ALTHOUGH THE COBB CHAMBER OF COMMERCE is known for its Southern hospitality in allowing local government groups to use its first class facility on Interstate North Parkway in the Galleria area, interim CEO Don Beaver may have been hoodwinked when he agreed Thursday to allow Cobb's school board to move its controversial Friday team-building retreat with its $4,500-a-day consultant to its board room.

School board junkies know that new school board Chairwoman Lynnda Crowder-Eagle has labored behind the scenes all month to stage an out-of-sight and out-of-earshot retreat for her dysfunctional board. First, with little fanfare and without any agenda and no mention on the system's elaborate Web site, a weekend retreat was set for the scenic Amicalola Falls Lodge in the North Georgia Mountains near Dahlonega. The new board chair hoped that school board followers and pesky reporters wouldn't bother to attend. Wrong!

When she heard the bad news this week that several parents and an MDJ videographer were planning to make the trip to Amicalola Falls to keep tabs on the board, she decreed via schools PR czar Jay Dillon that no taping would be allowed for the MDJ Web site. And to heck with the Georgia law that clearly says - to everyone but Dillon, Crowder-Eagle and school attorney Glenn Brock - that all school board meetings can be recorded both visually and for audio.

Crowder-Eagle was insistent on the mountain retreat, although maverick board member Alison Bartlett criticized it as a boondoggle and suggested the event be held at the system headquarters in the board room, which the board spent several hundred thousand dollars renovating a few years back and installing cameras and lighting to jazz up the coverage of its meetings on the system's cable TV channel.

Note: The Fulton system has its training and retreats in the superintendent's board room. Cobb school board member Dr. John Crooks, who says he has now "gone rogue," trumped Bartlett and said he wasn't headed to the mountains to hear a $4,500 consultant at taxpayers' expense with three furlough days looming for Cobb teachers. In other words, he felt their upcoming school board-inflicted Valentine pain.

Meanwhile, as far as Beaver and whether he and the chamber let Crowder-Eagle pull a fast one on them, it's worth noting that the chamber should be one of the groups leading the local charge for more transparent and open government. One of the chamber's most respected past chairmen, current U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.), was one of the staunchest supporters of the Georgia sunshine laws during his long legislative career in Atlanta and in recent weeks has been one of those calling loudly for President Obama to live up to his campaign promise that health-care negotiations would be carried out in public on C-SPAN, rather than in secret like Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid have done. That secrecy helped fuel the public's disgust with the health care bill and was a main reason for Republican Scott Brown's recent upset win in the U.S. Senate race in Massachusetts.

The chairwoman's scheming and shenanigans to hide the so-called team-building retreat from John Q. Citizen might be prompted because she knows how embarrassing her board is and remembers the old joke about how the pre-Arthur Blank Atlanta Falcons played in a domed stadium "so God won't have to see how bad they are."

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BUT BACK TO OUR GOOD-HEARTED CHAMBER and our politically tone-deaf board chair. With iffy weather predicted for the north Georgia Mountains, Crowder-Eagle was presented a perfect face-saving way out of her predicament: how to still stage a stealthy retreat and how finally to seem sensitive to the event's high cost during tough economic times, yet without having to admit that her critics were correct. She decided to scrub the mountain retreat and instead stay home - but not at their Glover Street headquarters.

Apparently, board member Holli Cash of Smyrna got Beaver to offer up the chamber board room in hopes that a last-minute switcharoo to the chamber site would draw fewer board watchers than Glover Street.

Although word leaked out Thursday afternoon that the mountain retreat had been deep-sixed and diverted to the chamber, Crowder-Eagle didn't announce the new location until after 10 p.m. at the very end of Thursday night's board meeting. Let's hope that Beaver wasn't a part of the Crowder-Eagle/Cash ploy to stiff the public after the dicey weather forecast thwarted what one blogger called "the Amicalola Falls kabuki dance."

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THE BOARD'S PERPETUAL PROBLEMS caused one AT reader to draw a parallel not to the Falcons but to another local team, the Braves, which for decades were one of the sorriest teams in Major League Baseball. Then in 1991 they went "from worst to first," all the way to the World Series. How?

Owner Ted Turner brought in a new general manager who knew what he was doing (John Schuerholz), a new manager who knew what he was doing (Bobby Cox) and a host of new players (Tom Glavine, John Smoltz, Terry Pendleton, Sid Bream, etc.) who quickly learned how to win. The rest is history.

Does the Cobb school headquarters need a similar housecleaning at the top?

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RUMORS WERE BUZZING around the vacant Marietta High School head football coaching position this week with several knowledgeable Blue Devil followers telling AT that one coordinator and two assistant coaches on the current staff have applied for the job.

However, athletic director Paul Hall told AT Friday afternoon that none of the current staff members have applied for the position, which opened up when longtime coach and Marietta alumnus James “Friday” Richards resigned the previous Friday. Hall does say there’s “a really good pool” of applicants and that he plans to cut off applications by Feb. 12 and, hopefully, have a new coach within a few weeks.

Hall won’t divulge any names among the applicants, but the rumor mill says Marietta will settle only for an experienced coach who’s a proven winner. AT reported several months ago that Richards would be stepping down and one name that popped up right away is former Marietta player and assistant coach Jess Simpson, who’s carried the Buford High School program former Blue Devil coach Dexter Woods put on the fast track to even greater heights. Woods won three state titles in nine years at Buford and all Simpson has done is win three straight. However, sources close to the Gwinnett County school tell AT that if Simpson leaves, it probably will be for a plum assistant coaching position in the major college ranks.

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A FAMILIAR FACE and highly informative source in the Journal has been named team doctor for the new Atlanta Beat women’s pro soccer team that will begin its first season in April and will play in a new 16,000 stadium now under construction at Kennesaw State University.

Dr. Stan Dysart, the MDJ health columnist who practices with Pinnacle Orthopedics, is the new Beat team doctor, says team owner Fitz Johnson of Marietta. The Beat will start out on the road and then play their first game in their new stadium in May on Mother’s Day.

Dysart also is on the newly formed KSU football exploratory committee that is led by legendary former UGA coach and athletic director Vince Dooley. Should KSU choose to move forward with football, Dysart and Pinnacle practice of more than 20 doctors would seem to be strong candidates to keep the team healthy and ready to play on Saturdays.

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EVENTS: Marietta fathers and their daughters ages 5-12 years are invited to the city’s annual Daddy-Daughter Dance Feb. 7 from 2:30 to 5 p.m. at the Mansour Center at 995 Roswell St. in Marietta. Registration is at the Marietta Parks and Recreation office at City Hall. Tickets are $30 for couples and $5 for extra daughters. Reservations are required by Feb. 4 or when the first 125 couples register. Call (770) 794-5601.

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PEOPLE: Republican activist Barbara Hickey has been installed as president of the Cobb County Republican Women’s Club. Elected president-elect was Sheila Brower, vice-president was Janet Bell, recording secretary Liz Owens, corresponding secretary was Mary Van Brink, treasurer was Johnell Woody and assistant treasurer Billie Dendy. … Georgia House Speaker David Ralston has appointed Rep. Ed Setzler (R-Acworth), as chairman of the Judiciary Non-civil Subcommittee on Crimes Against Children/Controlled Substances/General. … Gov. Sonny Perdue has appointed Mike Fletcher, 59, of Marietta to the State Board of Registration for Professional Engineers and Land Surveyors. Fletcher is director of the Atlanta Office of Halvorson and Partners. He has 30 years of experience in structural engineering.