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‘Cop City’ Opponents Say Atlanta Is Disenfranchising Voters

Activists say they’ve collected 104,000 signatures to put the $90 million police training facility to a vote. Atlanta wants a signature verification process.

Opponents of a police training facility in Atlanta say the city has to put the facility’s construction up to a vote this year after activists collected more than 104,000 signatures calling for a referendum. But the city wants to conduct a signature verification process on the petitions—a move that some on the left have decried as unscientific, or reminiscent of Republican doubt-casting about votes. The fight over the training facility—dubbed “Cop City” by opponents—has escalated over two years, leading to mass arrests of protesters and the police killing of activist Manuel Esteban Paez Terán this year. Opponents have also tried blocking the project through the legal system, ultimately suing Atlanta earlier this summer for the right to collect signatures to put construction up to a citywide vote. Atlanta allows referendums to be called with signatures from 15 percent of voters who participated in the last general municipal election. Cop City opponents estimated that number at 58,203 signatures—far fewer than the 104,000 they’ve collected this summer.

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Kelly Weill

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