Georgia Today: Arrested journalist placed in ICE custody; Wildlife Refuge saved by nonprofit

Orlando Montoya: Hello and welcome to the Georgia Today podcast. Here we bring you the latest reports from the GPB newsroom. On today's episode, a journalist arrested while covering a protest in Atlanta has been placed into ICE custody, a nonprofit saves land near the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge from being developed into a titanium mine, and Georgia lawmakers react to the assassinationof two Minnesota lawmakers last weekend.

Harold Jones: After this kind of hit the airwaves, people started wondering who this person voted for and who they supported. It doesn't matter who he voted for, it doesn't matter who he supported. Violence is violence.

Orlando Montoya: Today is Friday, June 20. I'm Orlando Montoya, and this is Georgia Today.

Story 1:

Orlando Montoya: Immigration officers have taken custody of a Spanish-language journalist arrested on obstruction and unlawful assembly charges while he was covering a weekend protest in metro Atlanta's DeKalb County. GPB's Pamela Kirkland has more.

Pamela Kirkland: A spokesperson for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement confirmed Wednesday that the agency detained Mario Guevara, a Spanish-language journalist, after he spent days in a DeKalb County jail. Guevara will now have to fight deportation proceedings in an immigration court. His attorney says he is in the U.S. legally. Guevara was covering a protest Saturday when he livestreamed video of his arrest. Guevara worked as a journalist in El Salvador before fleeing the country in 2004 and has developed a sizable following on social media as an independent journalist in Atlanta. For GPB News, I'm Pamela Kirkland.

Story 2:

Orlando Montoya: Yesterday was Juneteenth and across Georgia the anniversary of the end of slavery in America marched on, despite this being a fraught time nationally for diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. Many celebrations took place last weekend, including in Atlanta, where a music festival took place in Piedmont Park. Yesterday on Tybee Island, near Savannah, scores of people gathered for a wade-in at the beach.

SOUND: Crowd singing "Wade in the Water"

Orlando Montoya: The annual event honors Black students who, in the 1960s, attempted to desegregate the whites-only beach by wading into the water and being arrested. In Augusta, Juneteenth festival organizers said a few previous festival sponsors ended their sponsorship after company-based DEI changes. The holiday was recognized federally in 2021, and in Georgia the following year. At least one state, West Virginia, has revoked the holiday observance.

Story 3:

Orlando Montoya: The National Nonprofit Conservation Fund says it has acquired the site of a proposed titanium mine near Georgia's Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge. The purchase announced today ends a six-year-long project that united environmentalists and lawmakers in opposition, but until recently seemed on the cusp of gaining state regulatory approval. Rena Ann Peck of the nonprofit Georgia Rivers credits the sale to Conservation fund donors and the sustained campaign to save the swamp.

Rena Ann Peck: No other nature cause in Georgia state history has had such overwhelming support and achieved such a monumental win. I'm just so relieved and happy and it's a momentous step.

Orlando Montoya: Peck says the fund paid $60 million for just under 8,000 acres. Scientists had warned that mining so close to the refuge could irreparably harm it.

Story 4:

Orlando Montoya: Georgia lawmakers are reacting to the attacks on Minnesota lawmakers last weekend. Former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark were killed Saturday by a gunman impersonating a police officer. Democratic state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife Yvette also were shot in their home in a separate incident. Speaking with GPB's Donna Lowry, Augusta state Sen. Harold Jones says the violence has rattled lawmakers and so has the way some people in the public have responded.

Harold Jones: Here's one of the things that was troubling to me, is actually after this kind of hit the airwaves, people started wondering who this person voted for and who they supported. Violence — it doesn't matter who he voted for, it doesn't matter who you supported. Violence is violence.

Orlando Montoya: Jones says while the Georgia Capitol is well protected, he'd like to see stronger connections between capitol police and local law enforcement. He also says Georgia should consider ways to shield lawmakers' personal information, such as home addresses, from public view.

Story 5:

Orlando Montoya: Two Georgia educators will be added to the National Memorial to Fallen Educators in Emporia, Kansas, today. GPB's Chase McGee has more.

Chase McGee: Christina Irimie and Richard Aspinwall both worked as math teachers at Apalachee High School in Winder. On Sept. 4 of last year, they were killed during a school shooting that also took the lives of two students. Now they will be honored along with seven other U.S. teachers who died in the service of education. Maddie Fennell is the executive director of the National Teachers Hall of Fame. She says that while every death is tragic, preventable shooting deaths are especially impactful.

Maddie Fennell: That makes it even more tragic because we're not doing everything we can do to stop that.

Chase McGee: Both teachers will have their names inscribed on large black granite books on campus at Emporia State University. For GPB News, I'm Chase McGee.

Caption

Sheriff Patrick Labat

Credit: AP Photo/Ben Gray, File

Story 6:

Orlando Montoya: The sheriff of Atlanta's Fulton County is suing county leaders, accusing them of interfering with his ability to manage his budget. The lawsuit filed by Sheriff Pat Labat on Tuesday escalates a battle between the elected sheriff and elected county commissioners. Labat alleges the commission's purchasing policies illegally limit his ability to address problems at the troubled and aging county jail. Commissioners repeatedly have questioned Labat's spending, accusing the sheriff of putting the county's finances at risk.

Story 7:

Orlando Montoya: Georgia Department of Transportation officials say they've made strides in addressing emergency preparedness. The assessment came Wednesday in a report dealing with agency staff members learned from their response to last year's Hurricane Helene. Assistant State Maintenance Engineer Emily Fish told GDOT board members one key problem was communication, making sure employees were safe and where they needed to be after the storm.

Emily Fish: So we've purchased 1,200 new radios that will be distributed to all the districts. We have also purchased satellite phones for when the cellular towers are down and we have purchased Starlink devices.

Orlando Montoya: She says the agency mobilized more than 2,000 employees, more than half its workforce, to respond to the storm.

Story 8:

Orlando Montoya: In Macon, a mental health initiative has launched its second-ever public survey aimed at understanding trauma in the community. The survey asks about adverse childhood experiences, or ACEs, which can be the result of violence, abuse, or neglect. GPB's Sofi Gratas has more.

Sofi Gratas: Adverse childhood experiences are common and can lead to stress and depression if unchecked, according to the CDC. ACE surveys typically rank risk from 1 to 10. Last year's survey from the city-funded Macon Mental Health Matters Program found an average score of 4 across 21 ZIP codes in Bibb County. Program director Andrea Cook says since then, they've brought more mental health events to those areas. This year, they'll add interviews to the survey.

Andrea Cook: I'm hopeful that making people more aware of their own ACEs scores and then the greater community's ACEs score will result in people who feel more connected.

Sofi Gratas: Cook says more survey participation this year could also help better direct resources and local funding. The survey closes on July 11. For GPP News, I'm Sofi Gratas.

Story 9:

Orlando Montoya: A young swimmer was airlifted to a Savannah hospital on Tuesday after being bitten by a shark. The bite occurred on South Carolina's Hilton Head Island, near Georgia's Tybee Island. Shark bites in Georgia are rare. Rachel Cantrell of the Tybee island Marine Science Center says there only have been 17 unprovoked shark bites in all of Georgia's recorded history.

Rachel Cantrell: Sharks are looking for their food in the water and especially if a school of fish is swimming right by and next to you and they're just trying to get that fish, sometimes they'll accidentally get a person instead.

Orlando Montoya: A spokesperson for Memorial Health University Medical Center said the hospital could not release information about the minor's condition, but Hilton Head Island Fire and Rescue said the injuries were not life-threatening.

Story 10:

Orlando Montoya: Summertime in Georgia brings a number of nuisances: heat, humidity, and biting insects — and add to that, Canada geese. GPB's Chase McGee tells us why the birds are so hard to get rid of.

Chase McGee: Starting in late June, Canada geese are flightless. They're busy molting feathers they use to migrate across North America. Kara Nitschke is the state migratory gamebird biologist. She says that as a result, you might see more geese hanging around homes and businesses — and sometimes, being very territorial.

Kara Nitschke: And if they have a nest in a really inconvenient location where people travel a lot, if there's people coming in and out and there's a nest nearby, then they can really get kind of bullied by these geese. You know, they can hurt you.

Chase McGee: People who want to keep geese off their property can try certain techniques, including motion activated sprinklers, scarecrows, or decoys of predators like coyotes. For GPB News, I'm Chase McGee.

Story 11:

Orlando Montoya: Georgia peaches are being sold in Mexico for the first time in 27 years. State Agriculture Commissioner Tyler Harper said today the shipment of 42,000 pounds of Georgia peaches to Mexico was made possible by new technology that allows the crop to meet the country's strict import requirements.

Story 12:

Orlando Montoya: Insurance giant Aflac says it has identified suspicious activity on its network in the U.S. that might impact Social Security numbers and other personal information. The Columbus-based company today called the incident a cybercrime and said that the intrusion was stopped within hours.

Story 13:

Orlando Montoya: And tomorrow marks the 50th anniversary of the nonprofit group Atlanta Landmarks taking control of the city's historic Fox Theatre, saving the fabulous Fox from being torn down. The campaign to save the architecturally stunning 1929 theater became a watershed moment for Georgia historic preservation. Theater president and CEO Alan Vela spoke with GPB about the campaign in 2019.

Alan Vela: I think that the city and the citizens realized that so many great historic properties had been torn down, especially theaters like the Loew's, the Rialto, the Grand, and many others. And I think they finally put a stake in the ground and said, "Stop, we need to preserve some of these facilities."

Orlando Montoya: And you can learn more about the theater and its history by watching the GPB documentary, The Legend Lives On: Atlanta's Fox Theatre at GPB.org.

And that's it for today's edition of Georgia Today. If you'd like to learn more about these stories, visit GPB.org/news. If you haven't yet hit subscribe on this podcast, take a moment to do that now. It helps you to keep us current in your feed. If you have feedback, send that to us at GeorgiaToday @GPB.org. I'm Orlando Montoya. I hope you have a great weekend.

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For more on these stories and more, go to GPB.org/news