The photo above is a screenshot of the first post I wrote on GA Jim back in December of 2008.

The other day WordPress sent me a reminder that it’s been eight years since I started this blog. That reminder prompted me to reflect on how much has changed since 2008. I am also reminded how much remains the same and how many issues that drove me to start this blog eventually drove me to run for Alpharetta City Council.

When I started this blog in December of 2008 America had just elected President Obama and much like today our country was very politically divided. The global economy was also three months into an unprecedented financial collapse worse than any economic crisis we had seen in my lifetime.

Eight years ago I was a husband, a father of two children and a residential real estate agent who was a political news junkie but had never had any desire to run for political office. I was also an active member of my community who for some inexplicable reason spent what little spare time I had following local zoning issues in an effort to keep my neighbors informed about decisions that impacted our schools, quality of life and miserable traffic.

Ten months before I started GA Jim the Alpharetta City Council had unanimously approved an enormous high density mixed use development named Windward Mill at the corner of Windward Parkway and Northpoint Parkway. The proposal included more than 1.3 milion square feet of office and retail space in addition to 400 condos in a tower up to 15 stories high.

My neighbors and I overwhelmingly opposed to such a dense urban project as part of our master planned development in Windward. And after months of petitioning city council there were so many people in attendance that most of the overflow crowd was forced to watch the meeting on closed circuit TV next door.

After hours of listening to arguments for and against that application the mayor and council voted unanimously to approve the project over our objections. The vote was 5-0 with city councilmen Doug Derito and David Belle Isle recusing themselves from the discussion because of their business ties to the applicants.

So in December of 2008 I was very frustrated with what was going on in politics and decided I needed a better platform to help keep my fellow citizens informed about issues impacting our community. GA Jim was that platform and over the years it has undergone many changes.

During my 2011 city council campaign this blog served as my campaign website. It allowed me to tell the people of Alpharetta who I was and why I was running. It also helped me to quickly respond to campaign issues that popped up as well as coverage in local newspapers and broadcast media.

Once I was elected to public office GA Jim again faced various changes and even went silent for extended periods of time as I tried to balance my desire to keep the public informed with the additional responsibilities of representing 63,000 constituents. But eight years later GA Jim is still here and I am still committed to using this platform to keep people informed and answer legitimate questions they have about the issues that affect their lives.

Thank you for taking the time to be part of that.