Marietta Street, Atlanta GA (pic submitted by Rob)

Another item on tomorrow night’s Decatur City Commission meeting agenda: a $38,000 change-order to make changes to the West Ponce de Leon/Trinity car and bike lanes.

Here’s a rundown of the additions/alterations being proposed to the City Commission in a letter from Deputy City Manager Hugh Saxon (pg. 28 of the meeting materials)…

• “Bike Box” at West Ponce and West Trinity Place: $11,000
• Re-striping of West Ponce between Trinity & Pinetree: $5,100
• Changing material used to stripe bike lanes from paint to a “more durable thermoplastic”: $5,600
• Misc, signing sand cleanup: $3,800
• Additional paving materials needed for milled portion of  West Ponce: $8,500
• Contingency: $4,000

According to Saxon’s letter, funds are available in the approved project budget to pay for these additional expenses.

Pic above: An example of a “bike box” in Seattle

According to an item on tomorrow night’s City Commission meeting agenda (see pg. 13 of the materials), Decatur’s Holiday Inn on Clairemont Road is being sold to a private investor.  As part of the sale agreement, the new company “needs a long-term lease to operate the Conference Center and a long-term agreement for parking services.”

The city is recommending that the city allow the Decatur Downtown Development Authority to sub-lease their interest in the Conference Center and associated parking deck to the new owner.  In return for this, the hotel’s new owner will make “significant capital improvements…that are needed to update and modernize the facility.”

And before anyone asks, I’m checking with the city on whether the Holiday Inn is just changing ownership or whether it will become a new/different hotel.

From the AJC’s recent article about Atlanta food carts and the obstacles they face around the metro…

And while free-standing restaurants such Taqueria de Sol operate food trucks of their own, most truck operators have been careful not to tread on the turf of dining establishments, Smith said.

Lyn Menne, Decatur’s assistant city manager for community and economic development, said that has been one of her concerns as the DeKalb County city weighs whether food trucks would be an asset in the commercial district.

“We don’t want to create businesses that compete with our existing restaurants,” Menne said. “We also have very limited spaces where these could actually park.”

In related news, John Kessler reports that Fulton County shut down both El Burro Pollo and Atlanta Fry Guy food trucks in Poncey-Highlands on Saturday for preparing their food on the street.  King of Pops was not closed down (because his food isn’t prepared on-site).

My one-and-only food cart pic from my trip to Portland, OR last summer

If a penny sales tax is added to the City of Atlanta’s current tax rate as a result of the transportation referendum in 2012, the city’s sales tax rate would jump to 9%, the highest in the state and higher than Charlotte’s current rate of 8.46%.  That has Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed worried, according to the AJC.

With school capital improvement 1-cent sales tax (SPLOST) up for renewal by voters next year, Atlanta’s Mayor is rethinking his sales tax priorities.

How does this affect Decatur?  Well according to the AJC, because Atlanta, Fulton, DeKalb and Decatur share borders, they all have to agree in order to put SPLOST on the ballot.  (Uh, OK.)  That means if Atlanta opts out completely, then the other municipalities can’t even ask their residents for the penny tax.

CSD’s Bruce Roaden is quoted in the article, saying that while a project list hasn’t been compiled, the Decatur school system plans to ask its voters to renew the SPLOST and if it wasn’t renewed, funding for capital improvements would have to come from “general funds or other sources”.   This at a time when most school systems around the state are strapped for cash.

Worried Decatur residents have wondered how not renewing SPLOST might affect paying back the city’s new under-construction 4/5 Academy at 5th Avenue, as it is currently a main source of funding for the project.  Mr. Roaden tells DM that 5th Ave is financed using Certificates of Participation (COPs) paid back with general funds.  However, the school system has been thinking about including language in next year’s SPLOST renewal that would cover the costs of the COPs long term financial obligations.

But all is not lost.  Atlanta Mayor Reed’s current solution is a “fractional tax” for his city, that would keep Atlanta’s tax rate down around 8.2% with an added penny sales tax for transportation.  (Whether that would mean that Fulton, DeKalb and Decatur would also have to go with a smaller fractional tax is still not clear to me.)