In September 2016, Stockbridge City Councilwoman LaKeisha Gantt was arrested following a domestic dispute. According to a police report, her husband reported that they had been in a verbal altercation by phone all day and that Gantt had threatened to cut his throat. When officers arrived at the couple’s home, they found a smoldering pile of men’s clothing on the garage floor. The couple argued about the burnt clothing and infidelity, with the husband stating he called the police because she had threatened to kill him, to which Gantt reportedly replied, “You cut your own throat.” Gantt was initially arrested and charged with arson, but a judge later reduced the charge to criminal trespass, and she was released on bond. Police officials noted that Gantt’s husband was unable to prove any threats were made. At the time, Gantt was a practicing attorney and had previously served as the first Chairman for the Stockbridge Ethics Board.
Ms. Gantt has also faced two separate disciplinary actions as an attorney before the Supreme Court of Georgia. In August 2017, she received a public reprimand after admitting to professional misconduct in a client’s civil case. Gantt had been retained in 2007 to represent a client whose home was extensively damaged by an unoccupied truck. After filing a lawsuit in 2009, Gantt voluntarily dismissed it in 2010 but admitted she failed to adequately communicate this to her client and never refiled the suit. This negligence caused some of the claims belonging to the client’s minor children to be barred by the statute of limitations. Gantt admitted to violating professional conduct rules regarding diligence and communication, and the court cited mitigating factors such as her lack of a selfish motive, cooperation, and personal issues at the time.
In April 2019, Gantt faced a second disciplinary matter, resulting in a Review Board Reprimand. In this case, she admitted that a client hired her in 2014 for an adoption matter, but due to her failure to promptly complete the necessary work, the adoption was not finalized until March 2018—a delay of several years. Gantt acknowledged numerous instances where she failed to respond to her client’s communications and submit the required paperwork in a timely manner. While she cited personal and emotional difficulties in mitigation, the State Bar noted her prior discipline from the 2017 case as an aggravating factor.
A Failure of Oversight
As a public officer and trustee for the people of Stockbridge, Councilwoman Gantt has a fiduciary responsibility to manage city property with the sole intent of benefiting her citizens. It is therefore deeply concerning that while she and other officials were permitted to enjoy the perks of office, such as accepting food and beverages at events held at the city’s new amphitheater, that very same venue was hemorrhaging public funds. The “VyStar at the Bridge” Amphitheater, intended to be a self-sufficient “enterprise” fund, saw its expenses explode from a budgeted 2 million to an actual 8.1 million. This catastrophic financial failure was deliberately concealed by charging its costs to an unrelated fund without council approval. This demonstrates a shocking failure of oversight from a council member who was literally on-site for the entertainment, yet seemingly oblivious to the financial disaster unfolding behind the curtain.
At this time we have no official word on who was able to remit these funds. We have received no detailed accounting of who this $8,100,000 now belongs to. The only bit of transparency you’ll find is in the fac.gov audits that were submitted 18 months late in the case of 2022 audits.
This lack of awareness is especially egregious coming from an attorney who has been twice disciplined by the State Bar for professional negligence, lack of diligence, and failure to communicate. For a public official with this professional history to preside over a city whose financial reporting failed to meet standards for three consecutive years is a profound dereliction of duty. The amphitheater’s losses were not a secret to citizen assessment of their black box. Yet the council reportedly saw almost no budget amendment requests between 2022 and 2024, only acting when the situation reached a breaking point. One cannot claim to be a responsible steward of public money while enjoying the amenities of a project that is secretly draining the city’s finances. It suggests a fundamental unwillingness to recognize the amphitheater’s drain on finances.
Gantt’s vote to take my home.
The redevelopment plan, which invokes the state’s Redevelopment Powers Law, grants the council immense power; given your history, I have serious concerns about how you and the other members will wield it.
The plan you are championing, “Tax Allocation District #1,” uses the Redevelopment Powers Law as its authority, with the City Council, including yourself acting as the “redevelopment agent.” The justification for this massive project is that our neighborhood is a “blighted or distressed area” full of “substandard, vacant, deteriorating, or deteriorating structures.”
To be clear, the city isn’t taking my home through traditional eminent domain, where the government must pay “just compensation” for a clear “public use,” like a new road. Instead, it appears you are using a more insidious tool available under Georgia’s redevelopment laws. This is a mere ploy to take private property otherwise in good standing. The Institute for Justice is pursuing a similar matter in the courts, currently.
Under a related statute, the Urban Redevelopment Law, the city can simply declare a home “unfit for human habitation” or a danger to “public health, safety, or morals.” If an owner is notified that their property is considered blighted and fails to enter into an agreement to fix it according to the city’s plan, the city can do the work itself and place a lien on the property for the costs. That lien is “enforceable in the same manner as tax liens,” which means the city can foreclose and take the property.
This is how you can take our homes without it being called eminent domain. Instead of paying us for our property, the city can run up a bill for “rehabilitation,” slap a lien on the house, and then foreclose to settle the debt. Through this process, we could lose our home and receive no payment at all, unlike in an eminent domain case where just compensation is required. While your redevelopment plan claims that “no existing residences… will need to be involuntarily relocated,” those homes it purports not to be taken are on the official list of what’s to be “redeveloped.”
You… what? You thought taking my house wouldn’t come up? Indeed, it’s your legacy, Ms. Gantt. Alpha Kappa Alpha & their cohort members may be emboldened by your shenanigans. I, personally, am not of the opinion you should have a role in managing my day to day life, here downtown. Even if you do throw a mean party for your homegirls.
Sources.
1. “City councilwoman arrested after domestic dispute | 11alive.com”
◦ This news article reports that Stockbridge City Councilwoman LaKeisha Gantt was arrested in September 2016 following a domestic dispute. She was initially charged with arson for burning her husband’s clothes in their garage. The charge was later reduced to criminal trespass after her husband was unable to prove threats were made. The article notes she is an attorney with Gantt & Associates Law Firm and was sworn in as the first Chairman for the Ethics Board for the City of Stockbridge in 2011.
2. “IN THE MATTER OF LAKEISHA TENNILLE GANTT :: 2017 :: Supreme Court of Georgia Decisions – Justia Law”
◦ This document details a 2017 disciplinary matter before the Supreme Court of Georgia involving Gantt, who has been a member of the State Bar of Georgia since 2005. She admitted to dismissing a client’s lawsuit without adequate communication, which resulted in the claims of the client’s minor children being barred. For these violations, the Court accepted her petition for voluntary discipline and ordered that she receive a public reprimand.
3. “IN THE MATTER OF LAKEISHA TENNILLE GANTT :: 2019 :: Supreme Court of Georgia Decisions – Justia Law”
◦ This source describes a second disciplinary matter from 2019. In this case, Gantt admitted that after a client hired her for an adoption matter in 2014, she failed to timely perform the necessary work or adequately communicate with the client, causing a significant delay of nearly three years in the adoption’s completion. The State Bar noted her prior discipline from 2017, and the court ordered that Gantt receive a Review Board Reprimand.
4. “redev_fixed.pdf”
◦ This is the City of Stockbridge’s Redevelopment Plan for Tax Allocation District #1. It lists “Councilwoman LaKeisha T. Gantt” as a member of the Stockbridge City Council, which has responsibility for the plan and the creation of the Tax Allocation District.
Quoting from page 13: In December of 2004 the Stockbridge City Council adopted resolutions adopting an Urban Redevelopment Plan (URP), designating an Urban Redevelopment Area (URA) containing approximately 23 acres, and authorizing the City’s Urban Development Agency to assemble those properties which today include Stockbridge City Hall and the new amphitheater. The “Stockbridge URP” was created under the Georgia Urban Redevelopment Law (O.C.G.A. 36-61-1 et. seq.). The Urban Redevelopment Law, which is a different statute than the Redevelopment Powers Law which authorizes Tax Allocation Districts, defines a redevelopment area as a “slum area which the local governing body designates as appropriate for an urban redevelopment project.” The original URP, which was later amended in 2013, proposed demolishing and replacing 14 existing properties with civic buildings, commercial and office space, new residential development in multi-family and mixed-use buildings, new single-family house lots, associated public amenity space and parking facilities. The boundaries of the proposed Tax Allocation District #1 include the entire designated URA, which is identified on the next page.
5. “O.C.G.A. 36-44-1 et. seq. – Justia Law”
◦ This is the Georgia Redevelopment Powers Law which grants the city the broad power to “tap a property with the blight stick,” as the ij.org say it in their video embedded above. This is the law now invoked by the city, it declares private property rights null and void for vague notions of “the public good.” After this, it’s a hard thread to follow completely for a layman. Between 36-66-1 & 36-44-1, considering their full texts, from this layman’s perspective, this doesn’t look good for me.
6. “City of Stockbridge Economic Development Strategic Plan 2024“
◦ Page 93: Redevelopment Powers Act; Renovate, construct, preserve, restore, expand or demolish buildings for business, commercial, industrial, government, education, public or private housing, social activity, governmental services. Enactment: O.C.G.A. §36-44-1 et seq Purpose: Revitalize blighted areas; use future taxes for infrastructure. Funds Use: Broad range for development activities.
