GoDeKalb gives an update on our hotly debated vending carts posting and reports that last night the Decatur City Commission voted unanimously in favor of giving the program a trial run.

The blurb also has a little more info about what the program thru Lyn Menne…

Decatur Economic Development Director Lyn Menne told city commissioners that she has been approached on numerous occasions from residents who wanted to set up vending carts on the MARTA plaza.”

Residents have said they wanted to sell hotdogs and pre-packaged ice cream, [Lyn] Menne said. “We want to try for six months and see it how it goes.”

Jim Baskett has his doubts. See the full article for his comments.

h/t: InDecatur

Is this proposal referencing the TOP of the MARTA station or the front entrance facing Church? If its up top, I like it a bit better. There is a lot of dead space on that level when there’s no function going on. Now I understand some of the general confusion from the comments of the last post.

Can’t we come up with a better name for that plaza?

This is the report I’ve been waiting for.

Early this year, when the city commission took up the issue of annexation to a packed house at city hall, the main concern that current residents voiced was in regard to accommodating an additional 500 students into an already crowded school system. The commission decided in that meeting that they needed to ask the superintendent/school board to look closely at the issue before the annexation initiative went any further.

Well, CDS finally has its report and its up on their website. Just like many previous school reports, this one was produced by Rosser. There’s a lot of good data in it and I urge every resident concerned about school capacity to take a look, but I will try to sum up.

From what I can deduce, if the city were to annex the entire proposed area, the real strain on the school system would be at the elementary level (K-3 & 4-5). I’ve heard some say that DHS is already “at capacity” but these charts don’t show that (see page 23 of the presentation). Even with annexation there still seems to be enough room at Renfroe and DHS. Also, its worth noting that even without annexation, Glennwood will still be over capacity by 2010.

As a result, the seven options given in this report have to do with accommodating these additional students in the lower grades. (Full details of these options can be found on pages 24-27 of the report.)

Option I – Move 5th graders to Renfroe and open four K-4 schools (Oakhurst, Clairemont, Winnona Park, Glennwood)

Option II – Move 4th and 5th graders to Renfroe and open four K-3 schools (same as above)

Option III – Open Westchester as a 4/5 academy (this doesn’t deal with the K-3 issue)

Option IV – Split 4/5 into two buildings and add 3rd graders to the mix. K-3 schools become K-2.

Option V – Make Glennwood K-5 and have four K-5 schools

Option VI – Open Westchester as “choice school” with K-5 open enrollment

Option VII – Open Westchester, have five K-4 schools (Oakhurst, Clairemont, Winnona Park, Glennwood) and move 5th graders to Renfroe.

As I said, check out the full presentation for more detail. With each option, the report also details potential positives and negatives that go along with it.

The report also states that the city will begin a PR campaign regarding annexation this summer and that support “for” and “against” annexation is evenly split at 45% with 10% undecided among residents. (It doesn’t specify whether that’s in the annexation area or within the current city limits though). Additionally, the earliest date for annexation would be School Year 2009/2010. (All of page 21)

The last pages gives next steps, which include many meetings and using GPS mapping to give CDS a more precise visual of where students in the annexation areas are coming from, down to the street level.

Along with May-retta, Gainesville and Warren County schools, Decatur will find out today whether it will be among the first four charter school systems in the country. Prior comments and articles seem to indicate this is all but a done deal, so its relatively safe to assume that we will receive a hearty approval from the state school board.

If approved, major changes for Decatur include “incentive pay” for teachers, academic credits for students based on knowledge and not just class time, and a move toward using national tests (instead of state) to measure academic achievement.

This has been a continuing problem in Oakhurst as of late. Based on numerous posts on the Oakhurst message board over the past couple months, thieves are smashing in the front door of homes with visible flat-screen TVs from the street, taking them and nothing else, and bolting. It all takes less than a minute, so they aren’t concerned with alarm systems. Additionally, other posts indicate that they aren’t deterred by dogs (regardless of size).

A recent post/email from by the Winnona Park neighborhood watch (forwarded by Cherie) sums flat-screen thieves’ actions and intent around Atlanta.

* Thieves working in a group of 3 young men are pictured kicking in a door, rushing into a home, finding the big screen TV, ignoring other valuables, and loading big screen into a truck that is backed up to the door, for quick exit.

* Remarkable is the speed at which the operation took place:
In only a minute or so did the burglars kick open the door, locate the high value Big Screen TV and load it. So even if the alarm was sounding and the monitoring company was calling the police or the residence first, by the time it was clear to the alarm company/resident,etc. that this was a genuine burglary, the bad guys escaped with the one quick item in the truck.

So, if you have a flat-screen, its probably a good idea to make sure it can’t be viewed through a front window.