GSU geography prof recruits students as paid activists to stop plans to build cop training facility

A Georgia State University geography professor is recruiting students and alumni to participate in the “Stop Cop City” referendum campaign to block the building of a police and firefighter training facility in Atlanta. Opponents of the plan have claimed that it will increase police brutality in the city. 

Taylor Shelton, an assistant professor in the Department of Geosciences at Georgia State University emailed a geosciences listserv about “a perfect opportunity for anyone who’s looking for something flexible and short-term for the next month or so,” according to a screenshot obtained by James O’Keefe, who was forwarded the email by GSU geography students.

Should Geography professor Taylor Shelton @kyjts at taxpayer funded Georgia State be teaching geography instead of recruiting for “Stop Cop” initiatives?

The geography students who sent OMG this email seem to think so… pic.twitter.com/gkaaR5oJHC

— James O’Keefe (@JamesOKeefeIII) July 19, 2023

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The email says that FieldWorks, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that primarily helps progressive causes and Democratic campaigns, is hiring staff in three offices throughout Atlanta to stop the construction of a police training facility. The positions pay $22 to $25 per hour plus bonuses, and extra pay for those who can drive and do outreach work.

“This job is a great opportunity to make a difference in a fun, flexible work environment, all while making anywhere from $1,605 a week and getting some political experience states,” the email states.

The “Stop Cop City” campaign characterizes the center as a “police military base” that will be built on “stolen Muscogee land.”

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The Atlanta Public Safety Training Center will be built on 150 acres of a 380-acre parcel land in unincorporated DeKalb County. The initiative is a project of the Atlanta Police Foundation (APF), a non-profit assisting city police.

The 380 acres of the land owned by Atlanta has been removed from public use since the demise of the Honor Farm, an old prison farm, according to the APF. Of the 150 acres, only 50 will be developed for police and firefighters, and the rest will turn into a park, Rob Baskin, Vice President, AFP Director of Public Affairs & Communications, told Campus Reform.

”This property has been owned by the city of Atlanta for more than 100 years, bought in the early 1920s and it has lain dormant for 10 years prior to that,” Baskin told Campus Reform. ”When we got authorization from the city council to build the training center, we went into the site and cleaned it up. We took out the garbage and old tires and moved them properly.”

Plans include a driving course, set of classrooms, shooting range, a leadership institute, and a gym. 

Students at Moorehouse College, a Historically Black College in Atlanta, protested the initiative, inspiring professors to “speak out” and issue a Feb. 2 letter garnering 53 signatures, Campus Reform reported in February.

“There is an undeniable and direct relationship between the fate of Michael Brown and George Floyd as well as Tyre Nichols and the pending plan to build Cop City,” the letter read. 

“We must study how state violence directed against Black, Indigenous, People of Color [BIPOC]—as well as working-class people of all colors—reproduces itself in different ways over generations.”

When asked to respond to critics who say that the training center will militarize the police force, Baskin told Campus Reform, “It has nothing to do with militarization of policing.” 

”It’s strictly ensuring that we want police officers to be the best they can possibly be,” Baskin told Campus Reform. “When they are, incidents like what happened in Minneapolis like to George Floyd or the incident in Memphis to Tyre Nichols won’t happen because police officers are trained accordingly, and they know the standards that they have to maintain. Those weren’t good cops, and their behavior is not tolerated in Atlanta.”

Baskin said that the actions of the police officers left a “black mark” on policing.

”More training will go a long way to ensure those things don’t happen or don’t happen with much less frequency,” he said.

The Atlanta Police Department has been leasing temporary training space at Atlanta Metropolitan State College.

 “Although they have been great partners, having our own unique place that we can basically designate our own hours and do things that we need to do makes it more conducive to the schedule of all employees at Atlanta Police Academy,” Academy Director Major Fred Watson said.

The old training center is in the flight path by Hartsfield-Jackson International, but the facility is condemned, unsafe, vacant and moldy. Similarly, the Atlanta Fire Rescue Department’s Drill Center, located a few miles away, practices on a condemned fire tower, too old for recruits to use.

“When you’re in the business of saving lives, you have to make sure that you have the equipment that you need to train as if you work,” Chief Roderick Smith said. 

Morale, recruitment and retention suffer when public servants train in sub-standard facilities that do not meet the preparation needs required of a major urban law enforcement agency, according to the Atlanta Police Foundation.

Others, including Kwame Olufemi of Community Movement Builders, disagree. “To be clear — cop city is not just a controversial training center,” he said. “It is a war base where police will learn military-like maneuvers to kill black people and control our bodies and movements.”

Dr. Taylor Shelton was contacted multiple times for comment. No response has been received yet as of this article’s publication.