If you live in unincorporated DeKalb County or a DeKalb city where the County takes care of trash pickup for you, you have long been blessed with twice weekly trash pickup.  However, that may all soon change.

County CEO Lee May is proposing scaling back pick up to once a week.  The proposal comes after a three-month pilot program with 28,000 residents from the cities of Brookhaven, Chamblee, Dunwoody and Lithonia and unincorporated DeKalb, according to Crossroads News.

A note today from Commissioner Kathie Gannon announcing a meeting next Monday, February 9th at 6:30p at Scott-Candler Library to discuss the proposed changes, explains the reason for “One-day-a-week waste collection” this way – “Currently, garbage is collected twice a week for DeKalb County residents. On the first collection day, Sanitation picks up more than 66 percent of countywide garbage. This leaves a much lighter second-day collection.”

Additionally, the sanitary service rate sounds like it will remain flat.  The note states that “Residential customers will not experience a rate increase.” It includes these other proposed changes to the DeKalb trash pick up services…

• Standardized containers. The standardized use of 65-gallon green county-provided trash containers will ensure neighborhoods are cleaner and neater with the reduction of loose trash.
• Consolidated collection. With consolidated collection, all waste (solid waste, recycling, and yard trimmings) will be collected on the same day.
• Additional benefits to county residents. The program will include a renewed focus on recycling education for county residents and additional roadside litter collection by Sanitation employees.

The note states that the proposal is “set to be heard for a vote at an upcoming Board of Commissioners meeting.”

Photo courtesy of YouTube

The Medlock Area Neighborhood Association reported yesterday that Commissioners Jeff Rader and Kathie Gannon recently met with neighborhood representatives to give a brief update on the Scott Boulevard Baptist Church location, which is being redeveloped by Fuqua Development.

Fuqua presented some “very preliminary” drawings at the meeting.  The MANA site summarized it as such…

•  As proposed, the development covers 5.5 acres.
• All ten homes on Barton Way are under contract.
• A natural food store would serve as anchor.
• The project is a mixed use development. In addition to retail, it would include 200 apartment units (5 stories high).

MANA states that they’re planning a larger community meeting about the development in July.  Jump over to the MANA site for more pics of the renderings and details.

The AJC reports that the DeKalb County Commission “snuffed” an effort to ban smoking in public places throughout the county, including parks, bars and strip clubs.  In a 4-2 vote, both dissenting votes to dismissing the ban came from northside commissioners Jeff Rader and Kathie Gannon.

Bar and strip club owners argued that such a ban would hurt their businesses.

There’s been a good deal of chatter on the Oakhurst Message Board of late about higher-than-usual DeKalb water rates.  The AJC wrote a piece on our surely escalating water rates to cover extensive repairs and improvements to the system, though it’s unclear whether these individual reports are a result of that or something else.  (If you’re interested in how much rates are rising year-by-year, this County document (pdf) gives you a good idea of how rates will rise through 2011.  Note that the more water you use, the higher the rate.)

Anyway, the County is holding meetings about these repairs and upgrades, tonight and tomorrow night.

DeKalb County Commissioner Kathie Gannon recently sent this announcement around…

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I wouldn’t want to deny anyone the opportunity to express their airline-noise rage.

According to DeKalb Commissioner Kathie Gannon’s February newsletter (via the Clairmont Heights Civic Association), Hartsfield-Jackson is looking to lower the flight ceiling around DeKalb-Peachtree Airport by 1,000 feet.  This will obviously result in less airspace for planes coming into and leaving DeKalb-Peachtree as well as greater noise levels for folks on the ground in the area.

As to how much of an area will be affected, Kathie Gannon’s note states…

This would include decreasing the lower elevation of Class B airspace to 5,000 feet over PDK. This change would affect Dunwoody, Chamblee, Doraville and all surrounding neighborhoods.

I’m not sure if it will make things worse for folks closer to Decatur, but it certainly won’t improve on the airplane noise that gets folks so crazy in the warmer months.

Folks at DeKalb-Peachtree Airport and concerned residents in the surrounding neighborhoods are planning on attending a “public information / comment session [with the FAA] on March 1st at 3pm, 5pm, and 7pm at the Chamblee Civic Center located at 3540 Broad Street Chamblee, GA.”

Battling through seemingly endless whining, hollow statements, and hurt feelings at yesterday’s DeKalb County Commission meeting, the commission somehow managed to elect a new presiding officer: Commissioner Kathie Gannon.

As I reported just before the holidays, this presiding officer election has been tied to rumors that Vernon Jones may pull out of the Senate race against Chambliss and instead run against Hank Johnson for Congress. Why? Because “insiders” claimed that Johnson was working with lone Republican on the commission, Elaine Boyer, to get Gannon elected, and that this was seen as an effort to increase Republican influence in DeKalb (even though Gannon is a Democrat).

Well regardless of whether you buy Vernon’s strategists’ argument that Johnson is a secret Republican operative, it seems that Boyer did end up siding with Gannon, but only after informing the commission’s other nominee, Larry Johnson, that she wasn’t voting for him because he never asked her.

So, in the end there’s no vast right-wing conspiracy…its just that Elaine is a stickler for good manners.