Atlanta, Georgia residents who oppose the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center dubbed “Cop City” showed up in droves at the city council meeting on Monday, shouting, “You have dropped the ball,” while throwing ping-pong balls toward the front of the room.
The Stop Cop City organizers told FOX 5 in Atlanta they were marking a year since they submitted a petition to the city with over 100,000 signatures to put a referendum on the ballot giving residents the ability to vote on whether to allow the new training facility.
A federal lawsuit has been filed on the matter, which is pending.
During Monday’s meeting, several people in the audience began to protest after a speaker had finished at the podium, nearly 4 hours into the meeting.
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Two older women walked to the front of the city council room while holding a sign that read, “Andre Dickens, you dropped the ball on democracy,” referring to the mayor of Atlanta.
The sign also had a ping pong ball painted onto it with the number 116,000.
As the two women stood up front with the banner, others in the crowd began to throw hundreds of ping pong balls toward the city council members.
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According to a tweet from the Atlanta Community Press Collective, protesters said the ping pong balls represent the more than 100,000 signatures collected for the referendum.
The protest continued for about six minutes, when the live video of the meeting faded to a black screen. 20 minutes later, the feed returned, and the protesters had left the chamber.
Dickens and other supporters of the $90 million facility on 85 acres say it will replace inadequate training facilities and help address difficulties with hiring and retaining police officers.
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But opponents are concerned the new facility will lead to greater police militarization. They are also concerned the facility is located in a majority-Black area, FOX 5 reported.
The facility has been the center of several protests over the past couple of years. At times, the protests resulted in violence and vandalism, and even escalated after Manuel Esteban Paez Teran, who also reportedly went by the name “Tortuguita,” by state troopers in January 2023.
In October 2023, a special prosecutor chose not to pursue charges against the state troopers who shot Teran, saying the use of deadly force was “objectively reasonable.”
City officials reportedly claim the issues caused by protesters have raised the cost of the training center by nearly $20 million.
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