It's almost like a little neighborhood feud.
A woman living just down the street from the 1091 Bolton Court address that long has been Zeph Baker's residence of record is challenging whether Baker lately has lived there long enough to qualify for the House District 132 seat he's now seeking.
Louise Crozier of 1052 Bolton Ave. hand-delivered an Aug. 19 letter to the Georgia Secretary of State's elections division saying that come election day, Nov. 4, Baker will not, as required by law, have been living in the house district for at least a year.
Baker, who on Aug. 20 changed his voter registration address with the local elections office from Bolton Court to 3525 Stratford Drive, said he just moved this summer, and is renting the Bolton Court house he owns to a tenant.
Read the ledger-enquirer.com His new home on Stratford Drive also is in House District 132, so he has never left the district, said Baker, who calls this residency question a "distraction" with which his opponent, incumbent state Rep. Calvin Smyre, wants to divert attention from the real issues voters face in this election.
Smyre's voter registration address is 1103 Glenwood Road — just about four blocks away from Baker's new home, and six blocks or so from the Bolton Court house that Baker still owns. So all the principals in this contest are right there together, in the neighborhoods just south of Macon Road behind the Columbus Public Library.
Called at home Tuesday, Crozier would say only that she had "information" indicating Baker didn't meet the residency requirement. She would not elaborate. She said Smyre was not involved in her challenging Baker's qualifications.