First Monday

"Take a look at The Beacon," said Mayor Wood as I walked in to my first real Monday on the job. In it, was an article about Ms. Lori Henry, councilwoman and fellow mayoral candidate in the upcoming election in November. The article talked about how Ms. Henry was "the conservative" of the race and that the other two candidates, including Mayor Wood, were both not true republicans like herself. A pretty bold statement against a mayor who has been a republican mayor for over 12 years; seems like everyone else thinks he's a true republican. But this is politics and with it, come many interesting and outlandish accusations. And this is exactly the part of this job that I like the most; to observe the political nature of being a Mayor and what it takes to get things done. After this, it was time to take a look at the Facebook aspect of Mayor Wood's campaign and both he and I came up with a system to add pictures periodically so as to keep the Facebook community updated with the daily occurrences of the campaign. All in all, it was a pretty successful day, but there is still a long way to go.

First Full Day

I came in to the office early today for my first full day on the job. When I arrived, Mayor Wood was already meeting with Bill Largin, who is the Tech-coordinator of this campaign. Bill brought his daughter Lilly along, as seen in the picture, and we discussed how to handle the internet aspect of this campaign.

Afterwards, the Mayor and I went to lunch with Former Mayor of Mountain Park Jim Wright. This was a truly amazing experience because I got to sit in on a conversation between two mayors whose experiences were remarkably similar despite the fact that Mountain Park is a city of only 600 people versus Roswell's population of 101,000. We ate at the Fickle Pickle on Canton Street and it was a true taste of what local Roswell food was like: very delicious! Then, we made our way back to the law office, where I worked until about 5 o'clock on the list of Constant Contacts that were given to me earlier (which isn't exactly the most fun part of this job, I might add). Nonetheless, the first full day was great, and there will be many more to come!

First Council Meeting

Ms. Kenner had notified me that there would be a Council Meeting at City Hall at 8 am on Wednesday morning. Now, since I love politics so much, I was more than delighted to attend. When I arrived, I could feel a sense of tension in the room. That tension could easily be attributed to the fact that two of the Council members were going to run against Mayor Wood in the election for the Mayor of Roswell on November 3rd. On top of this, I would find out later that most of the Council was NOT supporting Mayor Wood in his re-election campaign. What a tough group! Then, after the Council Meeting, I made my way over to Mayor Wood's law office, which is where I would be working during most of my internship. At first sight, I thought 'Man, what an old building!' But soon after, I would learn to appreciate the historic aspect of this building. Later that evening, I was to attend Mayor Wood's very first Campaign Volunteer Meeting (for this campaign, anyway), to which I arrived almost an hour late! Turns out Ms. Kenner gave me directions FROM City Hall to Mayor Wood's house, which didn't strike me until I realized I was going the wrong way for more than a half hour. In the end, however, the meeting turned out to be great and I began to realize the role that I would be playing in Mayor Wood's re-election campaign (a pretty big one, at that).

First Meeting with Mayor Wood

Mrs. Drummond, my internship advisor at Alpharetta High School, gave me a call today to notify me that Roswell City Government was interested in my resume and wanted for me to give them a call. So I followed her directions and gave Ms. Robyn Kenner, Mayor Wood's Executive Assistant, a call. Little did I know, she was thinking about when I would give her a call at that exact moment! To my surprise, she asked me to come in within the next hour to City Hall to meet with her and Mayor Wood. So I quickly printed out my resume, dressed up with a shirt and tie, and headed on over to City Hall as fast as I could. The first thing Mayor Wood said to me when I met him was: "Come on, let's take a picture!" The guy didn't even know me and now he wanted to already take a picture with me! All I could think about is how nice a man he was for being a person of his stature. In any case, he and Ms. Kenner sat down with me and tried to detail what the next 6 months would be like with Ms. Kenner repeatedly asking me: "Are you sure you can do this?" And I would respond that this is exactly what I wanted to do; to learn what it takes to be a Mayor.