South Cobb Community suffers under Cupid Choice

Citizens from the South Cobb community are letting their voices be heard through SPOTLIGHT South Cobb News and we welcome their engagement on the subjects that impact our community.

This week, South Cobb citizens forwarded to SPOTLIGHT a recent article from a local paper, the MDJ, which led to an interesting back and forth. The article purported to summarize the first year of the District 4 commissioner, Monique Sheffield. 

As we talked with citizen after citizen, most offered a hard assessment of the first year of Sheffield as District 4 commissioner, describing her role in office as failed leadership. They point to it being a continuation of the failed leadership that Lisa Cupid offered during the eight years that she was commissioner for the area. 

We received the article with an inquiry…why SPOTLIGHT was not covering Sheffield? Our response was simple…Sheffield has not done anything for our community and has not accomplished anything in our community to be covered. The response back to us was “exactly”. They point to Sheffield’s lack of action in South Cobb and say it must be covered to highlight what she is failing to do for our community.

In this back-and-forth exchange, many citizens we spoke with wondered why the MDJ elected not to speak with them or others from the community on Sheffield’s poor performance. They point out that when quotes are sought on other South Cobb subjects, members of the community are often called to weigh in or give an opinion, but not this time. WHY? Given that members of the community could not give their opinions for the article, many shared their assessment with SPOTLIGHT and the news was not good. 

While the MDJ gave Sheffield a pass, and she was eager to pat her own back throughout the article, South Cobb Citizens have thrown the foul flag to say not so fast. All is not well in South Cobb as suggested in this article. To get to the heart of the matter, they say you need to speak with more than one person…you need to speak with others in the community, you need to go into the community and talk with those involved in supporting the needs of the community. Simply put, they are tired of one or two who are not really involved trying to convince the public that their individual opinion speaks for the rest of South Cobb when it does not. 

They say the article failed to showcase the poor performance of the District 4 Commissioner and her inability to get anything done for our community during her first year. As we talked, most offered their assessment of the first year saying Sheffield has taken over the proverbial baton from Cupid, who was a professional at not providing services to the South Cobb Community. They say Sheffield is picking up where Cupid left off, not delivering for the community. 

We all know that Cupid was never challenged to deliver for South Cobb and she didn’t. Her constant cry in the community was that she was the lone Democrat on a Republican board and could not get support, which was untrue. Now that there is a majority Democratic board, why is Sheffield and Cupid still failing to provide support and services to South Cobb, a majority democratic area? Why is South Cobb not the priority that it should be after languishing for so many years. We read the headlines that a different district is getting a new police station. Has anyone visited the precinct in South Cobb to see the conditions the officers have to work in? We could use a new station as well, but we don’t have the leadership at the table demanding this for us. They also point to the Lion’s Club in Mableton, an outdated building South Cobb is forced to use for meetings. Why not offer our community a new community center? How about turning some of the abandoned or vacant storefronts into usable real estate for the good of the community?

As she continued to harp on zoning throughout the article, Sheffield failed to mention the poor zoning vote she, Lisa Cupid, and others took last year that placed Dobbins in jeopardy. Even as Dobbins and the business community attempted to educate them on their error, they dug in. Many point to this fiasco and say that there remains an elephant in the room for them when it comes to the Cobb Commissioners being able to do the right thing for Cobb. They say the board is incapable of making progress on issues of concern to the South Cobb community and lean to obfuscation rather than getting anything accomplished.

As they assume no one is watching or paying attention, Cupid and her board continue their quest to eradicate anything that Mike Boyce led while he was chair, even if what he led were good for the community. Ignoring community groups who were formed to help the community seems to be a pass time for Sheffield and Cupid. 

For those who are ‘lucky’ to be granted a meeting, they are promised follow up from Sheffield on matters they brought to her attention, which never comes. After waiting days, weeks and months, they have given up home that she will ever respond to them. What was brought to our attention which was most disturbing are threats that Sheffield is alleged to be making to citizens who disagree with her. Her unprofessional behavior is often viewed by others as they watch her roll her eyes, grunt, moan, or make loud body noises to reflect her loathing for the citizens trying to engage her. The person displaying this abhorrent behavior is Sheffield, the same person that Cupid told citizens to go out and vote for during the 2020 election saying she was Cupid’s Choice. Unfortunately, now we know why. Many wish they had dug a little deeper to find out who Sheffield really was. 

Citizens also raised questions on Sheffield’s failure to disclose the nature of her “zoning” relationship with Garvis Sams. She has voted for every project that he has presented to the board, including the Dobbins fiasco. Some wonder if there is a real estate quid pro quo occurring. Citizens have pointed to dilapidated buildings that are in the Mableton community owned by Sams that are never cited for the community nuisance that they are. The slum-like buildings remain an eyesore for the neighboring homeowners, but Sheffield could care less about that part of the community. 

Citizens point to Sheffield’s failure during her first year to get Magnolia Crossing developed. Even though she knew this was a major issue , Sheffield failed to do a single thing to move this issue forward. Sheffield was recently in attendance at a community meeting on the undeveloped acres of land and said nothing and showed no leadership in the meeting.

South Cobb citizens say other failings on the part of Sheffield includes her not addressing the displacement of rental families in South Cobb, the awarding of no-bid contracts to companies being ran by former felons, the failure to disclose conflicts and abstain from voting; the awarding of millions of dollars in COVID relief funds to a company to tell them how to spend money in Cobb. This company allegedly provided her and others pro bono services; and failure to address the deserts that plague South Cobb including food, banking, housing, medical, and recreational, among others. 

Sheffield entered the commission race with no history that anyone could discern, but SPOTLIGHT has been able to find out some details, thanks to citizens, that we will share in a later article.

Now that they have our attention, citizens can look forward to more info. Similar to Cupid, we will hold Sheffield accountable in District 4.