A new report show addiction and mental health issues are prevalent in Cobb County; Solicitor Barry Morgan reflects on his career; And Cobb Countians rang in 2023.
A new report from Cobb’s public health authority found in the aftermath of the pandemic, the county is facing rising rates of drug use and mental health struggles.
The community health assessment, prepared every five years by Cobb & Douglas Public Health, is a sort of check-up on the state of the two counties’ wellness. This year’s is the first since before the pandemic, and the mammoth, 800-page document leaves no stone unturned.
Dr. Janet Memark, CDPH’s director, called the report a “snapshot into the health of our community” that gauges the major challenges facing the region, with mental health and addiction being two of the biggest.
Among the most startling revelations is that suicide became the second leading cause of premature death (in numbers of years of life lost) in Cobb during the five-year period surveyed from 2016 to 2020, killing about 13 people per 100,000 residents each year.
The number of “poor mental health days” reported by residents was relatively stable during that time, but began ticking up in 2020. Equally concerning, while hospital visits for mental health problems declined, overall deaths rose particularly in 2019 and 2020 to nearly 16 per 100,000.
Between the stress of the pandemic, loss of jobs and family members, and isolation it brought on, “all of those things led to much higher levels of anxiety and depression, and just a variety of mental health and behavioral health issues,” said Lisa Crossman, CDPH’s deputy director. Hand in hand with the mental health crisis is drug use, with drug-related deaths claiming 118 lives from 2016 to 2020. As with mental health struggles, while emergency room visits for overdoses declined during that period, deadly overdoses rose by more than 16%.
Opioid deaths rose statewide by some 70% from 2010 to 2018, according to the Georgia Department of Public Health.
Binge drinking in Cobb is also more prevalent than statewide or nationally, with 17.5% of adults reporting binge drinking in the last 30 days. The highest concentrations were in census tracts around Kennesaw and Vinings.
Ask Cobb County’s longest serving prosecutor about the mark he’s left in his quarter-century in office, and he won’t point to any headline-making cases.
Sure, says retiring Cobb Solicitor Barry Morgan, he’s had some interesting trials in his day, and some anecdotes from the courtroom to pass along.
But on the eve of his last day in office Friday, Morgan told the MDJ he’s most proud of the people who worked under his tutelage since he first took office in 1998.
Morgan brandished an impressive list of some of the folks who’ve passed through his office in the past 25 years. It includes two Cobb Superior Court judges, nine Cobb State Court judges, two Cobb district attorneys, a bevy of municipal and magistrate judges in Cobb and elsewhere, hundreds of defense attorneys, and nearly half of the Cobb district attorney’s stable of lawyers. As far as what’s next, Morgan will still keep a busy schedule. He’s returning to his roots, in a way, teaching music business classes at Auburn and Troy universities, while serving as a part-time Cobb magistrate judge, just as he did nearly 40 years ago. He also starts this week as a hearing officer for disciplinary proceedings in the Cobb County School District.
Libraries are typically quiet places.
But on New Year’s Eve at Mountain View Library in east Cobb, families danced to loud music in the children’s section. Later, the crowd counted down in unison as the clock struck 12 o’clock — in the afternoon.
The celebration, called “Noon Year’s Eve,” gathered around 150 people to celebrate, library staff said. In addition to a live DJ and dancing, children could set reading resolutions for 2023 and create a variety of crafts including party hats, noisemakers and masquerade masks.
The library also gave out take-home time capsule kits, which suggested the kids consider including family photos, menus from their favorite restaurants and perhaps even a toy they could stand to live without, according to Merideth Zobell, a youth services librarian at Mountain View who organized the event.
Those looking to get a head start on their reading resolutions for 2023 can join Cobb County libraries for a challenge to read 600 minutes during the month of January. Information is on the library system’s website at cobbcat.org.
The Battery Atlanta was packed with people on the last day of 2022.
The celebrations outside the home of the Atlanta Braves featured two separate countdowns to the new year, one at midnight and an earlier one at 8 p.m. for children and families.
The “Early Innings” New Year’s bash featured multiple performances by the Braves’ dance team, their drum lin, and Justin Roberts, a Grammy-nominated singer of children’s music.
As the rest of the Battery’s restaurants and bars began to fill with late-night partiers getting an early start, families danced the early hours of the night away to the live music and the tunes put on by a DJ between performances. At the end of the countdown to 8 o’clock, giant inflatable baseballs were dropped onto the cheering crowd.
Many children left with a baseball or two.
The later New Year’s Eve celebration had planned performances by 12 South Band and was set to end with fireworks.
Hillgrove used a big second quarter to pull away and defeat host Pope 60-43 in the girls championship game of the Hounds Holiday Hoops Classic on Friday.
The Hawks led from start to finish as they outscored the Greyhounds 20-9 in the second quarter to break open a close game. They were never threatened after that on their way to the tournament title.
Aryelle King and Amaya Harris scored 11 points each, while Kara Boggs added 10 points to lead Hillgrove. Caroline Heintzelman led Pope with 19 points.
Hillgrove held a narrow advantage throughout the first quarter and finished the period with an 11-7 lead. Leading 13-11 with 5:54 remaining in the first half, Hillgrove went on a 12-1 run to increase its lead to 25-12 with 2:37 left, and the Hawks went on to finish the first half with a 31-16 advantage.
King and Harris scored 14 of Hillgrove’s 20 points in the second quarter, with each player scoring seven points.
Hillgrove went on to maintain a double-digit advantage throughout the second half, leading by as much as 21 points -- 56-35 -- midway through the fourth quarter.
Boggs scored eight of her 10 points in the third quarter, while Kierra Jackson pitched in seven of the Hawks' 13 points in the final period. Pope was only able to get within 10 points on a couple of occasions in the third quarter, trailing 33-23 and 41-31.
Attorneys for Cobb County have filed a motion to have a seat at the table next week in a planned hearing on the lawsuit challenging the county’s “home rule” district map.
The hearing, scheduled for Wednesday afternoon before Superior Court Judge Ann Harris, will be the first proceeding in a court challenge to the map filed by east Cobb activist Larry Savage.
The lawsuit asks the court to toss out a district map which was adopted by the Board of Commissioners’ Democrats in October as an effort to keep Commissioner Jerica Richardson in office. Richardson was drawn out of her seat by a Republican-sponsored district map earlier this year, which was signed into law by Governor Brian Kemp. Both maps are set to take effect January 1.
In its effort, the county invoked the constitutional principle of home rule to assert its right to draw its own district boundaries. Savage’s lawsuit calls the move “illegal.” Savage’s lawsuit names the Cobb Board of Elections as its defendant, because that’s the body tasked with administering elections under the map. But in a filing this week, Elizabeth Monyak, an attorney for the county, argues the county should be allowed to intervene (Savage’s attorney said he has consented to that request). Judge Harris will hear arguments at 1:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Cobb Superior Courthouse.
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