Georgia Trend Daily – Aug. 31, 2026
Aug. 31, 2026 Augusta Chronicle
Columbia County pitches Google project as path to property tax relief
Joe Hotchkiss reports that Columbia County leaders say they are closer to a “strategic economic development partnership” with Google to bring a data center to the Augusta area. Amid a national backlash against the large tech facilities that store and process digital data, county leaders in a Wednesday announcement emphasized the potential windfall in revenue and lowered property taxes they say the Google project could bring.
Aug. 31, 2026 Georgia Trend – Exclusive!
Catching up with… Chris Ahrenkiel
Rachel Wallenstein reports, Chris Ahrenkiel has helped shape the city’s commercial real estate landscape. Outside the office, he’s deeply involved in civic life. He graduated from Leadership Atlanta in 2017 and serves as the board chair.
Aug. 31, 2026 Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Booze bankruptcy: Atlanta-based alcohol distributor lays off hundreds
Kelly Yamanouchi and Kelly Wenk report, an 128-year-old alcohol distributor based in metro Atlanta recently filed for bankruptcy and will lay off more than 500 Georgia workers, according to state filings. The layoffs come after Republic National Distributing Co., with headquarters in Cobb County, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in July, when it said it had about 1,460 employees.
Aug. 31, 2026 Rough Draft Atlanta
Kipp Atlanta Schools receives $35,000 from Delta for career readiness
Staff reports, KIPP Atlanta Schools announced it received a $35,000 grant from Delta Air Lines in late August to expand college and career readiness opportunities for students across its network. Dr. Michael Cormack Jr., chief executive officer of KIPP Atlanta Schools, said Delta continues to demonstrate what it means to be a community partner by supporting programs that prepare scholars for success beyond high school, inspire academic excellence, and broaden future possibilities.
Aug. 31, 2026 Marietta Daily Journal
Data Center debate pushes Marietta toward new regulations
Megan Jackson reports, Marietta is working toward creating an ordinance regulating data centers following three contentious council meetings where protesters advocated against data centers in the city.
Aug. 31, 2026 Columbus Ledger-Enquirer
Georgia Power drops more details about OpenAI contract. PSC meeting heats up
Kala Hunter reports, the largest single-user of power in Georgia history will be OpenAI’s 1,400-acre, 3.2-gigawatt Project Camellia data center in Effingham County, which finalized its deal with Georgia Power on Wednesday evening in a joint letter to the Georgia Public Service Commission. The PSC staff had an extra 13 days to review the contract after public scrutiny and pushback from some of the commissioners two weeks ago pressured more financial safeguards, preventing Georgia Power customers from footing the bill for OpenAI’s energy cost.
Aug. 31, 2026 The Current
Warnock calls for data center moratorium in Georgia
Craig Nelson reports, U.S. Senator Raphael Warnock on Friday called for a moratorium on data center construction in Georgia, describing the secrecy surrounding plans to build a $20 billion data center in Effingham County “unacceptable.” With “hundreds” of data centers already being planned in Georgia and a “feckless” U.S. Congress “moving too slowly” to regulate the artificial intelligence boom and the data centers that are tooling it, Warnock declared it was time for a data-center pause in the state.
Aug. 31, 2026 Georgia Recorder
ACA premium prices insuring 900K Georgians to shoot up – again
Ariel Hart reports, the Affordable Care Act health insurance program that covers 900,000 Georgians is on track to see price hikes of as much as 20% or more when open enrollment begins this fall for 2027 coverage. That’s according to state data obtained by the Georgia Recorder for the ACA exchange run by the state and called Georgia Access.
Aug. 31, 2026 WABE, KFF News
Trump stronghold in NW Georgia feels healthcare cuts, but political shift remains unlikely
Briah Lumpkins reports, Amber Bates of Cohutta, Georgia, is one of thousands of people without health insurance in the 14th Congressional District, home to about 765,000 people in the northwestern corner of the state. She and her husband have not had health coverage for the past two years, Bates said, because their employment is unsteady and they earn too much to qualify for Medicaid, the public health insurance for those with disabilities or low incomes.
Aug. 31, 2026 Macon Telegraph
Smaller bill to make Ocmulgee Mounds a national park tries to gather momentum
Katie Tucker report, the newest bill to reclassify Macon’s Ocmulgee Mounds as a national park leaves out thousands of acres of land and an elevated role for the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, but its omissions might give it the best chance to finally push the years-long initiative over the finish line. Representative Austin Scott introduced the Ocmulgee Mounds National Park Redesignation Act, or House Resolution 9416, earlier this summer on June 24.
Aug. 31, 2026 Georgia Recorder
New law clinic in Georgia aims to keep owners of heirs’ property in their homes
Maya Homan reports, a new law clinic at Georgia State University will offer free legal services to help families counter heirs’ property issues, which experts say are a leading cause of involuntary property loss and a barrier to the creation of generational wealth. The problem arises when the owner of a property does not appear on the title, which most commonly happens when someone inherits property from a relative who has passed away without leaving a will.
Aug. 31, 2026 Capitol Beat News
New partisan-linked Georgia sites mix news with divergent political messages
Ty Tagami reports, in late July, a new website popped online carrying local news stories from Georgia. There was an article about a disgraced former Atlanta City Council member, another about President Donald Trump’s visit to Cobb County and one about Georgia coach Kirby Smart.
Aug. 31, 2026 Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Brian Kemp’s international footprint expands in second term
Greg Bluestein reports that Gov. Brian Kemp hardly traveled out of the U.S. during a first term dominated by the coronavirus pandemic. In his second, he’s making up for lost time.
