Gwinnett funding for chamber questioned

Gwinnett citizen groups are questioning public spending on an economic development program run by Partnership Gwinnett, the county chamber of commerce. Citizens groups last week questioned whether taxpayers are getting their money’s worth and were skeptical of claims the Chamber hasn’t used public money to support the transportation sales tax measure on Tuesday’s ballot. Cattle farmer Lewis Wheeler was irrigating his Bermuda hay field in June, battling an exceptional drought in Greene County near Greensboro. The situation has grown worse.

Drought-stricken counties in the state. Georgia has been in a drought for nearly two years and over the past week, the situation has grown worse in areas southwest of Atlanta, where Troup, Meriwether and the southern part of Coweta County went from extreme drought to exceptional.

Job seekers in metro Atlanta. The metro Atlanta unemployment rate spiked in June, jumping to 9.3 percent from 8.6 in May. The Georgia Department of Labor said the increase is typical for the May-June period, when younger people, particularly students, enter the job market and are, at least for a time, unemployed. There were 17,526 new job seekers in metro Atlanta last month unable to find work.

Chick-fil-A. Restaurant and branding experts say CEO Dan Cathy’s statements about samesex marriage could cause the chain to lose millions of dollars if customers begin associating the company with polarizing political issues instead of food. At the same time, fallout continues to be mixed, with online petitions both for and against Cathy’s stand on traditional marriage, which was widely interpreted as a slap at supporters of gay marriage.