After being reported late last month that Decatur Superintendent Phyllis Edwards believed the school system needed a new school on the northside of town by 2018, folks openly wondered whether it would be K-3 or K-5 school.

Here’s an answer, found at the end of a new AJC blurb on the Superintendent’s plan to ask the Decatur School Board this evening to approve the bond that would fund the Phase II renovations to Renfroe and Decatur High, along with this new elementary school…

Edwards believes a new K-5 building—K-3 one side and a 4/5 school on the other—would cost about $25 million. She said she’d like to see the new school open by 2017-18.

The bond still needs to go before the Decatur City Commission.  Mayor Jim Baskett has already said that the city will pursue a bond referendum for the school system this Spring.

Start the clock.

According to one blurb on the AJC yesterday, Decatur Superintendent Phyllis Edwards is saying that City Schools of Decatur will need another k-5 building on the north side of the city to house students by the 2018-2019 school year.  And ultimately, as has been recently reported, the school system could require up to 2 new buildings to accommodate growing enrollment.

The post even notes that Dr. Edwards called DeKalb CEO Lee May about potentially available space in DeKalb County office buildings, after he recently unveiled a plan to move many county employees to a new development along Memorial Drive in unincorporated DeKalb.

But of course, building new schools isn’t cheap.  The extensive renovations already planned for Decatur High School and Renfroe Middle School have been planned to be paid for by issuing Certificates of Participation as part of a lease purchase agreement with Georgia Municipal Association.  Now with new construction on the horizon, the City is making good on its statement to revisit a bond referendum for Decatur Schools, back when it postponed a vote back in mid-2013.

The AJC reports that during the Mayor’s State of the City Address on Tuesday, Mayor Jim Baskett said that the city would revisit issuing a bond referendum for the school system this Spring.  The Superintendent told the AJC that the price tag on the bond would be around $80 million, notably higher than the $59.6 million bond referendum that the city rejected back in 2013.

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

As we reported via the AJC yesterday, DeKalb’s CEO Lee May gave his State of the County today where he proposed a plan to move some DeKalb County functions out of downtown Decatur and to a new development called “Downtown DeKalb” along Memorial Drive near the Kensington MARTA Station.  (You can read the relevant excerpt of the speech over on Decaturish)

We had contacted Decatur Mayor Jim Baskett yesterday for any comment, but he told us he wanted to wait and hear the CEO’s remarks before responding.

Today, after listening to the CEO’s speech, Mayor Baskett remarked to DM that the proposal to move some county functions out of Decatur is inline with other conversations with the county in recent years.

“It doesn’t seem to be a really new initiative in that several years ago we were told that the county was moving as much operations to Memorial Dr. as possible, thus the sale of the Callaway building.”

He also clarified that “Decatur remains the county seat and some operations will remain” in the city.  As has been mentioned previously, this would include the County Courthouse, which must be located in the county seat by law.

Reflecting on the impact on Decatur, the Mayor noted that “moving some properties onto the tax rolls is probably not a bad thing.”

Photo courtesy of DecaturNext

The Decatur City Commission passed the revised tree ordinance in a 5-0 vote last night.  The ordinance promotes a “no net loss” of the city’s current 45% canopy coverage.  

Under the new ordinance, residents will be allowed to remove up to three 6-inch diameter trees every 18 months without incurring a penalty, though owners will be required to file a free informational permit so the city can track canopy changes.  It’s a complicated ordinance, but highlights include a “no net loss” requirement is triggered when a land disturbance permit is filed and the replanting requirement is triggered when impervious coverage is increased on a lot by 15% or more. 

In remarks prior to the vote, Mayor Baskett noted the fact that the City Commission meeting room was less crowded then earlier this year when the first version came up for a vote.  “The fact that this room is not full of people tonight may be construed as we wore people down. It may be construed, as the fact, that we’ve addressed a lot of the issues people had and they didn’t feel as strongly about it.”  He continued, “We’re not going to make people happy that wanted to see something much, much stronger.  We’re not going to make people happy who want government to stay out of their lives.”  He also reiterated his personal experience with a border tree nearly being cut down adjacent to his property and his desire for revised border tree regulation.

Commissioner Patti Garrett noted that she believed they had addressed many of residents’ concerns, including that there’s no longer a canopy goal of 55% for every lot when something is done to a property, there are now incentives to replant, and there is double canopy coverage for specimen trees.

Commissioner Scott Drake closed out the commission’s comments on the subject saying that “we need to trust our neighbors, and talk to our neighbors.  Tell them what we’re doing, ask them what their input is.”  He continued “It is a confusing new ordinance, so there’s going to be an education that needs to happen.  I think the arborist is going to be busy answering questions and trying to put this in a digestible package for people who are looking to do projects.”  He went on to express hope that the arborist would continually flag any inefficiencies in the process and that the commission would make changes in the future if issues were identified.  The Mayor concurred on this point.

Decaturish also has a good article on the topic this morning.  You can review the full ordinance HERE and you can view this portion of the Commission meeting HERE (click on Item V and VI A)

The effective date of the revised ordinance is Monday, July 7th.

This graphic sent around by the city provides the necessary info…

At last night’s meeting, the Decatur City Commission agreed to add an agenda item to the October 22nd meeting that would entertain a moratorium on single family home demolition and tree removal (in excess of 12-inches at chest height) from October 22nd to January 24th.

The mayor pointed out that the city commission doesn’t normally give so much notice on an action item, but “…we did it tonight because this is stepping way out of our normal range of options.”  He also noted that the moratorium was needed to limit an extended flurry of activity surrounding these two actions between now and the first stage of the Unified Development Code is set to be completed in January.

City Manager Peggy Merriss said that the details of the moratorium would be available for viewing by the end of the week.

Proponents on both sides of the issue showed up to state their positions on the subject.  Decaturish has a good report of how things played out.

After another pre-commission meeting work session to discuss the City Schools of Decatur proposed bond fund to renovate the middle school and high school, As Scott reported in a comment last night…

The Mayor introduced a closing resolution deferring the bond vote for a year and proposing a joint city/CSD committee to explore the less discussed economic “ripples” beyond hard costs — the Freakonomics, so to speak — that may accompany significant system growth. It passed 5-0.

As you can view on the City’s website starting at around the 12 minute mark HERE, Mayor Baskett pre-empted his resolution stating “The school board has very serious issues, and it hasn’t got an easy solution. That said, we have to find a way to work with the school board to move this community forward…”

According to the resolution, blue ribbon committee would be charged with developing a broad-based community education effort estimated student enrollment trends, municipalization and annexation, the impact of commercial and multifamily redevelopment, the facilities master plan, and other topics to be identified by the committee.  The committee would also be charged with developing a process to gather survey and other data that would reflect community opinions for financing improvements AND consideration of financing options.

The commission then talked a bit about next steps and how the blue ribbon committee would be formed, but came to no immediate consensus, as they realized that they needed to speak with the

Over on Decaturish, Dan Whisenhunt has some additional comments from Mayor Baskett after the meeting and a copy of the actual resolution, which the Mayor read in full at the meeting.