Bad Links?
Other glitches?
Notify Webmaster

PTC postpones decision on annexation; Seeks county input before final vote on bringing 360-acre West Village into city

By JOHN MUNFORD
jmunford@TheCitizenNews.com

The Fayette County Commission will at least get a voice on whether or not Peachtree City should annex 360 acres on its west side.

Before voting whether or not to investigate the annexation idea in detail, the City Council Thursday tabled the matter for a month so the county could study the rough-sketch proposal from John Wieland Homes.

The delay was approved 3-2, with Mayor Steve Brown and Councilman Stuart Kourajian voting against the measure.

Council approval is necessary for the annexation so city staff can work more intently on the project with the developer. This would be the first project brought to council under its new relaxed system for handling annexation applications.

The 360-acre parcel is currently in the county’s jurisdiction, but Wieland wants it annexed into the city and combined with an 88-acre tract already in the city that’s zoned general industrial.

The rezoning could rile the county commission into a lawsuit over the property’s land use.

The county won a recent court battle with Pathway Communities, the former owner of the property, to keep the 360-acre parcel zoned for a minimum lot size of two acres. Pathway wanted the minimum lot size shrunk to one acre.

The annexation proposed by Wieland could lead to a total density of more than 700 housing units on the parcel.

The 360-acre tract the company wants annexed was actually part of several parcels encompassing more than 900 acres in a 2000 annexation attempt that was ultimately voted down by the City Council.

Although the annexation has seen support among some citizens, particularly in the Wieland development north of Wynnmeade subdivision, that was largely due to the need for another way out of the area.

That became somewhat of a moot point Thursday night as council voted to set aside $280,000 to engineer the MacDuff Parkway extension to Ga. Highway 74, whether or not the road would ultimately be in the city or county’s jurisdiction.

Councilman Steve Rapson said the road needed to be done, period.

If the road were extended as part of the proposed Wieland development, it might be necessary to make it four lanes at some point, drawing criticism from former road supporters about too much traffic congestion, Rapson noted.

Mayor Steve Brown said if the property remains in the county’s jurisdiction, he doesn’t want the city providing public safety services to the parcel.

“I want the county there putting out fires and handcuffing people they need to handcuff,” Brown said. “I’d never support our public safety people intervening in that area.”

In addition to connecting MacDuff Parkway, the annexation will also provide upscale housing that will add to the city’s property tax revenues, noted John Wieland, who personally made Thursday night’s presentation to the City Council.

Wieland envisions small cafes and antiques shops on ground floor units, with the above stories serving as living spaces. He also said there would be extensive green space along Line Creek to protect its role as a future water source for the county. The creek will feed into the proposed Lake McIntosh reservoir a few miles downstream.

The idea of the housing component is to attract seniors, singles and couples to the city without overburdening the school system, Wieland said.

“We’re going to create something special,” Wieland said, pointing to a similar project the company did in Smyrna.

Councilman Murray Weed noted that he still plans to vote down the annexation ultimately because he pledged in his campaign for office that he wouldn’t approve any annexations to the city.

He also questioned how much money it could cost the city to investigate the annexation application, and Wieland himself agreed to foot the cost for some staff time.

Weed pointed out that the city hired on a part-time staffer to the planning department to handle another project because staff didn’t have enough time to work on it.

Dan Fields, a vice president of the company, noted that the city would have to study the rezoning application for the 88-acre tract that’s already in the city anyway. That parcel is currently zoned for general industrial use.

If council ultimately signs off on further investigation of the annexation plan, it will likely mean a series of city workshops in addition to a significant amount of staff time, officials said.

By the time a final recommendation is made to council, there will be input from the public and various agencies including the Atlanta Regional Commission, the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority and the city’s own public safety departments, said City Planner David Rast.