Chickamauga voters are seeing a trio of rare competitive races in Georgia’s upcoming municipal elections with challengers to incumbents accusing elected officials of engaging in a good ol’ boy network that’s hard to break into.
Chickamauga Mayor Randal Dalton faces political newcomer Trey Deck, and incumbent at-large City Council members Lee Miller and Daymon Garrett are competing against Matthew Nave and James “Dale” Powell. The City Council seats will go to the top two vote-getters.
Randy Pittman, first vice chair of the Walker County Republican Party, said it’s rare to have a competitive race in Chickamauga. He said in a Facebook message he’s seen Deck hold multiple events but hasn’t seen much campaigning from Dalton.
“I wouldn’t be surprised whoever wins only wins by a handful of votes,” Pittman said.
Voters will also approve or end the Transportation Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax, a 1% sales tax for transportation projects.
Early voting runs daily through Friday, and Election Day is Tuesday.
Mayor
Dalton was reached by email Oct. 23 but did not make himself available for an interview after multiple subsequent emails and phone messages left at Chickamauga City Hall.
Deck knows almost everyone in Chickamauga, and that makes campaigning enjoyable, he said.
He’s never held office, but said he has experience doing business in town and helping others. He said by phone he works as a farmer and has worked in the corrugated box industry and in his family’s automotive parts business.
“My father was a man of principle who told me if you’re unhappy, you be the change,” Deck said of his motivation to run for office. “It’s not that I’m necessarily unhappy. I just don’t think our citizens are being treated fairly. There’s a double standard.”
With the current leadership, there’s a good ol’ boy network that allows certain people to get things done that others outside of the network cannot, Deck said.
During his campaigning, Deck has heard that people are most concerned with expensive school taxes and speeding, he said.
Deck has criticized Dalton for missing government meetings and not being a hands-on mayor. Dalton has earned the nickname “No-show Randal” for a lack of commitment to the position, Deck said.
Deck said he supports Nave for City Council.
City Council
More than anything, Miller wants voters to know he loves Chickamauga. The lifelong resident is running for his third term on the council.
“I think over the last eight years, we’ve seen the city change quite a bit for the positive,” Miller said by phone. “We’ve had a lot of good projects we’ve been able to accomplish over the past eight years.”
An example Miller gave was the addition of a Main Street manager to develop programs for residents and visitors about a year ago. Downtown now has a monthly First Friday event that closes streets for live music and vendors, he said. Car shows and a Jeep Fest, he said, are other events to bring people to Chickamauga’s historic downtown.
For the past four years, city leadership has been working on a plan to redevelop the property that housed Crystal Springs Print Works, Miller said. Formerly the city’s largest employer, the mill shut down about 10 years ago, he said.
“It’s going to be big,” Miller said, acknowledging that the process has been slow. “This thing is so exciting, to see this thing get to the point we’re at.”
Miller wants to be reelected to be part of moving the city forward, he said.
Garret, the other incumbent City Council member, did not return phone messages left at City Hall or text messages.
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A 2022 graduate of Gordon Lee High School, City Council candidate Nave said he decided to forego college to start a business and get involved in local politics, including working as a campaign manager to fellow candidate Powell.
He was elected to a term as chair of the Walker County Republican Party last year but decided not to run again to focus on a bid for a City Council seat.
The city’s economy has been declining over the past few decades, Nave said by phone, citing the mill closure. He wants to bring more opportunity to the city — his main focus if he wins the seat, he said.
“I honestly believe that we don’t have leaders in office that understand the struggle and aren’t necessarily focused entirely on the future of the city,” Nave, a Chickamauga native, said.
There’s not a lot of voter engagement in the city outside of the election, he said, adding that City Council agendas aren’t posted online. Nave texts a City Council member for meeting agendas, he said.
Georgia’s Open Meetings Law does not require public meeting agendas to be available online but does stipulate they be posted at the meeting site “as far in advance as reasonably possible” and be available upon request.
Not naming specific city leaders, Nave said the city has been run as a good ol’ boy club that doesn’t encourage voter input. He credited City Council Member Rhonda Jacks, elected in 2021, for encouraging more discussion at meetings but said there’s a long way to go.
Nave said a political change in Northwest Georgia state representation has paved the way for young candidates like him at the city level.
“Having worked on about a dozen campaigns at this point, I can tell a huge shift in the way things are run now compared to how they used to be run,” Nave said. “I think that the new, young energy had definitely taken hold with people like state Rep. Mitchell Horner and state Sen. Colton Moore.”
Horner is a Repubican from Ringgold. Moore is a Republican from Trenton.
In his sixth attempt at a City Council seat, Powell said he keeps running because he’s tired of seeing candidates run without any opposition.
“People need a choice, you know,” he said, adding he thinks the city runs fairly smoothly.
Among other jobs, Powell said his resume includes working as a homebuilder and carpet mill worker. He now works as a machinist, he said in a phone call.
He said citizens are tired of a lack of transparency, citing the City Council not posting meeting agendas online or on social media for over a year.
Powell said he follows local government but doesn’t like politics.
“These people are making the rules that I got to live by, and I want a say in the rules that I got to live by,” he said.
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Powell said he has also served as precinct chair for Walker County Republican Party since 2014 and is co-founder of the Georgia Transparency Coalition.
Serving on City Council isn’t rocket science, Powell said, adding he would base decisions on logic and what’s best for residents rather than his friends and family.
Chickamauga City Manager Michael Haney did not return emails or phone messages about Chickamauga’s election history.
Contact Andrew Wilkins at awilkins@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6659.