Adela Yelton helped start a high-performing charter school, ran her own business and is raising three boys.

Now she wants to try her hand at politics. Yelton is one of five candidates vying for a seat on the Avondale Estates City Commission.

“I’ve been dealing with community service for awhile,” Yelton told Decaturish. “Now I feel like the time is right to make a difference and make an impact on my neighborhood and city.”

“And my kids think it’s really cool,” she added.

The other candidates are:

John Quinn (incumbent)
Brian Fisher
Todd Pullen
John Pomberg

Avondale does not have commission districts and there are two seats on the commission on the ballot this year. The seats will go to the two candidates who receive the most votes.

Yelton previously ran the Bean Work Play Café, a co-working space for parents with on-site child care. She later sold the business. She lives in Avondale with her husband, Rich, and their three boys: one age 13, and 9-year-old twins. She was also involved in the founding of the Museum School, which is just outside the city limits but serves students that live in Avondale Estates.

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She said if elected she wants to focus on finding a happy medium between Avondale’s small town feel and its anticipated growth. Her platform involves “looking at growth in a balanced way.”

“I know that there are a lot of changes happening, or at least potential for change in the neighborhood. I’d like to be a part of steering that,” Yelton said. “I know a lot of work has been done so far by folks in the community. We’ve had a lot of different folks who have done work around development and growth in the city. We moved here because of the location and beauty of the neighborhood, the tree-lined streets, but I also know there’s change happening around us, so if we can also be proactive as a neighborhood and a city, we can be proactive there.”

She also wants to promote business development in the city.

“I see these businesses opening up in our neighborhood,” she said. “I used to own my own small business and I know it’s tough to do the day-to-day work and keep the lights on. I also know that when I was doing business in Decatur there was a very robust downtown development authority and a Decatur Business Association that was helpful. I’d like to see something like that in Avondale is well.”

As a mom of Museum School students she said, “Education is near and dear to my heart.”

The elections will be Nov. 3. Early voting will be held at 4380 Memorial Drive, Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Oct. 12 through Oct. 30.

Editor’s note: Decaturish will be contacting every candidate running for office in Decatur and Avondale Estates and will be sending them questionnaires that will run before Oct. 12. We will also write a short introductory article about each candidate. 

Candidates can submit photos and biographical information by sending an email to [email protected]