Story By John Mann
There was a good crowd of around eighty at Gunter’s Landing Friday morning as the group Strong Coffee welcomed guest speaker and former US Senator Doug Jones, who spoke on a variety of current events. Strong Coffee, a nonpartisan community support group, began as a small group of ten people and has been growing ever since. The group has since hosted speakers including Guntersville Mayor Leigh Dollar, Pastor Ben Alford, former Alabama legislator Jeff McLaughlin and former Guntersville Mayor Bob Hembree.
“Strong Coffee is a community of like minded people,” member Barbara Warnes said in her introduction at the event. “Independent, progressive thinkers who strive to make our town and our nation a safe place where we can all live. We come together once a month to share ideas, discuss actions and support each other emotionally in these trying times. We strive for diversity and justice, ideals that just a few months ago we took for granted.”
Warnes says that at their first gathering the group of ten simply met for discussion but nearly doubled that number for their second and third meetings. The group has traveled to Huntsville to take part in protests as well as joined with the Marshall County Democratic Club to take part in the two No King’s Protests that took place at the Marshall County Courthouse this year.
Jones was introduced by Guntersville Municipal Court Judge Shannon Mitchell, who met Jones in 1995, calling Jones “one of the best lawyers in the state of Alabama” and recounting Jones’ famous prosecution of the men responsible for the 1963 bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham.
Serving as US Senator for Alabama from 2018 to 2021 as well as the US Attorney for the Northern District of Alabama from 1997 to 2001, Jones touched on a number of current events during his time at the podium including recent election results, the government shutdown, the upcoming midterms and the importance of the SNAP program.
“There’s a lot going on here,” Jones said. “The mere fact that you’ve got so many folks here and you’ve built this organization up from ten people in a coffee club to close to a hundred people here today is something we are seeing all over the state. There is something happening and people are beginning to see things in a different light, and they are beginning to see things happening around the country and it is something I think we need to capture.”
If you want to get involved with Strong Coffee or find out about their next meeting you can reach out to them and be placed on their mailing list by emailing strongcoffeena@gmail.com. You can find more information about Doug Jones on his website at dougjones.com.
