Home freaking rule
The boundaries between governments in Georgia are strange and fascinating beasts. The attitude towards local government in Georgia is that the asshole across the street doesn’t understand the problems that you face from day to day, and this home rule attitude results in both a fine-grained control over local issues and a perhaps inequitable distribution of tax money. A recent example of this is Sandy Springs: though there was a well defined boundary for Sandy Springs, it was only as a community improvement district of Fulton County; Georgia doesn’t recognize any governments overriding counties other than cities (and towns), so Sandy Springs was mostly an academic concept until they recently voted to secede from the county. The incorporation of Sandy Springs was driven by the idea that tax money was not being properly spent on improving the community, but, on the other hand, Sandy Springs is very much a white flight area, and, though their roads may suck, it’s arguable that the tax money from all the rich assholes (median household income $60,428, median housing value $345,200) is more deserved by the more poverty-stricken areas of south Fulton. The desire for separation from the more urban south Fulton (According to the 2000 census, Sandy Springs is 77.5% white, Roswell 81.5%, Alpharetta 83.6%) is further evidenced in movements to split Fulton back into its constiuent counties, Fulton and Milton. I’m a bit torn as far as this desire: on the one hand, the original intent of joining Fulton and Milton was to create an opportunity to distribute tax money more evenly throughout the Atlanta metro area, ideally offering eventual finiancial equality through community improvement, but, on the other hand, any politcal area with a neck, especially in the South, just screams gerrymandering. The congressional district borders aren’t really any more heartening.
One of the things that made me think about Georgia’s boundaries was an advertisement for condos on Atlanta Road. The billboards include several features of the condominium complex: it’s 1.5 miles outside of I-285 on Atlanta Road, it’s in Vinings, and the prices start in the $150’s. One thing that struck me as odd was the combination of the first two claims. The borders of Vinings have become a bit fuzzy—it was supposendly once a city, though, never having learned any Georgia history, I’m only as sure as the lack of information I can find on the Internet. The area currently known as Vinings was made popular by Hardy Pace, a man famous because he owned a boat and was able to send it across the ‘hooch, and Vinings is not currently anything in particular as far as government is concerned. It’s generally accepted, however, that Vinings is in Cobb and inside the perimeter. Vinings as a Census Defined Place [4] exists between the ‘hooch and I-285, bordered by Cobb Parkway (US-41) on the north and a zig-zaggy line on the south. All of the Census Bureau’s concept of Vinings exists north of Atlanta Road.
Fuzzy borders are forgiveable, though. The divisions of districts are confusing even when separate governments are involved [5], and anything within a couple miles of Paces Ferry tends to have “Vinings” in the name, so the Vinings claim of The Palms seems a reasonable following of marketing trends. Advertising that your condominiums and townhouses are in Smyrna or unincorporated Cobb county (I’m really not sure which this place is in; the maps do nothing) just doesn’t pack the same punch. The thing that really bugs me about The Palms, though, is the rest of the ad. In addition to the fun facts at the bottom of the billboard, they had a plea at the top to (paraphrasing from memory) “Be selfish, live in…The Palms,” followed by a picture of a woman enjoying herself on the beach. Vinings may have a wide, poorly defined boundary as an unincorporated suburb of Atlanta, but there is at least one thing that I can certainly state about it: Vinings does not have a beach.
References:
Sandy Springs Fact Sheet
Alpharetta Fact Sheet
Roswell Fact Sheet
Vinings CDP Reference Map
Cobb County Street Map
Palms of Vinings
2002 Georgia Congressional Districts