UPDATE III: Asst. City Manager David Junger responds “Our Storm Water Engineer Julie Gyuricza received this complaint this morning and she is investigating the nature and cause of the flooding. We do not have enough information currently to know why this area flooded.”

UPDATE II: Jon writes in with a second report…”So it turns out there was a major blockage in one of the 18 inch pipes, and the city has already come out and taken care of it. They have also said they will be on the lookout for the area in the future.  I’m really pleased with how quickly the city has responded to us. I hope you let everyone know, because the city earned it’s reputation on this one….”

UPDATE: Jon writes in “Peggy already has the drain crew out looking at the area. It’s really great to see the city respond so quickly.”

Four days ago, Paula reported “rumbling on the Midway Woods yahoo group about the stalled development at Midway and S. Candler. …the latest is that the clearing of the lot has caused huge run-off problems and flooding.”

Yesterday evening, the President of the Midway Woods Neighborhood Association, Jon Rork, wrote in asking for help…

Read the rest of this entry »

As I’m sure many of you already know, the city commission voted last night to accept the 11 Midway Road parcels that sought annexation into the city of Decatur (well 10 of 15 voters among those parcels did.)  The AJC’s April Hunt has a summary of the vote that was posted earlier today.

I wasn’t there obviously, so be as skeptical as you’d like about my opinion – pieced together with sealing wax and commissioner saliva – but it seems that the city commission just wasn’t ready to an about-face and start denying annexation requests, even though the note from Peggy Merriss (page 67 of materials for the meeting) indicated that this annexation didn’t really fall under the city’s annexation deferral plan since “it was recommend the City Commission should not accept single or small lot annexation applications that are randomly placed in mid-block areas of adjacent streets that do not support the City’s interest in clarifying city limits.”

I still stand by my earlier metaphor: the hornet’s nest has been kicked.  Look no further than the Superintendent’s striking note to the commission on page 81 of the materials that essentially states “Please deny any further annexations in this area.”  Wow.  Now there’s a difference of positions!

Going forward, I think we can all agree that it wouldn’t be all that prudent for the city to continue to accept annexations while the school system struggles under a bloated school system.  But lord, it would be even worse if we simply started blanketly denying annexations with nothing more than a request from CSD in our hands.

So I resurrect my old call that for the sake of CSD, the city commission needs to figure out where it stands on annexation now, not in 2011.

Annexation isn’t the only thing going on in Midway Woods.

As anyone that lives there knows, talk of annexation just across the border has recently been mixed with another kind of buzz:  that of chainsaws.

A home developer has shocked local residents by clear-cutting more than 4 acres of land on the northside of Midway at South Candler in order to construct 28 homes on-site, inspiring one resident to write in asking “Where’s the Lorax when we need him?”

So I decided to do a little digging and clear the air.  Here’s what I found…

Though the development plan was approved in 2007, construction didn’t begin until early May of this year.  At that time, a letter from resident Conne Thalken was sent to the commission expressing the neighborhood’s concern. [thanks to Paula for fowarding!]

We have not had any contact whatsoever with new developer who assumed ownership of the property since the original developer’s bankruptcy and foreclosure on the property. We in the neighborhood understand that development of the property must hold to the plan as approved in 2006. However, we are uncertain about the new developer’s commitment to the conditions of the plan and concerned about the City monitoring the execution of the plan.

Along with the letter, Conne included the 17 point condition list that was attacted with the city’s approval.  It includes things like a privacy fence on the westside of Midway Road, an evergreen buffer on the eastside, a $5000 donation to Midway Woods park, a mandate to clear kudzu and help with traffic calming measures on Midway Road, no gate, and all homes must meet Energy Star rating.

However the biggest condition of all is number 12: “Preservation of the Open Space depicted on the Concept Plan prepared by FocalPoint Engineering, which is dated March 29, 2006, will be achieved and will be placed in a Conservation Easement to be governed by the City of Decatur.”

According to the city’s planning director, Amanda Thompson, the entire site is actually 8.92 acres, and the comprimise the city made for preserving half the site was to allow the full development of the other half.  She also adds ” They will have very tiny yards and will probably sell for around $500k.”

In regards to worries about the new developer complying to these conditions, Amanda assures us that they “are being followed and the site is inspected by either the Engineering Department or Development on a weekly basis.”

So…now you know!

An interesting development indeed…

Amongst the supporting documents for Monday’s city commission meeting is a letter from Midway Road residents who, despite the failed annexation effort earlier this year, want in to the city.  The block of 11 households in question sit immediately adjacent to the current city limits and therefore can request annexation from the city of Decatur.

The letter from residents, which is on page 11-12 in the materials section for the June 1st meeting, states that they have between 72%-78% support for annexation, which exceeds the 60% threshold necessary to make the request.

Needless to say this should be very interesting for a couple reasons.  First, despite what some have said, the annexation effort failed due to a lack of adequate data that demonstrated the school system could handle the increase AND unanswered questions about whether the city could make money off the effort.

Therefore, an 11 household residential annexation puts our city commissioners in an interesting position.  Up until now, they’ve been pretty willing to accept individual applications for annexation, however this one may just be large enough to get the old opposition riled up again.

Interestingly enough, the letter to the commission does address the dreaded “school age children” question under the “No Undue Burden on the CSD or City of Decatur Services” section… “There are only 6 children (2 of which currently/plan to attend the Waldorf School) in the annexation area; 5 of the 6 children are 5 or younger.”  Unfortunately, that statement kind of misses the major point of concern for current residents who aren’t as worried about the current school-aged population as what it would become once the property was included within the city limits.

How will the commission respond?  Where do your candidates for city commission stand on this?

Ready or not, the hornet’s nest has been kicked.