Avenue - $2,543 owed
1331 Glenwood Avenue - $604 owed

529 Gresham Avenue - $1,085 owed
535 Gresham Avenue - $2,136 owed
440 Flat Shoals Avenue - $4,167 owed
462 Flat Shoals Avenue - $11,598 owed
512 Flat Shoals Avenue - $16,652 owed
535 Flat Shoals Avenue - $536 owed

567 Flat Shoals Avenue - $534 owed
1336 May Avenue - $485 owed
1342 May Avenue - $369 owed
1350 May Avenue - $369 owed
487 Haas Avenue - $1,607 owed
0 Joseph Avenue - $803 owed

0 Gresham Avenue - $351 owed
0 Glenwood Avenue - $1,042 owed
0 Glenwood Avenue - $276 owed

It has been suggested to me that an update is in order about some of the positive things Jeff Notrica has done in East Atlanta recently. Fair enough. Notrica owns the block (except for the Graveyard Tavern) on Glenwood Avenue between Joseph Avenue and Gresham Avenue and has been active in bringing new business in there. In the past couple of months, two new restaurants - the vegan place Cenci and the great new place The Glenwood - have opened as has a real estate office, Origins.

And Notrica apparently (it”s not showing up in online property records yet) purchased the former Good News Cafe space on the corner specifically to bring the well-known lesbian bar My Sister”s Room to East Atlanta. It opened a little while back as well.

So Inman Park Properties does deserve credit for getting businesses open in what had been a troubled strip. The previous owners had bought it out of bankruptcy, I believe. I would argue, though, that all of these spaces were pretty much ready to go and it”s an easy thing to lease out existing spaces in a desirable commercial district. That”s Notrica just doing business as one would expect. It”s his reputation for letting buildings rot that makes this notable.

In the case of My Sister”s Room, though, it seems the bar”s owners were working directly with Inman Park Properties to find a new space somewhere intown. I suppose the bar could have just approached the previous owners of the Good News space (the same group that owns the Graveyard Tavern space), but for whatever reason it worked out where Notrica purchased the space specifically to lease to My Sister”s Room. And the opening of My Sister”s Room is a very good thing for East Atlanta. The club has an existing customer base, many of whom I imagine don”t live in East Atlanta. So it”s bringing a steady flow of people in, which has to be helping the other businesses here as well.

Just down Flat Shoals, work is progressing at the former Tucker Auto Electric building, which is owned by Inman Park Properties and has sat vacant for years. It”s getting a major renovation to become a pub, and that”s a very welcome turn for a real EAV eyesore. Word is the place will open around September as the Midway Pub.

All good news there. There are still problems with some of Notrica”s properties, most notably the empty lot on Glenwood next to a day care center. It”s become a camp for bums, but attempts are underway to resolve that. We”ll see how serious Inman Park Properties is about fixing that problem.

If the trend is that Notrica realizes East Atlanta is a good place for him to do business (rather than just a good place to own property to maybe develop someday), that”s very welcome. As the biggest property owner in East Atlanta Village, Inman Park Properties has tremendous influence over the neighborhood”s future. And that”s why I watch them closely.

Now that Fox 5 has run its “clarification” about the Atlanta homicide story during the newscasts that ran the reports I”ve seen, I can confirm that they are lying about what they originally reported, which is pathetic, but not entirely surprising.

In the clarification (this one is from 10 p.m. last night - the script was the same in both newscasts this morning, but read without the smooth skill of Russ Spencer), Fox 5 states:

“We want to clarify a report we aired yesterday. We reported that FBI statistics showed a dramatic increase in homicides in 2006 in Atlanta”s Zone 6 precinct, which includes much of the eastern part of the city. Now during that report, we showed video of locations in East Atlanta Village, and in fact there were no homicides in East Atlanta Village in 2006. We regret the false impression caused by that videotape.”

That is an absolute lie. Fox 5 did not report a dramatic increase in homicides in Zone 6. Fox 5 reported a dramatic increase in homicides in “east Atlanta.”

Specifically, they reported:

“The increase has been seen citywide, but nowhere has the jump been as dramatic as in east Atlanta, where in 2005 they had 6 murders; last year 15, a 150% spike.” - this was in their report that aired at about 5:30 a.m. yesterday. The “as dramatic as east Atlanta” line was accompanied by a shot of the “Welcome to East Atlanta” sign.

And:

“The murder rate is up all over the city, but especially in east Atlanta, which had 6 murders in 2005 and 15 last year, a 150% increase.” - this was in their report that aired at about 6:30 a.m. yesterday, and the report generally was toned down to focus less on East Atlanta.

“Zone 6″ was never mentioned.

Fox 5 reported that homicides were up dramatically in East Atlanta. They want to dance around what they reported and pretend this was simply a matter of poorly-placed video. But they clearly associated these murders with the East Atlanta neighborhood (not some vague notion of “the east part of Atlanta”) by never mentioning any area other than “east Atlanta” and showing our “Welcome to East Atlanta” as they said murders were up in “east Atlanta”.

Yet they are unwilling to admit their mistake and fully own up to the damage they inflicted on the neighborhood”s reputation. Instead we get sugar-coated revisionist history intended to make Fox 5 look less at fault than they actually were.

Apparently Fox 5 is more interested in protecting its own reputation than they are in damage they inflict on East Atlanta”s reputation.

Oh, this has pissed me off. Last night and today, Fox 5 here in Atlanta has been reporting on the increase in murders in our fair city during 2006. The biggest increase in the number of murders occurred in Atlanta”s Zone 6, of which East Atlanta is a part. In 2006, there were 15 homicides in Zone 6, compared to 6 in 2005.

So Fox 5 decides to focus on this increase in reports by Mark Teichner that aired on their 10 p.m. news last night and during their morning news program today. I”m not sure how long this will remain live on their site, but here”s a version of the report on their horrible myfoxatlanta.com website.

In that report, Fox 5 makes this statement:

“But nowhere has the jump been as dramatic as in East Atlanta, where in 2005 they had 6 murders; last year 15. A 150% spike.”

In case you do not see the video, it was peppered with scenes from East Atlanta, including our big green “Welcome to East Atlanta” sign and shots along Flat Shoals Avenue.

But there”s a little problem here. Their claim that murders were up in East Atlanta is 100%, absolutely, indisputably false. During 2006, there were exactly zero murders in East Atlanta. None. Not any.

Atlanta”s Zone 6 includes eleven separate “beats”, and the APD reports crimes by category, zone and beat. This is accessible through a crime mapping tool on the APD website.

Here”s the rundown of homicides in Zone 6 broken out by the individual beats:

Beat 601 - 0 homicides
Beat 602 - 3 homicides
Beat 603 - 0 homicides

Beat 604 - 1 homicide
Beat 605 - 1 homicide
Beat 606 - 0 homicides
Beat 607 - 1 homicide
Beat 608 - 4 homicides
Beat 609 - 1 homicide

Beat 610 - 0 homicides
Beat 611 - 4 homicides

East Atlanta is Beat 610 - zero homicides. Yet Fox 5 chose to tag East Atlanta with having a 150% increase in murders during 2006. This is likely a result of the typical extremely lazy journalism practiced by local television stations, but the effect is that over their air they have repeatedly painted East Atlanta as an area of the city that has experienced a 150% increase in homicides over the past year, and tangentially suggested East Atlanta has a drug dealing problem, as they have placed the cause of Atlanta”s increased homicide rate on drug activity.

Often times the media refers to “east Atlanta” in the generic sense (there is a big difference between “east Atlanta” and “East Atlanta”), but in this case, Fox 5 specifically came to East Atlanta, broadcast our welcome sign and neighborhood scenes along with the statement that murders in “East Atlanta” have risen 150%. Completely irresponsible and absolutely associating this with “East Atlanta”, not just “east Atlanta”.

I”ve written to a bunch of people at Fox 5 demanding a retraction to this defamatory portrayal of East Atlanta. We”ll see what happens, but I wanted to at least expose the truth here.

That is all.

Update: Apparently Fox 5 leadership doesn”t like to respond to emails, but if you create a blog on their crappy community site calling them out, they”ll give you a response. The guy there is hiding behind the notion that “eastern Atlanta” is what they meant, so I don”t expect much of a meaningful retraction, but we”ll see.