Commercial and Residential Locksmiths in Marietta

Construction began Nov. 15 on a new seven-story, $263 million tower at Marietta, Ga.'s Wellstar Kennestone Hospital, the medical facility announced in a news statement.

The hospital serves most of northern and central Cobb County north of Atlanta.

Wellstar filed an application for the project with the Georgia Department of Community Health in early August. State approval was required, a process that took the three months leading to the project's start in mid-November.

The new building is expected to be completed in 2025 and will add 61 acute-care beds to the hospital, which currently has 633 beds, plus another 67 beds relocated from elsewhere within the medical center.

Wellstar plans to demolish the current Baird Building, a two-story structure built in 1964, that is "outdated and beyond its useful life," the hospital said in the release. The old building sits between the hospital's existing purple and blue towers, but the new structure is designed to connect to both towers for enhanced convenience and accessibility.

Specialized Care Units to Be Included

In its August application to state health officials, the hospital proposed that:

In its submission, Wellstar noted the growing popularity of private rooms, citing more privacy, less stress on patients, lower infection rates and fewer medical errors. COVID-19 has increased the desire of patients to have private rooms, it said.

By increasing the size of the hospital, the company expects to be able to accommodate the continued growth of Kennestone's service area.

Wellstar's primary service area of Cobb, Cherokee and Paulding counties is expected to expand by more than 5 percent over the next half-decade. And in the six counties making up Kennestone's primary and secondary service areas, the 65-years-and-older population is expected to grow by more than 25 percent in the next five years.

"The new tower will provide necessary space for additional patient beds and services, including neonatal care for our youngest patients and medical care for adult patients and families," Mary Chatman, president of Kennestone and Wellstar's Windy Hill Hospital, noted in tan August press release.

"In addition, we will expand the number of private rooms in response to the voice of our community and people we provide care for."

The medical center tower will not result in any new clinical health services but will expand space for existing services. Once the building is finished, fewer new personnel will be required to operate it, the hospital reported.

In addition, several hospital amenities would be relocated to the tower, including the cafeteria, kitchen, chapel, gift shop and registration/admissions.

Wellstar plans to fund the project with $63 million in cash and $200 million in debt financing.

Patients Need to Be Aware of Construction

With the kickoff of the hospital's new construction came some important updates for patients:

Metro Atlanta builder collects toys to help local families in need this holiday season

This is a paid post contributed by a Patch Community Partner. The views expressed in this post are the author's own, and the information presented has not been verified by Patch.

Traton Homes is collecting new, unwrapped toys for Cobb Christmas now through Friday, December 10, 2021 to help support local families in need. The goal is to once again stuff a bus full of toys so that children in Cobb County enjoy a merry Christmas.

"We invite all Cobb residents to join us in supporting Cobb Christmas. Simply drop off a new, unwrapped toy at our corporate office now through December 10," says Kimberly Garwood, Director of Marketing for Traton Homes.

For nearly 20 years, Marietta-based Traton Homes has supported the efforts of Cobb Christmas, a local non-profit that provides toys and food to low income and working poor families in Cobb County during the Christmas season.

New, unwrapped toys can be dropped off at Traton Homes' corporate office, located at 720 Kennesaw Avenue in Marietta.

Since partnering with Cobb Christmas, Traton Homes has collected and donated thousands of toys. Donations come from the company, as well as from employees, vendors and many caring members of the community.

Cobb Christmas is a non-profit, non-denominational organization that is dedicated to assisting low income and working poor families in Cobb County during the holiday season. With the help of hundreds of volunteers, three age-appropriate gifts are provided to each child.

For more information about Cobb Christmas, visit www.CobbChristmas.net. For more details about Traton Homes and its Cobb County new home communities, visit www.TratonHomes.com.

ABOUT TRATON HOMES

Founded 50 years ago, family-owned Traton Homes is one of metro Atlanta's most established and innovative homebuilding companies. The award-winning firm is known for combining traditional building practices with a passion for the latest systems and styles to create some of greater Atlanta's most sought-after, full-featured townhomes, single-family homes and active lifestyle communities. Traton blends beautifully-crafted design with top-quality building materials to create homes and communities with enduring appeal, offering exceptional value.

Headquartered in Marietta, Georgia, Traton Homes offers "Altogether More" to homeowners in Cobb and Cherokee Counties, including more experience, more impressive architecture, more outstanding features and more rewarding lifestyles in more desirable locations. For more information about Traton Homes, call 770-427-9064 or visit www.TratonHomes.com. The builder's corporate office and design center are located at 720 Kennesaw Avenue in Marietta.

This post is an advertorial piece contributed by a Patch Community Partner, a local brand partner. To learn more, click here

Find out when you can pick up those last-minute Thanksgiving staples from Publix, Walmart, Kroger and more grocers in Georgia.

GEORGIA — As the number of Americans fully vaccinated against the coronavirus continues to grow, the traditional Thanksgiving gatherings of the pre-pandemic days are likely to return with a full, festive vengeance to Georgia this year.

In our excitement to once again cook a complete holiday meal for 20, it's quite possible we'll forget an item or two on our grocery lists.

Fortunately, plenty of grocery stores in Georgia will be open Thanksgiving Day to pick up that missing can of cranberry sauce or additional package of biscuits.

Here are the hours for grocery stores that will be open on Thanksgiving Day, along with those that won't. As always, Patch encourages you to call ahead to your local store to confirm hours at that location.

CVS: Many CVS Pharmacy locations, including 24-hour locations, will be open regular hours. Some pharmacies may have reduced hours or be closed for the holiday. The company recommends calling ahead to confirm store hours.

The Fresh Market: All locations will be open 7 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Food Lion: Most stores will be open until 4:30 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day, but customers are encouraged to call their local store to confirm hours.

Kroger: Most stores will open at the regular time and close by 5 p.m. with the exception of select stores. Shoppers should call ahead to confirm local store hours.

Piggly Wiggly: All stores open normal hours, 7 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Sprouts Farmers Markets: Stores will be open from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Stop & Shop: Stores will be open regular hours.

Walgreens: Most stores and 24-hour pharmacies will be open during regular business hours. Select pharmacies will be open with modified hours. Customers are encouraged to check their local store hours before heading out.

Whole Foods: Stores will be open on Thanksgiving, but hours may be limited and will vary by location.

Closed Thanksgiving Day:

Georgia Basketball Game Notes

Georgia and Notre Dame will be meeting for the first time in 21 years when the two squads face each other on Friday. The Lady Bulldogs own a 2-1 lead in the all-time series. The Lady Bulldogs and Fighting Irish traded a home and home back in 1991 and 1992, with Georgia taking wins in Athens and South Bend by a combined 10 points. Notre Dame is off to a fast start with a perfect 5-0 record. Freshman guard Sonia Citron has earned back-to-back ACC Freshman of the Week honors and is averaging 12.5 points and 6.5 rebounds this season. The Fighting Irish are led by a talented group, headlined by Maddy Westbeld, Dara Mabrey and Maya Dodson. The high-scoring Irish have six players averaging in double figures. Georgia's 2022 Signing Class is ranked No. 7 nationally according to ESPN. Janiah Barker and Sydney Bowles, two of the highest rated players in the nation, will join talented point guard product Tineya Hylton in Georgia's incoming class.

Barker – who is considered the No.1-ranked forward nationally and among the top-3 players overall -- is a native of Marietta, Ga. She currently preps at Montverde Academy in Florida. Bowles – a consensus top-10 guard prospect -- is from Lithonia, Ga., and plays at Woodward Academy. They will begin their collegiate careers during the 2022-23 campaign.

Hylton prepped at Hamilton Heights Christian Academy in Chattanooga, Tenn., before going back to Canada to play at Royal Crown Academic School in Toronto, Ontario. She will join the Lady Bulldogs this season. Georgia has held three of its first four opponents below 50 points, with Mercer the only team to crack that mark with 52 points. Head coach Joni Taylor's teams have held opponents below 50 points 42 times over the last seven years. Every available player touched the floor in three of the first four contests, with 10 players playing against Mercer. Twelve of the available 13 players scored at least a point against Gardner-Webb, while 10 of 12 scored against Gardner-Webb. Junior forward Javyn Nicholson has already matched her career double-double mark with two this season. She scored 13 points and brought down a then career-best 12 rebounds in the season-opener against Gardner-Webb, marking her first double-double since 2019. She then scored 13 pts. and brought down a new career high 13 rebs. against Alabama State. Jenna Staiti now ranks fifth in school history with 213 career blocks. Tawana McDonald owns the program record with 297 swats during her time at Georgia. Staiti is also the SEC's active career leader in blocks. Head Coach Joni Taylor and her staff implemented a new offensive philosophy prior to the 2020-21 season with the goal of playing a more up-tempo style with defensive pressure.

That move has paid dividends. Since last season, Georgia has scored over 90 points four times. The Lady Bulldogs scored over 90 points just four times combined in the five seasons prior. SEC coaches voted the Lady Bulldogs fourth in the annual preseason poll, just behind South Carolina, Texas A&M and Tennessee. Georgia came in at No. 19 in the national preseason coaches poll. Last season, the Lady Bulldogs finished ranked No. 10 in the Associated Press top-25 -- its highest ranking going into the NCAA tournament since 2001. Coach Taylor's teams have lived by the mantra 'It's not where you start but where you finish.' In five of her first six seasons, the Lady Bulldogs have finished well ahead of their preseason ranking. The largest jumps came in 2017-18 -- when Georgia was picked eighth and finished second -- and last season -- when the team was picked ninth and finished fourth.

Georgia's SEC Standings Under Joni Taylor

Jenna Staiti has become known as 'Steady Staiti' over the last two seasons -- and for good reason.

The Cumming, Ga., native has scored in double figures in 35 of her last 41 games with 14 double-doubles and nine 20-plus point efforts. It is a remarkable stat line for the All-SEC center, especially when you look back to her first two years of college basketball.

During her freshman and sophomore campaigns, Staiti averaged 4.4 ppg and 1.7 rpg in 65 total games played. Staiti has now more than tripled her points per game average to 13.2 ppg and upped her rebounds to 7.3 per contest over the past three years. Georgia has become one of the top defensive teams in the SEC during Coach Taylor's tenure. In her six seasons leading the program, the Lady Bulldogs have finished either first or second in the conference in scoring defense on three occasions, including a league-best and school record 54.1 ppg in 2015-16. Last year, Georgia ranked second in the SEC, holding opponents to 60.5 ppg. The team also finished top-5 in most defensive categories, including field-goal percentage defense, 3-point field-goal percentage defense and turnovers forced. Que Morrison is known as one of the top defenders in the nation as she routinely guards the opponent's top player night-in and night-out. Last year, Morrison led all players in conference play with 33 steals (2.2 per game).

The Riverdale, Ga., native has also stepped it up offensively. She has now scored in double figures in 16 of her last 17 games dating back to last season. After suffering a string of injuries in her career, Morrison finally experienced a full healthy season for the Lady Bulldogs.

Here is a look back at some of the adversity Morrison has overcome.

The defensive stopper placed on the SEC All-Freshman Team after drawing 32 starts on Georgia's NCAA tournament team. Then, in her sophomore campaign, Morrison missed the first eight games due to a torn meniscus in her left knee. In 2019-20, she had an injury to her foot before the year began. She then suffered a torn labrum in her right shoulder to end her junior campaign midway through SEC play. Mikayla Coombs — a native of Buford, Ga. — was selected by her peers to serve as the vice chair of the SEC Women's Basketball Leadership Council. As one of four elected officers, she will participate in various meetings throughout the year to provide feedback to Athletics Directors, Senior Woman Administrators and Faculty Athletics Representatives.

This news came after she was chosen as the only student-athlete representative on the NCAA competition committee. Coombs graduated with a degree in sport management from the University of Georgia and is currently pursuing a master's in the same program. She was named a UGA Presidential Scholar in 2020, has placed on the Athletic Director's Honor Roll three times and made the Dean's List in 2021. Georgia had one of the deepest rosters in the SEC last season. The Lady Bulldogs played 10 or more players in 23 of 28 games and used 11 or more players on 14 occasions.That trend looks to continue this year with 10 returners who could all see big minutes. Georgia has one of the longest tenured staffs in the SEC. With the return of Karen Lange, Chelsea Newton and Robert Mosley, Georgia is the only team in the conference to not have a single coaching change at any level -- head coach or assistant coach -- over the past six years. Junior guard Chloe Chapman played two seasons with the Georgia soccer team, but after spending two years as a dual-sport athlete, she will now focus on just basketball. The Mitchellville, Md., native was a consensus top-40 prospect and was rated as the No. 8 overall point guard in the nation coming out of high school. Lady Bulldog freshmen Reigan Richardson and Jillian Hollingshead were both named McDonald's All-Americans, marking the first time in Georgia history the program has signed two McDonald's All-Americans in one class. Hollingshead and Richardson are the 11th and 12th McDonald's All-Americans to sign with the Lady Bulldogs and are the first to commit right out high school since Ronika Ransford in 2010. Current Lady Bulldog Mikayla Coombs was a McDonald's All-American in 2017. Georgia junior forward Jordan Isaacs was the only non-senior to start every game for the Lady Bulldogs last season. Isaacs made big play after big play and stepped up defensively to lead her team. She made perhaps two of the most important plays of the year for the Lady Bulldogs. One was her block on Rennia Davis' shot attempt that sealed the win against Tennessee, while the other came against Arkansas when she brought down an offensive board to set up Gabby Connally's buzzer-beater. Georgia is one of just two SEC programs (Tennessee) and one of just 16 teams nationwide to reach the 1,000 win total. The Lady Bulldogs accomplished the feat last season on the road at East Carolina. It was the latest impressive accomplishment for the storied program.

The Lady Bulldogs are one of only three teams, joining Wisconsin-Green Bay and Tennessee, to have a winning record every year since 1980 and have been to 34 of 39 NCAA tournaments.

The Southern Poverty Law Center filed an appeal of a judge's decision to reject a lawsuit against Cobb Schools over COVID-19 protocols.

COBB COUNTY, GA — A month after a federal judge rejected the Southern Poverty Law Center's lawsuit against Cobb County School District over a lack of COVID-19 protocols, the SPLC has filed an appeal against this decision, officials announced Wednesday.

The SPLC filed a lawsuit on behalf of four Cobb parents Oct. 1 against the school district, Superintendent Chris Ragsdale and all seven members of the CCSD school board, requesting a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction. The parents have children in the district with health issues "who are at risk of severe illness and even death" if they contract COVID-19: myeloid leukemia, hypogammaglobulinemia, Duchenne muscular dystrophy, bronchiectasis, chronic bronchitis and chronic severe asthma.

"This case isn't just about masks, this is about disability discrimination in the Cobb County School District and ensuring that all children have an equal opportunity to access an in-person learning environment," said Mike Tafelski, senior supervising attorney for the SPLC, in the release. "The district's continued refusal to follow CDC guidelines and ensure safe schools for all students effectively deny our clients the access they are entitled to under federal law."

The lawsuit also alleges that the district's choice to relax many of its COVID-19 protocols before the 2021-22 school year started — like not requiring masks in schools — forced parents to put their kids in asynchronous learning options where they are "segregated from their nondisabled peers and deprived of critical social and educational opportunities, in violation of their rights," the SPLC said in a news release.

"Online interactions are not the same as in person interactions. Isolating students with disabilities in virtual learning when that is not their choice — when they could attend class face to face with accommodations — is segregation," said Beth Baird, one of the parents suing on behalf of her child. "We've been trying to move away from segregating and isolating children with disabilities for too long to take steps backward now."

U.S. District Judge Timothy Batten denied the SPLC's request last month, saying the district "made an informed choice that is neither arbitrary nor unreasonable" and that parents were asking the courts to overrule the district's authority.

"[CCSD's] COVID[-19] policies apply to all students, regardless of ability. Additionally, plaintiffs — like all students in Cobb County — were given the option to attend virtual school in lieu of in-person classes," Batten wrote in his ruling in October. "Plaintiffs attempt to allege disparate treatment by a facially neutral policy that applied to disabled and non-disabled students alike, and their argument falls well short of the high bar required for injunctive relief."

A district spokesperson sent the following statement to Patch regarding the lawsuit appeal:

"We cannot comment on pending lawsuits but appreciate the support of Nelson Mullins on all legal matters concerning the school district."