By Randy Travis
Published Sept. 8, 2021
SOUTH FULTON, Ga. - The mayor pro tem for College Park faces an unusual allegation: does he even live in the city he’s supposed to represent?
Derrick Taylor filed to run for reelection in Ward 2, a seat he first won in 2017.
According to his sworn statement attached to the notice of candidacy filed on Aug. 17, Taylor lives in an apartment at 2800 Camp Creek Parkway. That’s in College Park.
But the FOX 5 I-Team found him spending a lot of his time at a house in the City of South Fulton.
College Park resident Vannessa Bridges filed a challenge to Taylor’s candidacy, asking for a hearing "to determine whether or not the candidate is eligible to seek reelection."
"You should live in the area because that’s supposed to be your community," Bridges said in an interview. "Not just a job. It’s supposed to be your community. You’re supposed to help the people in your community. And I just don’t see it!"
We saw Taylor or his SUV at the South Fulton house at all hours of the day, on various days of the week.
Once we even saw him rolling in luggage.
One day when we knocked on the door of that South Fulton house. Taylor answered, explaining his son and daughter live there with his grandchild. He just stops by a lot.
And his car we repeatedly saw outside? Taylor said his son borrows it a lot for their cleaning business.
"I work overnight also," he explained. "Sometimes I come here. Most of the time I go to my house."
In June, College Park police responded to a burglary call at Taylor’s apartment. But he wasn’t the one who called the police. It was his sister. According to the report, "Veronica White … stated that her apartment had been broken into and ransacked."
When Taylor arrived at the scene, he told police he had last been at the apartment three days earlier.
Taylor later told us his sister has been living with him temporarily because of COVID-19. He said he was likely in Albany helping his father when the apartment burglary happened.
He insisted he sleeps at the apartment. But listen to this exchange with the FOX 5 I-Team:
"So how much stuff do you have in this house?"
Taylor: "Pretty much nothing. I may have a pair of pants. Some shorts. Something like that. I don’t have a room here."
"Can you show us?"
Taylor: "Show you what?"
"Show us the bedrooms."
Taylor: "I’m not going to let you walk through my house."
But didn’t he say it wasn’t his house?
Then this exchange:
"(We) want to see if there’s a bedroom set up for you and your wife."
Taylor: "It’s not. I’m not going to let you in my house."
And he never did let us into his house.
No word yet on when his College Park eligibility hearing will be scheduled.
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