Presumably the change is a change in name only. Fulton County Community Zoning Board (CZB) Nov. 20 approved, with a caveat attached, a recommendation to have 7,000 acres of land currently in the Chattahoochee Hill Country Overlay District changed to put it in the Cedar Grove Agricultural Overlay District. The same change was included for the Chattahoochee Hill County Conservation Subdivision Ordinance. Fulton County’s Transfer of Development Rights (TDR) program in Chatt Hills will also likely move to Cedar Grove.

At the meeting Nov. 20, Deputy Director of the Dept. of Environment and Community Development Randy Beck was asked by board members Bruce Moody and Sandra Hardy if making the change would be in name only with no other effects. Beck said the change was in name only. Moody’s motion followed, specifying that the change from Chattahoochee Hill Country Overlay District to the Cedar Grove Agricultural Overlay District be one of name only.

The 7,000 acres in question, a large triangular piece of land, primarily positioned north of South Fulton Parkway east of Rivertown Road and west Ga. Highway 154, was initially included in Chatt Hills when that city and the city of South Fulton were proposed in 2006. The 7,000-acre portion was allocated to the proposed city of South Fulton by the General Assembly. Neither the Chatt Hills or South Fulton groups were consulted on the matter.

Also at the meeting and for public comment only, commissioners heard a proposal that would have the Fulton County TDR program renamed as the Cedar Grove Agricultural TDR program in the 7,000 acres formerly included in the Chatt Hills planning area. As with the other measures at the meeting relating to the new city, county planning staff said they had received no official notice that the new city want to assume planning and zoning authority within city limits. Consequently, Fulton County will continue to implement the TDR program by including it in the Cedar Grove Overlay District. Beck said Fulton could talk with the new city about an intergovernmental TDR program for cross-boundary TDR sending and receiving areas.

Hardy asked county planning staff why the county was pushing to rename the area within weeks of Chattahoochee Hill Country coming on board with its mayor and city council. An intergovernmental agreement could be worked out at that time, she said. Hardy received no answer to her question.

Fulton County Board of Commissioners are expected to take up the overlay and TDR matters at the Dec. 5 meeting.

login to post comments