2 qualify for District 2 council seat
By DON FLETCHER
News Staff Writer
As qualifying for Atmore city offices enters its second week, one candidate who initially filed papers to seek the District 1 city council seat being vacated by Webb Nall, will now run instead against District 2 incumbent Jerome Webster.
Andreas Grant, who filed qualifying papers last week to challenge Bob Turk for the seat Nall has held for the past 25 years, found out later he did not meet the residency requirements and had been declared ineligible to seek the council post.
An email sent by Alabama Ethics Commission officials to the city council hopeful and to City Clerk Becca Smith, who is also the city’s Elections Manager, notified both that he was “non-certifiable” as a candidate for District 1.
Grant has a 6th Avenue address. Most of that street lies within District 1, but a few of the northernmost blocks, including the one in which he lives, are in District 2.
“I had to modify some of my paperwork,” Grant said Monday afternoon, June 16. “I found out that I didn’t live in District 1, that I actually live in District 2.”
Smith said Grant has formally withdrawn from the District 1 race and has filed new qualifying papers to seek the District 2 seat. Angelia Norman also qualified Monday, so Grant is now one of two challengers for Webster’s seat.
Qualifying for all six city council slots will continue through 5 p.m. on June 24. The qualifying fee for each office is $50. Those who had qualified by 10 a.m. Tuesday to seek office in the August 26 municipal election:
Mayor — Acting Mayor Shawn Lassiter, who took office on June 2 in the wake of Jim Staff’s retirement, has qualified for a four-year term, and Sandra Gray has also qualified. Ernie Digmon, who has announced his intent to seek the office, had not yet qualified.
District 1 — Bob Turk was the only candidate to have qualified by Tuesday morning. Grant’s action made what appeared to be a two-candidate race, a one-candidate race — unless another individual qualifies by the deadline.
District 2 — Webster has been out of town due to a death in his family and had not qualified to run for a third term by 10 a.m. Tuesday but has announced his intention to do so. Norman, who lost the 2020 election to Webster by just 55 votes, and Grant will challenge him.
District 3 — Eunice Johnson, who took office in 2020 after defeating incumbent councilman Chris Walker, is the only person to have qualified for the seat by 10 a.m. Tuesday.
District 4 — David Dobson, who is set to be sworn in next week to fill the District 4 vacancy created by Lassiter’s elevation to the mayor’s office, is the only person to have qualified by 10 a.m. Tuesday for a four-year term as the district’s representative.
District 5 — Bub Gideons has qualified to seek the seat being vacated by Chris Harrison, who has represented the district for the past 13 years. Gideons, who lost a runoff against the District 5 rep in 2020, was the only person to have qualified for the seat by 10 Tuesday morning.