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Peter Biello: Welcome to the Georgia Today podcast from GPB News. Today is Wednesday, June 26th. I'm Peter Biello. On today's episode. Campaigners for President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump arrive in Atlanta ahead of the planned first presidential debate tomorrow. A new investigative report profiles the living descendants of enslaved people for whom the US government's promise of land was fulfilled. And what is the future of legal access to cannabis in Georgia? These stories and more are coming up on this edition of Georgia Today.

Story 1:

Peter Biello: Campaign surrogates for President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are in Atlanta today stumping for the two candidates ahead of their presidential debate tomorrow. Among other events, Trump's campaign hosted a meeting focused on black business owners, and Biden's campaign presented the endorsement of former Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger, who emerged as a fierce Trump critic after the January 6th attack on the US Capitol. Protests and gridlock are expected near the debate location CNN Studios in midtown Atlanta. You can watch or listen to debate coverage and analysis on GPB radio or TV, or at GPB.org, tomorrow evening at 9pm.

Story 2:

Peter Biello: This spring, the federal government proposed a plan to reclassify marijuana to a schedule three drug. Moving it into the same category as things like prescription cough medicine. At the same time, Georgia legislators have passed laws limiting the cannabis products available in the state. So what does that mean for legal access to cannabis in Georgia? GPB's Amanda Andrews dives in.

Amanda Andrews: Tucked away on the bottom level of a plaza in Sandy Springs is a quiet hemp shop.

Joe Salome: Yeah.

Amanda Andrews: But the smell is louder than the music. The earthy aroma of cannabis products fills the room of the Georgia Hemp Company. Joe Salome co-founded the business in 2017, and he says being in the hemp industry means constant challenges.

Joe Salome: Right. And I've been fighting this for almost ten years now without being shut down by the ever credit card processor. Whereas that being shut down by every social media advertising platform, I can't even do that.

Amanda Andrews: Despite the hurdles, the company has four locations and a variety of products available. Hemp stores outnumber registered dispensaries in Georgia, so Salome says many of his customers are people in pain who don't qualify for medical marijuana cards.

Joe Salome: You don't need one of the 16 or 18 conditions in the state of Georgia to get a card to come into my store, and we have all the same products that the dispensaries are now selling as well.

Amanda Andrews: But what Salome sells isn't what you can get with a medical card. It's just close enough to satisfy people frustrated by the dispensary system. But one hope is that with the promised change in federal regulation of cannabis, real proven prescription cannabis drugs will become more accessible. So what's the change? Right now, marijuana is in the same category as drugs like heroin, LSD and methamphetamine. And what the Federal Drug Administration calls schedule one. That's drugs the FDA says are most likely to be abused if marijuana is listed in schedule three. It would join drugs like caffeinated aspirin and cough medicine with codeine. Dawn Randolph is the head of the Georgia Pharmacy Association. She says anyone thinking THC products will soon be available at the same place you get those drugs. The pharmacy counter should think again.

Dawn Randolph: You know, this sounds really exciting. And it isn't. It needs to be covered. But we've got a long way to go.

Amanda Andrews: Maybe 5 or 6 years to go, she says. Marijuana advocates Angela Weston and Yolanda Bennett founded the Georgia medical Cannabis Society to help current cardholders navigate the state's complex cannabis laws. Bennett says she's looking forward to rescheduling because of the money she would save if her cannabis products were covered by insurance.

Yolanda Bennett: We would have spent almost $1,000 at the dispensary, back in October if it wasn't for the buy one, get one free for some may as four month. Can you imagine?

Amanda Andrews: Bennett got her medical marijuana card in 2018, five years before Georgia opened its first dispensary. But at the state level, another change is coming. Governor Kemp signed Senate Bill 494 into law in April, regulating the cannabis industry. And so, while federal rescheduling might open some doors, Angela Weston says SB 494 closes others.

Angela Weston: And they're taking to stay away from the CBD stores. So now those patients who don't have one of those 19 conditions, they're in trouble.

Amanda Andrews: THC-A is a legal compound typically sold as a smokable flower bud that won't get you high until it's burned. Then it turns into THC, the illegal compound which will get you high. Some people, like Weston, who have medical cards, still turn to THC-A. They say smoking it works better than low THC lotions or gummies.

Angela Weston: When I'm in pain, I need a quickness. I need the flower for that.

Amanda Andrews: On October 1st, SB 494 will close the loophole that left THC a legal in Georgia. So in the short run, what will be left legal are low dose cannabis derived drugs, which many say don't address their pain and can be very, very expensive. For GPB News, I'm Amanda Andrews.

Story 3:

Peter Biello: Macon is the latest Georgia city to invest in housing specifically for people experiencing homelessness. The so-called tiny cottages will house people with mental health issues who can get needed resources. GPB's Sofi Gratas has more.

Sofi Gratas: By the time neighbors on Macon's East side could tour the ten new one bedroom units. Applications to live here had already flooded in. Tenants selected will meet the federal definition of homelessness and pay no more than 30% of their income. For Timothy Hart, that means just over $200 a month. Hart says he's been living in temporary housing for the last six years, working on his recovery and getting treatment for his mental health.

Timothy Hart: I lost 24 years to prison. You know, that little bitty bed in that little bit of room you sleep in? Actually, when you get out, you need your space.

Sofi Gratas: Now this cottage will be home.

Timothy Hart: I can't wait to put my first breakfast on the table.

Sofi Gratas: Meanwhile, in West Macon, a couple dozen affordable homes for seniors are also being built. For GPB News, I'm Sofi Gratas in Macon.

Story 4:

Peter Biello: The Georgia Supreme Court has ordered the removal of a county probate judge over ethics charges brought by the state's judicial watchdog agency. The state's highest court issued an opinion yesterday removing Douglas County Probate Judge Christina Peterson from office, effective immediately, and prohibiting her from holding any judicial office in the state for seven years. Peterson has seen ethics charges against her for much of her tenure, and last week she was arrested after being accused of pushing a police officer during an early morning scuffle at an Atlanta nightclub.

Story 5:

Peter Biello: A U.S. Department of Agriculture program aimed at stemming child hunger during the summer break from school, officially has begun in Georgia. GPB's Grant Blankenship has more.

Grant Blankenship: The program is called Happy Helpings, serves meals at places like this Boys and Girls Club, and make. Tamika Boone of Georgia's Department of Early Care and Learning administers Happy Helpings. She says about 16% of Georgia kids have remained food insecure since the Covid pandemic. And summer can be hard for them when school lunches go missing.

Tamika Boone: We're seeing more areas picking up and serving meals, and so we're we're chipping away at that child food insecurity, a one program, one meal at a time.

Grant Blankenship: But Georgia is one of a dozen states which opted not to enroll in what the USDA calls the Sun Bucks program. That's a $120 summer only benefit for families to use at grocery stores. You can find a link to a map of Happy Helping sites on our webpage, GPB.org. For GPB News, I'm Grant Blankenship in Macon.

Story 6:

Peter Biello: National hotel brand Red Roof Inn has reached a settlement that ends a federal trial in Atlanta over sex trafficking allegations. Trafficking survivors had filed a lawsuit accusing the company of having direct knowledge of sex crimes taking place at its locations. The trial began two weeks ago, and the defense has begun presenting its case yesterday. Terms of the settlement reached today were not disclosed. Red Ruffin denies the allegations and says it's working to eradicate trafficking and exploitation. It is the first time a national hotel brand, not just owners or franchisees, went to trial over such accusations.

Story 7:

Peter Biello: State lawmakers have launched an effort to regulate artificial intelligence. A panel of state senators today set a broad framework for determining how Georgia should control the technology to protect the public without stifling innovation. A similar state House panel is expected to meet soon as well. So far, Colorado is the only U.S. state that has adopted AI regulations.

Story 8:

Peter Biello: This month Reveal, from the Center for Investigative Reporting is releasing a story called "40 Acres and a Lie", co-reported with the center for Public Integrity and Mother Jones magazine, which identified 1250 black individuals who received land after the Civil War and trace their living descendants. GPB's Pamela Kirkland spoke with one of those reporters, Alexia Fernandez, and one of the descendants, Mila Rios.

Pamela Kirkland Alexia and Mila, thank you so much for joining me.

Alexia Fernandez: We're glad to be here.

Mila Rios: You're very welcome.

Pamela Kirkland: Alexia, one episode focuses on the land given and then taken back from enslaved people on Skidaway Island. I wanted to start with you just talking about the reporting that went into the series, because I understand this was a years long investigative endeavor.

Alexia Fernandez: Yes. Basically two years ago, I found I was I was researching a different project, and I ended up finding the titles in the National Archives, which had been recently digitized, and there was land titles that, you know, with people's names and locations. And it said Sherman's Special Field Orders 15, which I later realized was the 40 acres program. So I knew that that wasn't kind of like the narrative. I knew about 40 acres and a mule. You know, it's always this understanding that it was a promise, but not something that actually happened. So, you know, we began digging into it, and it wasn't just Skidawy Island. And Georgia was like land was given all, you know, through the Sea Islands. And Mila's great great grandfather got land inland. And like the now, I guess now it's suburban Savannah, but it was along the Ogeechee River. So, yeah. So that's kind of how it got started.

Pamela Kirkland: And so again, looking at Skidaway, but it's now a gated majority white community with beach houses. What led you to investigate that? And just tell me about the evolution of some of these areas that you've come across, because they're much different than what you were talking about in what was pre-Civil War time.

Alexia Fernandez: Most of them are the ones that I places I went to were almost unrecognizable, that you would have to be like, what? This was really the plantation because these plantations were massive. They were either cotton plantations on the Sea Islands or rice plantations on the mainland, on the coast. So, for example, Skidaway Island, you know, a few maybe at the most, a dozen people owned land and they were like just massive cotton plantations. And then if you go there now, you would never know. It's like half of the island is now a massive gated community called The Landings. And it's mostly white, I think maybe like 1% black. It's really expensive. We try to do figure out how much 40 acres was not worth in that gated community, and it's about $2 million just for the land. And. Yeah, and so we went in there and we actually spoke with people who lived there and told them about, hey, people got land titles on the, you know, basically where you live on plantations that your house is located. So that was a place that we focused on just because we felt like it really exemplified what was lost from, you know, that generational wealth that wasn't passed on when this government when this program was revoked?

Pamela Kirkland: Mila your ancestor, Pompey Jackson, lived near what is now Savannah. Tell me what you knew about them. And what was your reaction when you found out your great great grandfather had received land under General Sherman's 40 acres and a mule promise?

Mila Rios: Well, to be very honest with you, all of my life, I had been hearing about my great great grandfather because my great grandmother lived with us, and she wanted me to always remember our family history. And she would talk to me about her father, her siblings, what life was like, what growing up was like in Jim Crow, Savannah. And, so it was it was very it was always fascinating to me. And so after her death, many years after her death, I started studying the genealogical information. So I was up on ancestry. And to be very honest with you, I don't even think that she knew that her father had received 40 acres, because at that particular time, Pompey was only about 18 or 19 years old. He was very young, and so he did not get 40 acres. He was given four acres because he wasn't married at the time. He had no children. And I found that information on ancestry. And I was pleasantly surprised to see that, because that was a piece of information that I was not aware of.

Pamela Kirkland: And I saw in the article. You also said that one of his biggest regrets was not learning to read and write, and so that was something he really wanted. You know, his children and I'm assuming his, his family afterwards to invest in. Do you think that that would have made a difference back then for him being 18? But with all of this going on, just having a better understanding of the land, what it would mean and what it could potentially mean for, you know, generations of family.

Mila Rios: I know he wanted an education, and I was very pleasantly surprised to see that when he went to the Freedmen's Bureau to sign some documents and to get stipends from the Union Army during the course just after the Civil War, that he had learned to sign his name. Where many people were still using ecstasy. He had learned to sign his name. And he instilled in his children how important education was. And that was something that my great grandmother talked about all ad nauseum. Believe me. Unfortunately, I'm very happy to say I think Pompey would be proud. We have all been college educated.

Pamela Kirkland: Alexia, talk to me about some of the contrasts you saw in the reporting. You have the stories of the people who were formerly enslaved, how they struggled, how they were often very poor. And then you contrast that with some of these communities and what they look like now, very wealthy, well-to-do white enclaves. Did any of that strike you?

Alexia Fernandez: So to me, the biggest contrast was just seeing, wow, like 150 years later, it's like that, that that history, it never happened. It's just like by being there, you would never know. There was no marker. There was nothing. To me, that was the biggest shock. Like, you know, we actually tried to find as many descendants as we could of the 1200 plus people that we found, but we were only able to find like 40 living that 41 living descendants. And middle of the series also takes a look at reparations and what might be owed to the descendants of these formerly enslaved people. How do you think your family's history may have been different, if they had retained the land that was promised to your great great grandfather? I'm quite sure it would have been a lot different for them. But my family didn't leave Savannah, Georgia, because of the lack of land. They left Savannah, Georgia because of Jim Crow. So I don't know whether my part of the family would have stayed down there or not, because even if we had the land, Jim Crow would have still existed. So that is why we left. A lot of people I spoke to had a similar view, was like, it wouldn't have solved everything. You know, because of what was going on at the time. Like it could have been just taken away later on.

Peter Biello: That's GPB's Pamela Kirkland speaking with Alexia Fernandez and Mila Rios. For more on this story, visit GPB.org/news.

And that's it for this edition of Georgia Today. If you want to learn more about any of these stories, visit GPB.org/news. And if you haven't subscribed to this podcast yet, take a moment. Do it now. It'll keep us current in your podcast feed, and if you have feedback or a story idea, we would love to hear from you. Email us. The address is GeorgiaToday@GPB.org. And if you are here because you decided you wanted a break from our fundraiser, it's only a two day fundraiser, but such breaks are required every now and then. We encourage you to give to GPB to make podcasts like this possible. Give at GPB.org and thank you so much for your support. I'm Peter Biello. Thanks again for listening. We'll see you tomorrow.

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