NOV. 25 - DEC. 8, 2016
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On Our Borders Editor’s Note: News knows few borders. Here are some of the local news stories from neighboring communities that may be of interest to Buckhead residents.
EXEC UTIVE PA RK RESI DEN TS SEEK A N NEXATI ON I N TO BROOK HAVEN
The sweet smell of baking bread wafts from EPI Breads and greets visitors to the Executive Parkview Townhomes. The bakery on Tullie Circle is just north of the Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta office park in Brookhaven’s city limits. The town homes, surrounded by trees on Woodcliff Drive and within yards of CHOA, are in unincorporated DeKalb County. Residents are hoping Brookhaven City Council will close the gap by approving a requested annexation. “Nobody knows we’re back here,” said Rick Bennett, HOA president for Executive Park Townhomes. “We’re a secret.” Seeking to be annexed into Brookhaven along with Executive Park Townhomes are the Executive Park Apartments on Briarcliff Road, the Executive Park Condominiums on Executive Park Lane and two single-family homes at 1705 and 1721 Woodcliff Drive NE. The two houses have been purchased by a developer seeking to have the property redeveloped into nine townhomes. A recent request to the DeKalb County Board of Commissioners to rezone the property for multi-use homes was deferred. The total annexation area is approximately 19 acres and includes nearly 200 people. “This is completely resident-led, all done by volunteers,” Bennett said of the annexation request.
D UN WO ODY C I TI Z EN S ON PATROL FO R CE D EB U TS
Volunteers with Dunwoody Police Department’s Citizens on Patrol program hit the streets the morning of Nov. 15 ready to serve as extra eyes and ears for officers. “My father raised me to support the local police department … and it is incumbent on us as citizens to be involved and engaged,” said Wayne Radloff, a retired Navy captain and one of the first eight members of the program. Radloff, Ron Silvers, Jim Sturgis and Russ Thompson drove from City Hall in the program’s two new white vehicles, marked “Dunwoody Citizen Patrol” on the sides, to make their first solo patrols after weeks of training. “Since I’ve come to Dunwoody, I’ve heard about how much people here volunteer and this is a great example of that,” said Chief Billy Grogan, who announced the program in June. The volunteers are not police officers and do not carry weapons, Grogan said. They have undergone extensive classroom and field training with other officers so they can handle such responsibilities as directing traffic and conducting business and residential safety checks. Officer Mark Stevens, who helped organize the program and train the volunteers, said the slogan of the program is “See and Be Seen.”
PL A N TO REP LA C E SA N DY SPR ING S WEN DY ’ S WI TH BA N K BLA STED A S A NTI-PED ESTR IAN
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A plan to replace a Wendy’s restaurant on Roswell Road with a SunTrust bank was slammed by the city Planning Commission Nov. 17 as out of character with the pedestrian-oriented City Springs project across the street. In a 5-1 vote recommending denial of the project’s variances, the commission agreed with a city staff finding that called the bank and its drive-through a “detriment [to] the public good via perpetuating a pedestrian-hostile environment.” SunTrust next goes to the City Council for a final decision. The Wendy’s restaurant has operated for about 30 years at 6240 Roswell Road at the intersection with Johnson Ferry Road. SunTrust aims to demolish the restaurant and replace it with a branch bank relocating from 5898 Roswell Road at the Cliftwood Drive intersection. Bank officials declined to say what would happen with the bank’s current location. SunTrust spokesperson Katie Lopez said the proposed relocation is “a natural part of ensuring that SunTrust is able to maximize its market opportunities and meet the needs of clients in an efficient and effective manner. The 6240 Roswell Road location provides the convenience our clients want, while also allowing us the space that better fits our needs.” City Springs, under construction on the other side of Johnson Ferry, is the city’s massive mixed-use development. It will include a theater, a new City Hall, shops and apartments, all tied into a larger master plan for a walkable, denser downtown. SunTrust’s project requires variances, according to city planning staff members, for the property’s two driveways — which lose any grandfathered status due to the new project — and for a proposed drive-through ATM structure separate from the main
bank building. SunTrust attorney Den Webb claimed that “we don’t think we need variances at all,” triggering some confusion as to whether he was challenging the commission’s ability to hear the case. Webb then argued that SunTrust deserves the variances from the “hardship” of designing the separate drive-through because it is safer for walk-in customers than putting drive-through lanes closer to the building.
G O O G LE FI B ER INS TA L L ATI O N IN B R O O KHAVEN DEL AY ED O V ER HUT S I TE
Nearly a year after the Brookhaven Zoning Board of Appeals denied Google Fiber’s request to build a utility hut in Parkside Park, a place to put the building still has not been located. Mayor John Ernst told residents attending his town hall Nov. 17 that the search for an alternative site for the utility hut to service the south side of the city is still underway. “The city is working really hard … so the south side can have some connectivity,” Ernst said. “I’m on a first-name basis with Google Fiber Georgia now.” While the technology has advanced in the past several months, Google Fiber still needs to build a 10-foot tall barbed-wire fence surrounding the building, Ernst said. Last December, the ZBA denied Google Fiber’s request to build the utility hut in Parkside Park, a narrow strip of greenspace running along Dresden Drive between Apple Valley Road and Parkside Drive. Google Fiber’s system requires a number of utility huts in central locations. In Brookhaven, the city agreed to provide space for two huts in public parks. One in Blackburn Park is finished. The other was to be built in Parkside Park, next to a DeKalb County fire station at the park’s western end. But the city later learned it did not own the strip of land there.
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