Episode Details

On the Thursday September 12th edition of Georgia Today: Georgia state lawmakers say they will consider new gun policies next session; Some schools boost precautions following threats made on social media; And preservationists, say several buildings in Macon are in need of what they call "intensive care".

Peter Biello: Welcome to the Georgia Today podcast from GPB News. Today is Thursday, September 12th. I'm Peter Biello. On today's episode, Georgia state lawmakers say they will consider new gun policies next session. Some schools boost precautions following threats made on social media. And preservationists say several buildings in Macon are in need of what they call "intensive care". These stories and more are coming up on this edition of Georgia Today.

Story 1:

Peter Biello: Georgia's state House speaker says lawmakers will consider new policies next year after a school shooting killed four people at Northeast Georgia's Apalachee High School. The changes could include increasing student access to mental health care, encouraging people to store guns safely, and information sharing among schools, police and health professionals. But Republican Jon Burns' proposals today stop short of Democratic demands. They include universal background checks and a mandate to safely lock up guns, as well as a red flag law that would allow the state to temporarily take guns from someone in crisis.

Story 2:

Peter Biello: Threats made on social media continue to rattle Georgia schools. Atlanta public schools were under heightened security today, and several Atlanta private schools also received warnings about potential violence. APS sent out an alert to parents about the unspecified threats last night. In northwest Georgia's Rome, the police chief, Denise Downer-McKinney, addressed parents' concerns about a high school lockdown last week.

Denise Downer-McKinney: These threats are not a joke. And we've got to let our children know that they are not a joke and that we have no tolerance for anyone threatening to harm our students, faculty or staff.

Peter Biello: The threats in Atlanta prompted some parents to keep their children out of school for the day.

Story 3:

Peter Biello: Norfolk Southern has fired its CEO for having an inappropriate relationship with a subordinate. The departure ends two years of on-the-job turmoil for CEO Alan Shaw and comes days after the company's board announced it was investigating his alleged ethical lapses. Shaw was leading the Atlanta-based railroad last year when one of its trains derailed, causing the country's worst railroad disaster in the last decade. Norfolk Southern said yesterday its chief financial officer, Mark George, has taken over as CEO.

Story 4:

Peter Biello: Current and former residents of public housing developments in Georgia are demanding improved living conditions. As GPB's Sofi Gratas reports, many of them showed up at the Atlanta headquarters of the Department of Housing and Urban Development last week.

Sofi Gratas: Diana Brown, a caregiver from Albany, says she's been asking for years that HUD addressed poor conditions, including mold, faulty amenities and overall disrepair affecting senior residents at an apartment complex run by the county hou