Georgia Today: I-285 weekend closure; Last day of early voting; Starbucks closes Atlanta office

Peter Biello: Welcome to the Georgia Today podcast. Here we bring you the latest reports from the GPB newsroom. On today's episode, today is the last day for early voting. The I-285 closure that had been scheduled for last weekend is now this weekend, and Georgia's wetlands are actually benefiting from this year's drought. 

Wayne Harris: We take advantage of these times like this, get into those areas and do invasive exotic plant control. 

Peter Biello: Today is Friday, May 15. I'm Peter Biello and this is Georgia Today. 

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Peter Biello: Major traffic delays are expected in metro Atlanta this weekend when a 2-mile section of Interstate 285 closes for construction. The Georgia Department of Transportation says all northbound and southbound lanes from Cascade Road to Martin Luther King Jr. Drive will close from 7 p.m. tonight through 5 a.m. Monday. Traffic will be rerouted downtown by way of Interstates 20, 75, 85, and Langford Parkway. The closure was originally planned for last weekend, but was delayed because of weather. 

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Peter Biello: Today is the last day of early voting in Georgia's primary election. GPB's Sarah Kallis reports on the final push of campaigning. 

Sarah Kallis: Candidates are holding events across Georgia to make their final pitch and energize voters to turn out on Tuesday. Democratic candidate for governor Keisha Lance Bottoms told people in Macon the state needs a strong leader. 

Keisha Lance Bottoms: The challenges that we are facing in this state are not challenges that I have ever experienced in my lifetime. 

Sarah Kallis: Republican Senate candidate Derek Dooley told voters in Sandy Springs why he should be their Senate pick. 

Derek Dooley: It's going to take a new leadership to go up there for the right reasons and that's why I'm doing it. 

Sarah Kallis: Over 700,000 people have already voted. If you plan to vote on election day, you can cast your ballot Tuesday at your assigned polling place between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. Several major races are expected to go to a runoff, which will be held on June 16. For GPB News, I'm Sarah Kallis.

Peter Biello:  Find out who's on your ballot plus information about how and where to vote with GPB's voter guide. Head to GPB.org/election to learn more. 

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Peter Biello: Law enforcement officers evacuated the Fulton County Courthouse this morning as part of a drill to prepare for the FIFA World Cup. The soccer tournament's first match in Atlanta is now a month away. Fulton County Sheriff Pat Labat says the games bring a range of security concerns including human trafficking and attacks on buildings like the Fulton County Justice Center. 

Pat Labat: You can never train too much. And so we did it on a normal day so that both the judges, the court personnel, people that visit our courthouse, people that work feel safe and know the evacuation protocols. 

Peter Biello: He said the Atlanta Police Department is leading a coordinated local, state and federal response. 

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Peter Biello: Georgia's ongoing drought could have a bright spot when it comes to wetlands. A U.S. Fish and Wildlife biologist says the dry spell that started last summer so far hasn't negatively impacted plant and wildlife in the state's estuaries. Biologist Wayne Harris at the Savannah National Wildlife Refuge says he'll worry about that if the drought lasts for years, but in the meantime:

Wayne Harris: We take advantage of these times like this, get into those areas and do invasive exotic plant control. So if you can go in on foot versus having to take a boat into places like that, it just really, really increases our capacity for doing invasive species control. 

Peter Biello: The latest drought monitor released yesterday shows severe drought conditions in Georgia holding steady despite recent rains. 

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Peter Biello: Starbucks is closing a corporate office in Atlanta as part of a move aimed at shoring up its finances. The coffee giant said today that 300 corporate jobs are being shed across several states. It wasn't clear how many of those were in Atlanta. No coffee house employees were affected. The move is expected to save the company $400 million. 

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Peter Biello: The president of Gordon State College will become the president of Valdosta State University. The University System of Georgia's Board of Regents named Donald Green to the South Georgia position yesterday. Green also previously served as president of Georgia Highlands College. He's the permanent replacement for former VSU president Richard Carvajal, who stepped down last year to accept the presidency of California State Polytechnic University. 

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Peter Biello: One of George's most anticipated art exhibitions, "American Sublime," opens today in Atlanta. GPB's Kristi York Wooten reports. 

Kristi York-Wooten: Outside the High Museum in Atlanta, signage is going up for a new show featuring the work of one of Georgia's most famous living artists, Amy Sherald. Assistant curator Angelica Arbelaez, stands beside a decal depicting one of the 39 portraits in this mid-career retrospective. 

Angelica Arbelaez: American Sublime, which arrives at the High on May 15, will be a wonderful opportunity for visitors to really get an understanding of Amy's practice and development as an artist. You get a sense of how she was thinking when she was in graduate school from the mid-2000s, and you get to trace her kind of artistic evolution all the way through to 2024. So there will be much to see, particularly works that convey her understanding of color, the way that she works with her sitters, the depth and elegance with which she captures them, and also how Amy has just become more and more ambitious with the scale of her works as well. 

Kristi York-Wooten: Amy Sherald was born in Columbus, Ga., in 1973 and told PBS in 2023 about her first experience seeing a Black person depicted in a painting on a museum wall. It was Beau Bartlett's "Object Permanence." 

Amy Sherald: As a sixth grader, my first time going to a museum, when I saw this painting by Beau Bartlett, I was shocked that I was looking at a figure of a Black man. He was standing in front of a house; he had on a belt that had some handyman stuff. I just remember standing there for a few minutes and I realized when I that work that I wanted to make paintings like that. I was able to see my future in that moment. 

Kristi York-Wooten: Sherald studied at Clark Atlanta University, at Spelman College, and at the Maryland Institute College of Art. And in 2016, she became the first woman and the first African American to win the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery's portrait competition, which ultimately led to the commission of one of Cheryl's most famous works: her portrait of former first lady Michelle Obama. Here's Arbelaez. 

Angelica Arbelaez: She sought out to paint her as not only the woman that has gained the recognition that she has because of, because she was the first Black first lady, but also acknowledging that she is an everyday person. She tries to find a way to capture her sitters in a moment of repose, of quiet dignity, and you really get that when you see the portrait of Mrs. Obama. 

Kristi York-Wooten: Other works in American Sublime include Sherald's portrait of Breonna Taylor, the woman killed by police in Louisville, Kentucky in 2020, as well as a recreation of the famous 1945 photograph, "V-J Day in Times Square." As Sherald told NewsHour in 2024, her work is a celebration of everyday Americans. And this year, as the country celebrates 250 years, American Sublime is a fitting collection. 

Amy Sherald: Yes, the excellence of what it is to be an everyday American. The people that make the world go 'round. All of these individuals that are in my portraits stand up as archetypes for that, because we can think about all of the big names and the big "H" of history, but the little "h" is what really makes everything, everything. 

Kristi York-Wooten American Sublime runs from May 15 through Sept. 27 at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta. For GPB News, I'm Kristi York-Wooten.

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Peter Biello: In Georgia sports, the FIFA World Cup Trophy Tour has arrived in Atlanta. The 18-carat solid gold trophy to be lifted by the soccer tournament's winners in New Jersey on July 19 was unveiled at Coca-Cola headquarters in Atlanta yesterday. Among the dignitaries on hand for the unveiling were Gov.Brian Kemp, Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens, and Ambassador Andrew Young, who was instrumental in bringing the 1996 Olympic Games to Atlanta as mayor. The trophy will be on display through 9 p.m. tonight and again tomorrow from 2 to 8 p.m. Tickets to see it are free, but registration is required. The tour, sponsored by Coca-Cola, includes 75 stops across 30 countries. Atlanta will host eight matches in soccer's biggest tournament beginning a month from today. 

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Peter Biello: Spring festivals are a great way to get out and enjoy your community or explore a neighboring community, and this weekend has a great lineup of festivals all across the state. Fayetteville is hosting Suds on the Parkway. Marietta has its Greek Festival, and Adel is hosting its Daylily Festival. The 52nd annual Down Home Days Festival is in Chickamauga, and Clarksville is hosting the 64th annual Mountain Laurel Festival. There is the Register Pecan Festival, the Georgia Jug Festival in Knoxville, Ga., and Thunder Over Evans just outside of Augusta. If you do venture out this weekend, be sure to check the weather forecast as you might need an umbrella. And remember, the 285 closure near Atlanta this weekend may make travel tougher than usual. 

Peter Biello: And that's a wrap on a busy week of news. Thanks so much for listening to Georgia Today. If you want to learn more about any of these stories, check gpb.org/news and subscribe to this podcast because we're coming back with more news on Monday afternoon. Your feedback and story ideas are welcome. Send them to us by email. The address is georgiatoday@gpb.org. I'm Peter Biello. Thank you very much for listening. We'll be back with you on Monday.

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