Atlanta Public Schools elections (2017)

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2019 → ← 2013
Atlanta Public Schools Elections
General election date
November 7, 2017
Runoff election date
December 5, 2017
Enrollment (14-15)
51,145 students

All nine seats on the Atlanta Public Schools Board of Education in Georgia were up for general election on November 7, 2017. Six seats were elected by district and three seats were elected at large. Six incumbents filed for re-election. A runoff election was held on December 5, 2017, after no candidate in Districts 2, 3, 5, and 7 won a majority of votes in the general election.

District 2 incumbent Byron Amos won against newcomer Keisha Carey in the runoff election after they defeated challenger Tony Burks in the general election. The open District 3 seat drew five newcomers, Adzua Agyapon, Lewis Cartee, Michelle Olympiadis, Antoine Raynard Trammell, and Rashida Winfrey. Olympiadis-Constant defeated Agyapon in the runoff election. Newcomer Erika Yvette Mitchell defeated Raynard Johnson in the runoff election after defeating candidates D'Jaris James, Jatisha Marsh, Bobby Montgomery, and Jackye Rhodes for the District 5 seat. In District 7, newcomer Kandis Wood Jackson won against Patricia Crayton after they defeated candidates Nathaniel Borrell Dyer, John Wright, and Micah Rowland in the general election.

In the general election, incumbent Leslie Grant defeated challenger Ade Oguntoye to retain her District 1 seat. Incumbent Nancy Meister was the only candidate to file for the District 4 seat and won unopposed. In District 6, incumbent Eshé Collins defeated newcomers Valrie Walker Sanders, Patreece Hutcherson, and Donta McMichael to retain her seat. District 8 incumbent Cynthia Briscoe Brown won against challengers Ben Stone and Charlie Stadtlander. Incumbent Jason Esteves was the only candidate to file for the District 9 seat and won unopposed.

A decision in Fulton County to freeze property assessment values to their 2016 levels led to funding uncertainties in the Atlanta Public Schools. As of November 1, 2017, Fulton County had not collected property taxes, meaning the Atlanta Public Schools had yet to receive 62.5 percent of its funding. The district took a short-term loan that came due in December 2017, but the county was not expected to collect property taxes until January 2018 at the earliest. On November 3, 2017, Atlanta Public Schools was granted a motion for a tax collection order that allowed the district to begin collecting taxes sooner than otherwise anticipated.

Elections

Voter and candidate information

The Atlanta Board of Education consists of nine members elected to concurrent four-year terms. Six seats, Districts 1 through 6, are elected by district and three seats, Districts 7 through 9, are elected at large. The general election for all nine seats was November 7, 2017. A runoff election was held on December 5, 2017, after no candidate in Districts 2, 3, 5, and 7 won a majority of votes in the general election.

Candidates were required to file for election by August 25, 2017. Qualified candidates had to live for one or more years within the district they wished to represent, be 18 years or older, and be registered to vote in Atlanta. Candidates could not be members of the state board of education or employees of the Georgia Department of Education.

To cast a ballot in the election, citizens had to register to vote by October 10, 2017. For information on the voter identification requirements in Georgia, please click here.

District 1

Results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 1 General Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Leslie Grant Incumbent	74.86%	10,237
Ade Oguntoye	24.79%	3,390
Write-in votes	0.34%	47
Total Votes		13,674
Source: Fulton County, Georgia, "Official Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017 and DeKalb County, Georgia, "Election Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017

Candidates

Leslie Grant		Ade Oguntoye
	Incumbent

District 2

Runoff results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 2 Runoff Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Byron Amos Incumbent	50.49%	3,725
Keisha Carey	49.51%	3,653
Total Votes		7,378
Source: City of Atlanta, GA, "Fulton County/DeKalb County ‐ Official and Complete Combined Results," accessed December 12, 2017

Runoff candidates

Byron Amos		Keisha Carey
	Incumbent

General results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 2 General Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Byron Amos Incumbent	48.09%	3,529
Keisha Carey	35.96%	2,639
Tony Burks	15.49%	1,137
Write-in votes	0.46%	34
Total Votes		7,339
Source: Fulton County, Georgia, "Official Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017 and DeKalb County, Georgia, "Election Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017

General candidates

Byron Amos		Tony Burks		Keisha Carey
	Incumbent

District 3

Runoff results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 3 Runoff Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Michelle Olympiadis-Constant	59.30%	9,131
Adzua Agyapon	40.70%	6,268
Total Votes		15,399
Source: City of Atlanta, GA, "Fulton County/DeKalb County ‐ Official and Complete Combined Results," accessed December 12, 2017

Runoff candidates

Adzua Agyapon		Michelle Olympiadis

General results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 3 General Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Michelle Olympiadis-Constant	38.84%	5,994
Adzua Agyapon	22.28%	3,438
Rashida Winfrey	16.78%	2,590
Lewis Cartee	16.41%	2,532
Antoine Raynard Trammell	5.33%	823
Write-in votes	0.36%	56
Total Votes		15,433
Source: Fulton County, Georgia, "Official Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017 and DeKalb County, Georgia, "Election Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017

General candidates

Adzua Agyapon		Lewis Cartee		Michelle Olympiadis

Antoine Raynard Trammell		Rashida Winfrey

District 4

Results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 4 General Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Nancy Meister Incumbent (unopposed)	99.16%	11,945
Write-in votes	0.84%	101
Total Votes		12,046
Source: Fulton County, Georgia, "Official Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017 and DeKalb County, Georgia, "Election Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017

Candidates

Nancy Meister
	Incumbent

District 5

Runoff results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 5 Runoff Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Erika Yvette Mitchell	63.52%	7,988
Raynard Johnson	36.48%	4,587
Total Votes		12,575
Source: City of Atlanta, GA, "Fulton County/DeKalb County ‐ Official and Complete Combined Results," accessed December 12, 2017

Runoff candidates

Raynard Johnson		Erika Yvette Mitchell
	Former candidate

General results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 5 General Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Erika Yvette Mitchell	25.34%	2,988
Raynard Johnson	18.04%	2,127
Jatisha Marsh	16.83%	1,985
D'Jaris James	15.32%	1,806
Jackye Rhodes	12.35%	1,456
Bobby Montgomery	11.56%	1,363
Write-in votes	0.57%	67
Total Votes		11,792
Source: Fulton County, Georgia, "Official Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017 and DeKalb County, Georgia, "Election Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017

General candidates

D'Jaris James		Raynard Johnson		Jatisha Marsh
			Former candidate
Erika Yvette Mitchell		Bobby Montgomery		Jackye Rhodes

District 6

Results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 6 General Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Eshé Collins Incumbent	58.02%	7,146
Valrie Walker Sanders	18.12%	2,232
Patreece Hutcherson	15.13%	1,863
Donta McMichael	8.44%	1,039
Write-in votes	0.29%	36
Total Votes		12,316
Source: Fulton County, Georgia, "Official Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017 and DeKalb County, Georgia, "Election Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017

Candidates

Eshé Collins		Patreece Hutcherson
	Incumbent
Donta McMichael		Valrie Walker Sanders

District 7 (At-Large)

Runoff results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 7 Runoff Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Kandis Wood Jackson	69.88%	49,771
Patricia Crayton	30.12%	21,452
Total Votes		71,223
Source: City of Atlanta, GA, "Fulton County/DeKalb County ‐ Official and Complete Combined Results," accessed December 12, 2017

Runoff candidates

Kandis Wood Jackson		Patricia Crayton

General results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 7 General Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Kandis Wood Jackson	42.55%	29,215
Patricia Crayton	19.90%	13,662
John Wright	19.86%	13,635
Micah Rowland	9.72%	6,672
Nathaniel Borrell Dyer	7.30%	5,016
Write-in votes	0.68%	466
Total Votes		68,666
Source: Fulton County, Georgia, "Official Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017 and DeKalb County, Georgia, "Election Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017

General candidates

Nathaniel Borrell Dyer		Patricia Crayton		Kandis Wood Jackson

John Wright		Micah Rowland

District 8 (At-Large)

Results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 8 General Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Cynthia Briscoe Brown Incumbent	70.14%	50,706
Charlie Stadtlander	17.31%	12,512
Ben Stone	12.14%	8,774
Write-in votes	0.42%	302
Total Votes		72,294
Source: Fulton County, Georgia, "Official Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017 and DeKalb County, Georgia, "Election Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017

Candidates

Cynthia Briscoe Brown		Charlie Stadtlander		Ben Stone
	Incumbent		Former candidate

District 9 (At-Large)

Results

Atlanta Public Schools, District 9 General Election, 4-year term, 2017
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Jason Esteves Incumbent (unopposed)	98.96%	62,816
Write-in votes	1.04%	661
Total Votes		63,477
Source: Fulton County, Georgia, "Official Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017 and DeKalb County, Georgia, "Election Summary Report: Official and Complete," accessed November 17, 2017

Candidates

Jason Esteves
	Incumbent

Additional elections on the ballot

See also: Georgia elections, 2017

The Atlanta Public Schools Board of Education election shared the ballot with Atlanta's municipal elections for mayor, city council members, and city judges. A special election for two seats on the Fulton County Commission also appeared on the ballot.

Key deadlines

The following dates were key deadlines for this Georgia school board election in 2017:

Deadline	Event
August 25, 2017	Candidate filing deadline
October 10, 2017	Deadline to register to vote
November 7, 2017	General election
December 5, 2017	Runoff election (if needed)

Endorsements

The following is a list of official endorsements made by political parties, education organizations, media sources, and unions.

Do you know of an official or organization that endorsed a candidate in this race? Let Ballotpedia know by email at editor@ballotpedia.org.

Candidate endorsements*
Endorsement	District 1	District 2	District 3	District 4	District 5	District 6	District 7	District 8	District 9
Atlanta Association of Educators	Ade Oguntoye	Tony Burks	Antoine Raynard Trammell	-	Jatisha Marsh	Patreece Hutcherson	Nathaniel Borrell Dyer	Charlie Stadtlander	-
Atlanta Federation of Teachers	Ade Oguntoye	Tony Burks	Michelle Olympiadis	-	Jackye Rhodes	Patreece Hutcherson	-	Charlie Stadtlander	-
Buckhead Coalition	Leslie Grant(i)	Byron Amos(i)	Lewis Cartee	Nancy Meister(i)	Jatisha Marsh	Eshé Collins(i)	Kandis Wood Jackson	Cynthia Briscoe Brown(i)	Jason Esteves(i)
Georgia Association of Black Women Attorneys	Ade Oguntoye	-	Adzua Agyapon	-	-	Eshé Collins(i)	John Wright	-	-
Georgia Equality	Leslie Grant(i)	Tony Burks	-	-	-	Eshé Collins(i)	Kandis Wood Jackson	-	-
*As of October 31, 2017, Ballotpedia had not identified an organization's official endorsement in districts marked with a "-" (i)Indicates incumbent

Ade Oguntoye was also endorsed by the Atlanta Black Slate for District 1.

Jason Esteves was also endorsed by Latino Victory U.S. for District 9.

Campaign finance

Candidates received a total of $716,045.24 and spent a total of $600,290.10 as of December 31, 2017, according to the City of Atlanta Office of Municipal Clerk.

Candidate	Contributions**	Expenditures	Cash on hand
District 1
Leslie Grant (Incumbent)	$26,475.00	$20,932.72	N/A*
Ade Oguntoye	$9,623.00	$8,702.34	$920.66
District 2
Tony Burks	$11,090.08	$8,778.10	$2,311.98
Byron Amos (Incumbent)	$29,774.00	$28,799.89	$974.11
Keisha Carey filed an affidavit on July 21, 2017, stating her intent not to receive or spend more than $2,500 in the 2017 election.
District 3
Adzua Agyapon	$58,792.00	$51,333.16	$9,559.17
Lewis Cartee	$22,971.00	$17,945.65	$5,025.35
Michelle Olympiadis	$16,550.99	$12,893.63	N/A*
Antoine Raynard Trammell	$2,470.00	$1,605.26	N/A*
Rashida Winfrey	$28,678.00	$8,412.91	N/A*
District 4
Nancy Meister (Incumbent)	$1,694.00	$0.00	$1,694.00
District 5
Jackye Rhodes	$1,471.00	$7,517.49	N/A*
Bobby Montgomery	$0.00	$0.00	$0.00
Jatisha Marsh	$37,599.26	$34,310.55	N/A*
Erika Yvette Mitchell	$13,612.39	$15,459.25	N/A*
D'Jaris James	$1,855.00	$1,670.00	N/A*
Raynard Johnson	$7,228.92	$1,525.85	N/A*
District 6
Eshé Collins (Incumbent)	$32,090.00	$16,605.34	$15,484.66
Patreece Hutcherson	$12,455.00	$12,154.73	$301.00
Donta McMichael and Valrie Walker Sanders filed affidavits on April 19, 2017, and June 26, 2017, respectively, stating their intents not to receive or spend more than $2,500 in the 2017 election.
District 7 (At-Large)
John Wright	$34,761.00	$20,145.78	N/A*
Nathaniel Borrell Dyer	$2,465.00	$770.62	N/A*
Kandis Wood Jackson	$75,625.39	$67,537.01	$6,963.38
Micah Rowland	$4,000.00	$1,163.65	N/A*
Patricia Crayton filed an affidavit on November 2, 2017, stating her intent not to receive or spend more than $2,500 in the 2017 election.
District 8 (At-Large)
Cynthia Briscoe Brown (Incumbent)	$96,770.89	$76,744.47	$20,026.42
Charlie Stadtlander	$19,680.00	$32,522.18	$79,270.57
Ben Stone filed an affidavit on August 23, 2017, stating his intent not to receive or spend more than $2,500 in the 2017 election.
District 9 (At-Large)
Jason Esteves (Incumbent)	$167,813.32	$152,759.52	$15,053.80
*Candidates reported no cash on hand. **The amounts listed include monetary political contributions; they do not include loans or in-kind donations.

Reporting requirements

See also: List of school board campaign finance deadlines in 2017

School board candidates in Georgia were required to file three campaign finance reports. For 2017, campaign finance reports were due on September 30, 2017, October 25, 2017, and December 31, 2017. If a candidate advanced to a runoff election, they were required to file an additional campaign finance report on November 29, 2017.

School board candidates had to file reports if they raised or spent more than $2,500. Candidates who raised or spent more than $2,500 but less than $5,000 were required to file a report only on October 30, 2017.

Candidates who received contributions of $1,000 or more had to file a Two Business Day Report within two business days of receiving the contribution.

Past elections

See also: Past elections in Atlanta Public Schools

To see results from past elections in Atlanta Public Schools, click here.

What was at stake?

Issues in the election

Judge approves temporary tax collection order

On November 3, 2017, DeKalb County Judge Alan Harvey signed a temporary tax collection order allowing Fulton County to begin collecting taxes after the county had not collected taxes by its usual October deadline. The bills were sent on November 9, 2017, with a due date of December 31, 2017, for Atlanta residents and January 15, 2017, for Fulton County residents.

“All of us at Atlanta Public Schools are pleased by today’s court ruling, which begins the process of collecting the property tax revenues that are so critical to the safe and successful operation of our school system,” Superintendent Meria Carstarphen said of the decision. “At the same time, the initial delay in tax collections will still have a significant impact on our ability to operate as normal for the remainder of this calendar year."

Because of the delay in collecting property taxes, on November 8, 2017, APS announced 1,200 employees would be required to take furlough days on November 20, 2017, and November 21, 2017, when students had off for Thanksgiving. Those who were affected included hourly employees, part-time employees, and administrators, who were not paid for the two-days they could not work. The district planned to repay salaried employees for the two-day furlough on January 15, 2018, along with a $500 one-time bonus. The district also froze hiring, slowed outgoing payments, and negotiated defered payments to charters and unfunded pension payments.

Of the planned furlough, Superintendent Carstarphen wrote on her blog:

“	APS – and other affected parties – remain in a crunch. Therefore, our district will continue to do everything we can to ensure the continued smooth and safe operation of our school system. I can’t thank our colleagues and stakeholders enough for their commitment to APS and for their understanding of the steps we had to take to mitigate our short-term cash flow challenges.	”
—Superintendent Meria Carstarphen, November 12, 2017

Halted tax revenue creates funding uncertainty

According to Atlanta Public Schools (APS), approximately 62.5 percent of its $777 million 2017-2018 school year budget came from the Fulton County Tax Digest. In June 2017, Fulton County decided to freeze property value levels at their 2016 assessment values after residents said the assessed values were too high (of the 318,000 residential parcels in Fulton County, roughly half saw an increase in assessed property value of 20 percentage points or more from 2016 to 2017).

The decision to freeze property assessment values required state approval of the adjusted tax values before tax bills could be sent. This meant that the tax bills, usually posted in the summer and due in October, had not been sent as of November 1, 2017. Because of the delay in tax collection, APS had not received any funding from Fulton County taxes—which makes up roughly two-thirds of the district's budget—as of October 31, 2017. In September 2017, the district took out a $100 million short-term loan, called a Tax Anticipation Note, with repayment of the loan set for December 2017.

On October 25, 2017, the Georgia Department of Revenue rejected the property assessment freeze, saying it would lead to commercial and industrial property owners paying too large a percentage of total taxes. This delayed Fulton County's ability to collect taxes until a new tax digest was approved by the state. The decision delayed the sending of Fulton County property tax bills until November at the earliest, according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. As Atlanta taxes are due within 45 days of the bills being sent and Fulton County taxes are due within 60 days, the newspaper estimated that the due date would likely be in 2018, after the APS deadline for loan repayment.

APS, along with the Fulton County School District, filed a motion on October 27, 2017, asking the courts to approve a temporary tax collection order allowing the districts to collect property taxes despite the state hold on Fulton County tax collection. A hearing was scheduled for November 3, 2017.

The possibility of the courts not approving the district's request for a tax collection order led APS Superintendent Meria Carstarphen to hold a meeting on October 30, 2017. During this meeting, she said that should the motion not be approved on November 3, 2017,

“	We [would] have to furlough the entire staff because we will probably have maybe one more month to be able to pay our bills and our staff and then we’ll have to stop until something else happens which at the earliest would be January.	”
—Meria Carstarphen, October 30, 2017

Incumbent candidate Jason Esteves said the possibility of a furlough was one of the last options. He also commented on the Tax Anticipation Note, due in December 2017. “We are trying to determine how to pay back that loan. I can guarantee you we will because it’s required by law,” he said. “We are looking at various financial mechanisms to ensure that that loan is paid off.”

The property assessment freeze announced in June 2017 also caused the Atlanta Board of Education to reassess its 2017-2018 budget. The district planned to make up an anticipated $4 million budget gap by cutting program funding and offering non-teacher, full-time employees a one-time $500 payment instead of the previously expected 1.5 percent raise.

Report a story for this election

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Click here to view or fill out the survey.

Election trends

See also: School boards in session: 2016 in brief

More candidates filed for election in 2017 than in 2013, including six incumbents—one more than filed for re-election in 2013. A total of 30 candidates appeared on the ballot, compared to the 26 who vied for election in 2013. In that year, three out of five incumbents (60 percent) were successful in retaining their seats.

Two seats were uncontested in 2017, a rate of 22.22 percent, both with the seat's incumbent winning re-election. The same number of seats were uncontested in 2013, but in that year one seat was won by a newcomer.

School board election trends
Year	Candidates per seat	Uncontested seats	Incumbents running for re-election	Incumbent success rate	Seats won by newcomers
Atlanta Public Schools
2017	3.33	22.22%	66.67%	100.00%	33.33%
2013	2.89	22.22%	55.56%	60.00%	66.67%
Georgia
2016	1.69	53.78%	78.79%	90.38%	28.79%
United States
2016	1.90	34.05%	71.31%	82.39%	41.04%

About the district

See also: Atlanta Public Schools, Georgia

Atlanta Public Schools is located in Fulton County, Georgia, highlighted above. It is also located in DeKalb County, Georgia.

Atlanta Public Schools is located in northwestern Georgia in Fulton County and DeKalb County. The DeKalb County seat is Decatur and the Fulton County seat is Atlanta. According to the United States Census Bureau, in 2014 DeKalb County was home to 722,161 residents and Fulton County was home to 996,319 resident. The district was the sixth-largest school district in the state in the 2014-2015 school year and served 51,145 students.

Demographics

DeKalb County and Fulton County outperformed the rest of Georgia in terms of higher education achievement in 2013. The United States Census Bureau found the percentage of residents over 25 with a bachelor's degree or higher was 39.7 percent and 48.2 percent in DeKalb County and Fulton County respectively; 28 percent of residents in Georgia attained the same level of education. The median household income in DeKalb County and Fulton County was $50,856 and $56,857 compared to the state's median of $59,179. The state had a poverty rate of 18.2 percent, while the counties had rates of 19.0 percent (DeKalb) and 17.6 percent (Fulton).

Racial Demographics, 2013
Race	DeKalb (%)	Fulton (%)	Georgia (%)
White	37.0	46.9	62.5
Black or African American	54.8	44.4	31.4
American Indian and Alaska Native	0.5	0.3	0.5
Asian	5.6	6.3	3.7
Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander	0.1	0.1	0.1
Two or More Races	2.0	2.0	1.9
Hispanic or Latino	9.1	7.7	9.2

Note: Percentages for race and ethnicity may add up to more than 100 percent because respondents may report more than one race and the Hispanic/Latino ethnicity may be selected in conjunction with any race. Read more about race and ethnicity in the census here.

Recent news

The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Atlanta Public Schools Georgia election. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.

Atlanta Public Schools elections (2017) - Google News

See also

Atlanta Public Schools	Georgia	School Boards
Atlanta Public Schools elections (2013) List of school districts in Georgia	Georgia school board elections, 2017 Public education in Georgia Local ballot measures, Georgia	School board elections, 2017 School board elections, 2016 School board election data analysis, 2017 School board election data analysis, 2016

External links

• Atlanta Public Schools
• Atlanta elections department