I attended a meeting held by the 501c-3 Stand Up DeKalb this week, which dealt with the possible formation of a city somewhere “West of I-85” and “East of US 29” and “North of North Decatur Road” and … An “area of eligibility” (my term) of about 30 square miles. Fear not, this is not a boundary that’s ever likely to be the subject of state legislation. What in God’s name would you call it? It might be easier to name it for what it isn’t—“Anywhere but”, which even sounds exclusionary, which coincidentally is something for which the whole cityhood movement has been criticized.
In fact, I’ve been told that if the Oak Grove/Druids are involved, any name is in play except “Northlake” (boo-hoo for me) because it invokes the wreckage of a mall and a bygone era. Maybe there will even be two or three “cities” (rather, call it “collective local representation” so as not to leave out some other form of jurisdictional). Certainly Tucker will do something on its own now that the January-from-Hell PR problem has landed on DeKalb—the little village really is the one perfect historical town left in DeKalb. Did you see how Tuckerites came together when landmark Handy Ace Hardware burned down? Contrast that with the reaction one could expect if Northlake Mall went up in flames.
One of the attendees at the Stand Up meeting suggested that “we” start “our city” small and intimate so as to annex areas later. Everybody knows what that means—Oak Grove. Just makes me feel good all over—how about you? Now there’s a representative community if I’ve ever seen one. Not an apartment complex in sight and very few rental homes to boot. Just wait ‘till the demographics are tabulated. You think Dunwoody has a hard time explaining it ain’t white?
Well—there may be some pretty powerful dissenting voices betting that their area will beat the “Grovians” to the punch. I sat at the Stand Up meeting with a guy from the Evansdale school zone and he pointed out that his house isn’t on the Stand Up map. He’s kinda big in Republican circles. He’s willing to bet he can get his legislative buddies from Dunwoody (those pesky provocateurs) to try his area before more Democrat Briarcliff—if you have to go small early on.
One can certainly see an area centered on Northlake Mall—and tight enough to exclude the people that hold their nose at it. The Northlake idea has the added benefit of incorporating Industrial property, a hospital and some railroad tracks (can you say commuter rail station)—no high school though, but that’s not a problem because we can now produce a charter school in a matter of days (again, thanks mostly to those same provocateurs. You can make a case that a 2-mile radius around Northlake Mall would be the most “complete” of the new cities on an economic asset basis (things that many new cities are very short on), even if only 10,000 people. Since the new city movement is all about breaking all of the rules about what constitutes a city, why not one where the commercial/industrial revenue is twice that greater of the residential. Wait a darn minute! That is a traditional rule for a city!
People, there’s a reason this area has leadership “issues”. In the final analysis, we are not one area. We aren’t even three areas. We’re a bunch of fat and happy neighborhoods that has NEVER had a reason to organize together….and this is too damn big and risky an issue to start doing it. Sandy Springs had thirty (40?) years of Leadership This and Civic Roundtable That and a central core LCI and State Reps that had been fighting the legislative battle forever. People knew the terms of engagement. Dunwoody has a civic association that is respected by not only this county, but maybe the whole world. Dunwoody has historic society, Dunwoody has a center, Dunwoody is a darn PLACE for Pete’s sake. You think the Perimeter CID didn’t have discussions behind the scenes downtown with how many headquartered Fortune 500 companies?
The most visible power we have in “this” area (whatever that is) resides EVERYWHERE and they ain’t gonna help with no city. It’s the Federal government. What they will do is help with a Druid Hills Road/Buford Highway/I-85 Corridor CID. The Feds will engage to enhance their living space between PDK Airport and Emory University and all points between.
Start there with some special districts and maybe show some innovative leadership which forces the county government to respond to your needs.
You mention how the community would react if Northlake Mall burned vs. how Tucker reacted when the Ace Hardware burned. The difference there is that the Ace Hardware management was part of the community. They worked to improve the community. Something the ownership of Northlake Mall hasn't done in a long time. These are the same owners of Lenox Mall and Phipps Plaza. It's easy to see why they don't want anything happening at Northlake. They don't want competition for their favorite children. And then there is Northlake Festival. Obviously there are things going on in this area. Those managing these two properties aren't interested in being part of the neighborhood in a good way. Something has to happen here. It's fine to take measured steps but not if it's going to mean another decade of Dekalb County governance of this area.
Ex: Dunwoody benefitted mightily as an unincorporated area from PCID (even if indirectly). BTW--I can't think of everything when blogging--a couple of things I didn't mention: (1)Kevin Levitas and Don Brussard should be thanked for their efforts thus far. Those efforts will go a long toward bringing a community (or several) together and putting those places on the map. Jurisdictions will be drawn regardless of the form they take. I'm assuming Kevin and Don will be just as happy under any of those terms. (Ex: If I had been more persistent (and creative and diplomatic and...) 12 years ago in the development stages of Northlake Community Alliance, we'd already have the community infrastructure to have a "bottom up" cityhood effort--and probably a bunch of institutions to lend it credibility--such as CIDs--then again the other side of the coin is the county would have pumped millions of dollars into the area already and been a full partner. (2) One thing that Dunwoody also has that "we" (again, what place?) don't is a hard copy news organ (Crier) that serves many uses. One big one is as monopoly news it is able to be a civic booster--it was MIGHTY MIGHTY is selling the new city to people. It's possible that on-line organs (like Patch) can serve that capacity, but readership is distributed among other on-line products and no group has enough years in place.
I also should have explained what StandUp DeKalb is. Maybe Don Broussard can provide a brief here. My take on it is as a 501c-3 with a few years of holding the county's zoning people's feet to the fire (following its own rules). If not, I'll get something into my next piece regarding "lower risk" community organizing alternatives and step-by-step approaches.
Thanks
If used as a city boundary, it would be the largest city area in Georgia and would violate any cost-efficient notion of density--little better than a small suburban county. Questions about StandUp should be directed to Don Broussard. BTW--therea are news articles that refer to a fledgling "Briarcliff Woods East Neighborhood Association" which has held two open meetings. http://www.facebook.com/BriarcliffWoodsEastNeighborhoodAssociation
My guess is that a group of self-appointed committee members like Brookhaven had will get together with not a question in mind, but the goal of working with Republican legislators to write what is known as "enabling legislation".
In Beth Nathan's remarks at the StandUp meeting, she suggested polling residents on their specific interests in city services--and inversely, how the county isn't satisfactory. If indeed NBCA used the term "no debate", it might not mean "no discussion", only that the meeting isn't a "for city" or "against city" discussion.
However, here it is after some work-- http://www.can-dk.org/home Kinda gives you an idea how far we need to go on the city-hood subject.
http://www.can-dk.org/file-cabinet/government-municipal (scroll down to "Just Thinking" category). A map is there also identifying a popualtion of 130,000--and even proposes council districts.
http://www.ajc.com/news/news/johns-creek-and-milton-seek-legislative-action-tha/nT7FJ/ This is not only a potential tax increase--its points to two of many reasons that new cities are vulnerable that are relevent to our area: (1) New cities will have municipal infrastructure needs that are simply new facilities that require bond borrowing--these are currently not in UGa's tax projections or what I consider worse--UGa makes absolutley no RISK projections (2) This articles example--crumbling roads. Areas with density are efficiently maintained--in fact, they have "streets"--when you see "road", thats a red flag that you don't want to own it--low density, not efficient. In such cases, the outer reaches of Dunwoody are more expensive to maintain than say, downtown Atlanta on a per taxpayer served.
Also--cities are about to start their own school systems--capital needs. Also--ever hear of mission creep? All governments have it. All.
No need for worst case scenario....we are a fat and happy, wealthy part of the county as you noted earlier.......just need to get our act together ! Schools are NOT a problem if we create a viable Charter School System within our new City. Other cities in Fulton float bonds (yes some debt ....but what better investment for all of us even though only one in four families has children in school in DeKalb) to finance Charter schools. I was part of "mission creep" during the Vietnam war buildup, and the 800,000 civilian employees in the Pentagon are part of " mission creep", but we can handle this much smaller problem.
http://lakesidecityalliance.org/