11 months ago
On the outskirts of Jimmy Carter's ancestral home in Plains, miles from the nearest interstate, sits a state shrine to Georgia's native president.
The Plains Visitor Information Center pays tribute to the peanut farmer-turned-president but also is a reminder that even on of the most sacred names in Georgia politics can fall victim to a budget crisis.
Only a ferocious battle led by leaders of Carter's hometown -- and the Democrats who represent his district -- has apparently spared the center from the budget ax. Still, politicians from Plains aren't certain the humble center that resembles a log cabin has been saved for good.
State Rep. Mike Cheokas of Americus counts Carter as one of his constituents and says it's "shortsighted to even contemplate closing the welcome center."
Adds Cheokas: "We are definitely on the map and it would be a mistake in any way, shape and fashion to close it down."
The battle began in January, when Gov. Sonny Perdue's budget proposed closing down the center, which cost about $186,000 to run last year. The reasons were simple amid a budget deficit that tops $2.6 billion.
Perdue and his supporters said the state had to make plenty of difficult decisions, and one of them was a proposed $6.5 million cut to the Georgia Department of Economic Development, which totaled roughly 18 percent of the program's budget.
The Plains outpost in the southern part of the state was an easy target. It is the least-visited of Georgia's 11 state-run visitor's centers, attracting 65,000 people last year.
By comparison, centers on heavily trafficked routes along busy interstates routinely attract several hundred thousand drivers each year.
The effort to close it hit a snag when George Hooks, the Democrat who holds Carter's former Senate seat, claimed a little-known state law required it to stay open.
"That should be sacred land, with a new president going in and the attention going into tourism in the economic doldrums," said Hooks, the dean of the Senate.
Meanwhile, Plains officials launched a crusade to remind legislators how important the center was to their local business.
Plains Mayor Boze Godwin lobbied lawmakers to help keep the center open.
State officials backed down, saying they will stave off the plans for now. But there's no certainty that Perdue's allies won't seek a change in the law in the coming weeks.
(Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
