DM has learned that the Decatur City Commission will take up a vote at its next meeting on Monday, January 20th to allow residents to keep up to two pygmy goats and/or pot-bellied pigs on their property inside the city limits.

Decatur’s animal ordinance has long been unclear when it comes to these animals that straddle the line between pets and livestock.  (Allison wrote a great piece here on the issue back in 2011.)

Decatur Planning Director Amanda Thompson explains that the clarity and change to the animal ordinance was developed during the just-completed, very involved Unified Development Ordinance process, but because it isn’t a “development” issue, it will be voted on separately at the January 20th Commission meeting.

We should receive a copy of the actual ordinance tomorrow, which will detail weight limits and other details.  Stay tuned.

Goat photo courtesy of picbot via Flickr, Pig photo courtesy of daniel_sh via Flickr

EcoNuke asked in FFAF about the current status of permits for the old DeVry site on the northeast side of Decatur to be converted into a VA Clinic.  Decatur Planning Director Amanda Thompson tells DM that “permits have been issued to renovate the existing building and permits are almost issued for a new 30 unit townhouse development on the north portion of the site.”

Back in September 2013, Real Estate BisNow announced that “Greenstone Properties has snagged a 20-year lease with Specialty Care Outpatient Clinic, which will serve VA patients, at 250N Arcadia Ave, a 103k SF building. The building will be fully renovated over 18 months.”

From the AJC’s county by county wrap up on Sunday...

Druid Hills residents began receiving letters Friday informing them about options for joining a city like Atlanta or remaining in the unincorporated part of DeKalb County.

The letters, from Druid Hills Civic Association President Justin Critz, said annexation into Atlanta would be an opportunity to be part of the city’s growing development and its neighborhood planning unit system.

But Critz also said uniting with Atlanta presents challenges in the form of potentially higher taxes and the cost of some services.

The letter asks residents to pay attention in the coming months as the Druid Hills community considers its options.

On a somewhat related front, City Planning Director Amanda Thompson tells DM that the city has never been formally approached by Druid Hills to be annexed.  Additionally, there would be some expected complications that would come with such a move.

There has never been a formal request from Druid Hills to be annexed into the city. I believe that Emory wishes to be identified with Atlanta.  Annexing Emory would require some special emergency management services for the hospital, research and if the CDC was included that we do not provide now.

A recent AJC article  on Druid Hills annexation options wrote off neighboring Decatur as an option “the city school system is already at its capacity and its government doesn’t want to add more residential properties”,

You may have noticed the fencing around the final set of 2-story Allen Wilson Terrace buildings along Commerce Drive and West Trinity Place.

Decatur Planning Director Amanda Thompson confirms that the Decatur Housing Authority will demolish these units.  City Manager Peggy Merriss says the demolition will occur after Phase III occupancy along Electric Ave is completed and noted that after the demolition “the DHA will market the land as a private housing development opportunity”.

This is in-line with the previous published plans for the development, which noted the eventual demolition of these final older units and “developing market rate housing along that side of the site”.  With the occupancy of Phase III, the DHA has replaced the original 288 units at Allen Wilson Terrace on a smaller parcel of land, and notes on its website,  “An important part of that [plan] is the use of approximately one-third of the site, the north end, for a potential condo development of approximately 150 units, some of which would be life cycle units.  The proceeds from the sale of this land will help fund the building of the new public housing units.”

Decatur has a Town Center plan.  A transportation plan.  Parking studies. An Environmental Sustainability Board.  We legalized backyard poultry a long time ago.

Basically Decatur has put a lot of codes, ordinances and plans in place over the last many years.  Plus, there are additional codes/ordinances and revisions that have been proposed over the past few years that have been back-burnered, waiting for this process to occur.  Well, it’s looks like it’s time to get started.

Last night, at the Decatur City Commission meeting, the commission approved the “Decatur Coding Studio Team” of consultants who will work on unifying the city’s codes into one document.  According to a letter from Planning Director Amanda Thompson…

The team will be led by TSW, a local full service planning, architecture and landscape architecture fum. TSW was the project manager for the City’s 2010 Strategic Plan. They have assembled a team that includes: Code Studio, a national fum based in Austin, Texas with expertise in zoning and development codes; Placemakers for public outreach; Pond Engineering; Karen Hueber a specialist in historic preservation; and, Maddox Nix Bowman and Zoeckler for legal review services.

TSW and Placemakers both worked on the 2010 Decatur Strategic Plan.  Code Studio is based out of Austin and has worked with other “liberal” leaning cities like Denver and Chapel Hill in developing a unified code.

What is the Unified Development Code?  Well, the City of Roswell’s website on UDCs describes it as…

…a single (“unified”) tool that addresses contemporary development and zoning practices in a format that is consistent and easily understood by administrators, developers, and community members.

The City Commission will also establish a “Stakeholder Steering Committee consisting of seventeen (17) members including representatives from each appointed volunteer authority, board or commission, and City Commission appointees from the community and other special interests. This committee would serve as an advisory group throughout the process.”, according to Ms. Thompson’s note.

The City Commission set a budget of $83,000 for phase 1 of the plan, which includes…

…establishing the overall public involvement schedule, communications methods, stakeholder interviews and a stakeholder steering  committee. It will also include the preparation of a detailed technical report that will outline the new table of contents for the UDO and exactly what will be changed. The technical report would be presented for adoption by the City Commission in January 2014.

So dust off your “I live for public involvement” hats and iron out your “I’m Proud to be a De-Communicate-R” t-shirts.  This certainly isn’t the last you’ll hear about this process between now and January.

Last week, Thomas sent in this photo of a Public Hearing sign on the vacant Hillyer Place property and basically asked “what’s up?”.

Here’s the answer.

The City’s Planning Director Amanda Thompson tells DM that 24 townhomes are being designed and built on the site.  Here are a few details on the project.

• 24 townhome units. Three story with drive under garages
• 25’ minimum townhome setback from the R-60 (there is a small, open air garden shed within the 25’ setback).
• Guest parking next to the smaller units within the 25’ setback.
• There is an evergreen tree buffer along the R-60 property.
• The front building along E Howard will be designed as live/work.
• 6’ sidewalks will be installed along the street frontage.

Ms. Thompson also sent along this drawn plan… (PDF version HERE)

Additionally, according to Asst. City Manager Lyn Menne, “The developer has worked closely with surrounding neighbors and gotten their support for this proposal.”

I’ve been meaning to post this ever since the Decatur City Commission meeting in late May when Commissioner Fred Boykin asked Planning Director Amanda Thompson about the status of the project.  Looks like Ralph beat me to it!

Tonight, the Decatur Planning Commission will consider rezoning the south parking lot at Avondale MARTA station as Mixed Use, under the 2009 changes to the zoning ordinance.  (Meeting materials HERE!)  We mentioned this revised plan back in March, in case you missed it.

MARTA and Decatur have done this dance before, resulting in the confusingly named Avondale LCI Master Plan.  According to sources a few years back, the plan was never executed because MARTA backed out, but now there’s a new MARTA-stration (MARTA + adminstration – get it?) and they have already publicly stated that they’re more aggressively pursuing transit-friendly development around existing stations.

The Patch article linked to above quotes Asst. City Manager Lyn Menne saying that there’s no current developer for the site, and that this rezoning just defines what the city “wants to see happen at the site.”

Rendering from the 2005 Avondale LCI Master Plan courtesy of the City’s Website