Georgia measures to create 3 new cities fail in primary vote

Voters in an affluent suburban Atlanta county rejected ballot measures that would have turned three mostly white areas into their own cities.

The three cities would have wrested key decision-making power from Cobb County, where the election of three Black women in 2020 gave Democrats control of the county commission for the first time in decades.

Proponents of the cityhood measures said local residents needed adequate representation and greater control over development. Some critics saw race as a driving factor in Tuesday’s referendums to create the cities of East Cobb, Vinings and Lost Mountain.