Remarks by Ovita Thornton
54 remarks on the record, newest first · Page 2 of 3
- Play at 3:58:03
“Okay, and so, and my next point, Mike is up here looking at all my notes. When we were talking about the ADUs and affordability, and this to me, and that's another reason why I'm not going to support that first text amendment. Expanding The general, the people who most likely can afford or want to do ADUs, they are nine times out of 10, and I'm not putting, and I guess after tonight, I'm 100% sure that they will not be attracting those families that I'm concerned about. They're not going to be attract, so when we talk about expense, there is nothing here that I think, again, I know Bob was…”
Commission · Jul 21, 2026
- Play at 4:00:28
“Well, it doesn't make that much sense to me. Because again, if ADUs are primarily for renters, Where is the connection to home ownership?”
Commission · Jul 21, 2026
- Play at 4:01:22
“And maybe this is where I'm just like on this narrow road. I'm thinking about the people who call me. I'm thinking about the folk that call the Homeless Coalition. I'm thinking about a mother right now who is in, their dog Ken, caring for her brothers because her mother died and the young man is blind. I don't have no place to send them other than trying to give them money each week until we, so those are the folk that I don't think the group of folk are, we're talking about almost two, three different groups of people.”
Commission · Jul 21, 2026
- Play at 4:02:37
“Well, I will also say, and I know Kelly's trying to move forward, I am definitely on board with the text amendment and this housing initiative being addressed next year i i i because it's too it's too it's too cloudy for me so i know it's cloudy for everybody else and i do think um you're talking about the adus i'm talking about it all now because there are definitely some misunderstood miscommunication And I do hope that you and the mayor-elect will plan on having a work session or training at the very beginning of the year so we all know, or y'all will know, and we'll all be on the same…”
Commission · Jul 21, 2026
- Play at 4:03:54
“So do you think the text amendment should include, if we revisit it or whatever, should spell this out a little bit clearer or not? Or is this totally different? That's totally different. OK. I'm good. I'm good.”
Commission · Jul 21, 2026
- Play at 4:15:14
“COMMISSIONER THORNTON. Yeah, this was a Yeah, this was good. And I want to make sure I respond to Commissioner Taylor and Commissioner Link. I think the concerns they raise should be a point of, if this passes, which I hope it does, that we address immediately, just immediately. Because to have the top, the earlier ones, it looks like we don't care. But when we did the homeless study, we probably should have done a resolution right then to back up the study. The resolution, again, is not specific, but I did, one of the biggest things that I like to think that I reminded everybody, we need to…”
Commission · Jul 21, 2026
- Play at 28:14
“for a gay pride day downtown, and it was really a good day. And I don't think, I think a lot of these groups, they bring in not just entertainment, amusement, fun day, but revenue also. And I do, after we just talked about the different enterprises, maybe, manager you can think about how can we do a downtown or entertainment type either enterprise or special revenue ahead of time um i don't want us to cut back i think like i said and i'll be downtown this weekend with hot corner so if we know that these events are important to the community. We should not wait till budget season for folks to…”
Commission · Jun 9, 2026
- Play at 30:21
“And this has nothing to do with anything we're talking about, but I'm going to say it because it's a revenue opportunity. Why are we allowing Pilgrim's Pride poultry to park all over that place, which is our property, for free? That's a revenue opportunity. So, just putting it out there.”
Commission · Jun 9, 2026
- Play at 37:50
“I have prepared to vote no, but I will be abstaining. I do think that just with some past things that we voted on I just do not know where it lands that I'm pretty sure this thing is going to pass without my vote so therefore I do think that having some type of education, training as soon as possible is necessary, but I will be abstaining because this is too complicated for me. This is a bit more than I want to take on as a teacher.”
Commission · Jun 9, 2026
- Play at 43:39
“Might as well be a no. It was going to be a deception. No.”
Commission · Jun 9, 2026
- Play at 48:39
“Now this one I will be abstaining on. This won't be a no. This is gonna be an abstention. And I'm abstaining because, like I mentioned at our last meeting, in June, anything that we were dealing with with the last study was gonna be kinda passed off to GIC. Now I admit I'm in a, a campaign season, so I haven't really been paying much attention. And like I said before, it sounds like this may pass, and so be it, but I'm gonna abstain because of past experiences that whole school is, burn me once, shame on me, burn, shame on you. So I'm gonna abstain on this one, but hopefully it'll turn out…”
Commission · Jun 9, 2026
- Play at 50:41
“We have an inclusionary zoning policy in place, so I have no problem with that at all. I just want to be clear that I need time to be more focused in my decision making. I have not had that time since election session had started. I'm still concerned about how things flow and how things happen. Please understand, I have nothing against inclusionary zoning. I just do not feel confident that I wanna take this step. And if it passes after this month break, I'll be refreshed, whatever, and be on board. Thanks, Commissioner.”
Commission · Jun 9, 2026
- Play at 47:29
“I don't know if that's the easier, but I know that we have asked this question about the enterprise fund for ever and a day. I don't know if, Just like we're looking at this sheet right now, all we would like to see is the enterprise, what enterprise it is and how much it is. I don't think that the viewing public wants to go through the mayor's budget and try to find it. And I know that's not what I want. It just seems like it's elementary third grade to put, which, what enterprise it is and how much money is in there, and if this was not the first time this question was asked, I probably…”
Commission · Jun 4, 2026
- Play at 48:19
“Just break it out and put public utilities and what that dollar amount is. I mean, just, can we just do it, just?”
Commission · Jun 4, 2026
- Play at 48:33
“Yeah, that's, I'm just saying, list the things and just put the. Right, amount. Yeah.”
Commission · Jun 4, 2026
- Play at 49:02
“And you would list them? Mm-hmm. and then we will see that dollar amount and it'll be a lot clearer.”
Commission · Jun 4, 2026
- Play at 50:18
“Just break it out. Pretend I'm in the third grade, and it's probably not even a pretense right now.”
Commission · Jun 4, 2026
- Play at 53:41
“The question I have, for some of the things that were not originally included in the budget and you're tweaking it and working it, are you trying to find ways to fund some of those things? And the one that I think that Commissioner Taylor was talking about, like the investigator for...”
Commission · Jun 4, 2026
- Play at 54:24
“Because we all worked on it together. Right. versus two teams, three teams, one team.”
Commission · Jun 4, 2026
- Play at 56:46
“Yes, it's been long overdue. And if we're going to move forward, I think I asked at the very beginning of this process when we knew it was going to be the planning department redevelop. And when we say urban renewal, it has a, for some of us, it has a... or has a negative thought sometimes. I asked at the very beginning, and I don't think it was done, that First AME be included in these conversations. They are gonna be impacted no matter what, and that is, I wanna say it's the oldest African American church downtown, and I don't want 20 years from now we equate it to a linen town. Now I don't…”
Commission · Jun 2, 2026
- Play at 1:22:35
“My comments are very similar to Commissioner Taylor. I do know that during the work session, there was a suggestion or remarks that Envision Athens was going to revise their mission statement. I would like to see that as we move forward, what that actually looks like. The other thing that Envision Athens provided so much technical assistance to community nonprofits, I would like to know where and how are these non-profits to function if we do move to Envision Athens, becoming a housing, focusing only on housing.”
Commission · Jun 2, 2026
- Play at 1:32:21
“Kind of got lost up here now. I'm still going to stick with my motion, I mean my support for RFP. I think that One of the Commissioner Handbeats said about he's hearing stuff on the campaign, and transparency is one of the key things that is on the campaign. I do not think this move was transparent. I do not think that the people who have called me to support this it was unusual calls, I'll put it that way, unusual calls. I don't, when I look at who are on these boards, everybody intersects. And I'm just, and I had to make it clear with one person, it is not personal, God knows it's not…”
Commission · Jun 2, 2026
- Play at 1:37:34
“Final opportunity. If we're going to do this, if we're going to be transparent, the bank that has been named also should be open to be part of a RFP process. In all fairness, the bank is my bank that I've banked in since the 80s when I moved here. But I do think if we don't have nothing to hide or if we're not cooking up something in the background, let's open it up for the RFP to be for the bank that has been identified and the whole program if we're going to put it out there like that.”
Commission · Jun 2, 2026
- Play at 1:38:36
“But if you put it open, there might be some you didn't know. It doesn't have to be right here in the neighborhood. Mayor, if you want to call for the vote, let's call for the vote, but I'm not going to sit here and debate this with you.”
Commission · Jun 2, 2026
- Play at 1:40:45
“Yeah, I want to reiterate that also, that the Sandy Creek Bay, because I was looking through the plan, looking for it, saying you'd be good. I was just going through all those pages. But I do think now that we have become educated, I want to thank Public Utilities again for the awesome presentation they did with me working with JJ Harris. It was very educational. and I do think it gives us some education. I hope that as we move forward, I do not have to keep reminding staff in this body that we are sitting on a time limit. Bomb with these septic tanks and just because the state doesn't…”
Commission · Jun 2, 2026