Atlanta: After exiting Kovid -19 epidemic and a coincidence crime spike, mayor Andre dickens He believes that he is entitled to a second term as the city hosts its most high-profile event since the 1996 Olympics.
Dickens recently launched its re -reconciliation campaign with $ 1.4 million in the bank and supported Atlanta’s business and political elite, including civil rights heroes and former Mayor Andrew Young and Jason Carter, grandson of Jimmy Carter.
The next Mayor of Atlanta will preside visitors as floods in the city for eight matches of the 2026 World Cup. There are no major challenges for the election election. If the candidate in August is through qualifying, the second mayor’s bid of Dickens may leave the 2021 drama, when the then city councilman won the two better-known rivals.
Dickens says that he is fulfilling the promise of reducing crime and promoting affordable housing. And he reduces the criticism of the workers, which says he separates the progressives of the city – especially by opponents as “Cop City” to support $ 115 million police and Fire Fighter Training Center.
Dickens told Associated Press in an interview, “The city stabilized during my tenure, integrated during my tenure, and is on a path that everyone can come here to raise a family.”
Professor Fred Smith Junior, a law of Emori University law, said that Dickens was a “energetic force”, he said that he increased affordable housing construction and helped to fail efforts to get away from the city for the most rich neighbor of Atlanta.
Smith said, “In the context of where he has done less well, I think many people who pay attention to the Atlanta government have not heard, especially on issues related to transit and public training center,” Smith said.
Atlanta ahead is one of the 16 cities of the US, Canada and Mexico, hosting the 2026 FIFA World Cup with a preview this summer, when this FIFA club hosts six matches of the World Cup, another international football tournament.
The sports will bring more traffic to the fast packed city. Like the previous mayors, the decance has slowed down to expand public transport. He distanced from the plan to build a light rail line with the city’s Eastuside beltline trail, saying that transfer to other projects would help in high-needs areas. Those people are expected to take years to complete.
Despite this, Dickens stressed that Atlanta would have “very festive time” during the World Cup, with rape and advanced lighting system. “I want people to know our culture, support our small businesses, are experiencing Atlanta, so that they want to come back as a holiday or bring their business here, open an office here,” Dickens said.
Housing Boost Dickens promised to construct or preserve 20,000 affordable housing units in two words. More than half has been constructed or under construction. Most of the rental and about three-fourths of people 2023 According to data from the US Census Bureau, midpoints are 60% of the domestic income or less for people, which was $ 85,880. Some are part of the neighborhood redevelopment with a government -owned land or mixed income residence.
Even when it makes it, Atlanta is quickly losing inexpensive units because the rich people go in and the poor, pushing out the residents for a long time, a pattern that was accelerated after the Olympics. Decance accepts this obstacle.
Despite investing millions of people to be homeless and quickly reduce the housemates, the administration of Dickens was criticized in January, when one person was killed after a bulldozer who cleaned a homeless camp ahead of Martin Luther King Junior Holiday events.
Dickens called for a reconsideration of how the city cleans the intrusion, but said they are unsafe for residents there and around.
Crime and controversy:
Another top priority for Dickens was reducing the crime, which fell during and after the epidemic in Atlanta and other American cities. From 2023 to 2024, the overall violent crime in Atlanta declined by 46 percent, and the youth crime declined by 23 percent, law enforcement officials recently said in a press conference with dickens.
Atlanta police chief Darin Sheerbam credited Dickens along with increasing the salary of the officers and allowed him to take the patrol cars of the house, stating that the tricks retained more officers and put the 911 response time half. Dickens also launched sports and job programs for thousands of youth to take a “overall” approach for crime.
Then “the police is the city.” Dickens has supported the training center as he was a member of a council, said that Atlanta would benefit from better trained police.
But the project became a flashpoint for progressive workers who argued that it would carry forward the police and damage the atmosphere of a adjacent black neighborhood. When a guard died by a guard police, tension increased, who argued that he had shot at him.
Critics of the training center have created efforts to “reduce” “deepest, deep, deep disbelief among those who were the greatest colleagues of this mayor” and Dickens’ office said, Rohit Malhotra, founder of the center of civic innovation, said Rohit Malhotra said, a progressive group that rejects construction.
Last May in the water crisis and an oversight fight, an burst pipe deprived several Atlanties for days, and the decance was slammed for poor communication. Now he says that plans are going on to fix the water and sewer system of the aging of the city.
The city’s Inspector General resigned in February after a long -standing quarrel with Dickens. He accused him of trying to thwart his inspection of the city hall. He said that his methods broke the law.
Dickens said that he has handled relations with his critics. “The solidarity group in me is going to use the power to be a second-task mayor to bring everyone to the project,” said Dickens.
