Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
Pictured from L-R Michael Paris, President & CEO of Council for Quality Growth Amy Clear, Coxe Curry & Associates Penny Warren, Committee Member David Schwickerwrath, Committee Co-chair & Vice-Chair of The Extension Board of Directors Kim Gresh, Committee Co-chair, Owner & President of SA White Oil Company Dr. Michael Unger, West Cobb Psychiatry, LLC, Board member Renee McCormick, Director of Community Relations, The Extension Skip Harper, Board Chair of The Extension Dan Priester, Coxe Curry & Associates
Submitted information and photo:
On Friday, April 1st, 2022, The Extension celebrated the groundbreaking ceremony for its new men’s campus in Marietta. Members of The Extension’s board and staff, donors, community leaders, and friends of the nonprofit gathered to mark the start of construction on the 22,000 square foot facility. The nearly one-hundred-year-old building that has served as the first permanent home of The Extension will be torn down to make room for the new building located on Church Street Extension. The new men’s facility will include a 56-bed dormitory with meeting rooms, recreational areas, and a cafeteria. The building is scheduled to be completed in the fall of 2023 and will increase The Extension’s capacity to help men struggling with homelessness and substance abuse in our community by seventy percent.
In 2021, The Extension served more than 330 clients, providing a lifeline to men and women who desperately wanted to reclaim their future from chemical dependency. With their current facilities at maximum capacity, The Extension had to turn away more than 500 individuals (65% of them men) to an uncertain and often perilous future. To meet the community’s growing need for services, The Extension’s Board of Directors and Capital Campaign Committee launched the Building Solutions capital campaign in 2020 to raise funds for a new men’s facility. According to Capital Campaign Committee Co-chair Dave Schwickerath, “Almost every donor to our campaign has been touched by someone they know affected by addiction. Almost everyone we asked to contribute has stepped up to help.”
The Extension’s Building Solutions campaign launched with a lead matching gift of one million dollars from AssuranceAmerica. This company’s support served as the single largest private gift in the organization’s history and set the tone for the campaign’s fundraising success. Guy Millner, AssuranceAmerica’s Executive Chairman and Founder, stated, “We are so excited to be a part of this remarkable progress. This team is doing incredible work, truly transforming lives, and we are thrilled to be a part of it. Now we want other companies and family foundations to join in to help this team of strong change agents say yes to those people waiting to join the program. Congratulations to all involved at The Extension for making a difference every day.” AssuranceAmerica has a proven history of charitable activities, giving 5 percent of its annual pre-tax earnings to The Extension and two other organizations that serve the local homeless population in Atlanta and Tampa. The Building Solutions campaign has raised nearly 90% of its fundraising goal and is on track to complete the campaign this year thanks to the remarkable generosity of the community.
For further information about The Extension, click here.
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
Early voting has ended in a special election for Georgia House District 45, and final balloting will take place Tuesday.
Eligible voters in the current District 45 boundaries—not the new lines that will be in effect for the May 24 primary—will be able to vote at their normal precincts on Tuesday.
The polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Absentee ballots also must be returned by 7 p.m. Tuesday.
Cobb Elections has more information on who is eligible to vote in the special election, what the current District 45 boundaries look like, and how you can check your registration status.
The Cobb Elections office said there are 12 precincts with voters who are eligible to vote in the special election:
As of Thursday, Cobb Elections said 1,861 people have voted in the special election in person. A total of 204 absentee ballots have been accepted.
The “jungle” special election includes three Republican candidates and one Democratic candidate who are vying to fill the remainder of the term of former State Rep. Matt Dollar.
If the leading candidate does not get a majority of the votes, there will be a May 3 runoff.
Dollar, a Republican who had been in office since 2003, resigned Feb. 1, and his successor will serve only through the end of 2022.
The Republican candidates are former State Rep. Mitchell Kaye and Darryl Wilson and Pamela Alayon, both of whom have been involved in Cobb GOP activities.
The Democratic candidate is Dustin McCormick, a project manager at McKesson.
Kaye and McCormick have both come out publicly against East Cobb Cityhood; Dollar has been the chief sponsor of a Cityhood bill that passed the Georgia legislature calling for a May 24 referendum.
McCormick is the only candidate in the special election who has qualified for the primary election in the new District 45. Current State Rep. Sharon Cooper of District 43 and Carminthia Moore have qualified as Republican candidates.
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
Next Sunday, The Art-Place Mountain View (3330 Sandy Plains Road) will mark its 30th anniversary with a free celebration for the community.
The event takes place from 6:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. and will include a gallery exhibition, music, a pottery demonstration, food and a theatre performance.
No reservations are required and all members of the public are invited.
The Art Place is a service of the Cobb Department of Parks, Recreation and Cultural Affairs that offers a wide variety of arts classes and leases art and theatre space for community organizations.
Activities include summer camps for children and performances of the Center Stage North Theatre, a community theater group.
Cobb County converted restaurant space in East Cobb into an arts center in 1986, opening the Steeple House Arts Center the following year at Johnson Ferry Road and Paper Mill Road.
But demand for arts programming grew quickly, and the county embarked on building a larger facility that became The Art Place.
The volunteer support group Mountain View Arts Alliance was formed in 1993 to partner with The Art Place for programming, events and outreach.
The facility currently serves 20,000 members of the public on an annual basis, and holds a number of other community events.
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Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
Residential property values in Cobb are expected to rise by 13.15 percent in 2022.
Cobb Tax Assessor Stephen White is predicting that the county’s tax digest will grow by more than 10 percent this year, the first double-digit yearly increase in more than two decades.
In a release issued by Cobb government, White said that the projected rise of 10.49 percent is based on an additional $5 billion increase in the value of residential, commercial and personal property as of March 31.
That includes a predicted growth of 13.15 percent in residential values, an increase of 6.56 precent in commercial values and 0.83 percent more in personal property values.
The tax digest is the overall value of property—real and personal property, motor vehicles and public utilities—adjusted after such things and homestead exemptions and the senior school tax exemption.
For 2022, the tax digest is projected to be a record $48.4 billion. The 2021 tax digest is $36.1 billion.
In a statement accompanying the county release, White said that due to the strong real estate market in Cobb “it is apparent we need to make changes to values that are reflective of what properties are worth. Many neighborhoods have properties selling for more than our value. The majority of our residential properties will see an adjustment in their Fair Market Value on their assessment notice because our value for last year is no longer reflective of what properties are worth.”
The final 2022 tag digest numbers will be revealed in July. Residential assessment notices go out to Cobb homeowners in May and commercial assessments are issued in June.
White’s prediction comes as Cobb commissioners are bracing for a summer budget season.
In recent weeks, they’ve been hearing budget requests from department heads that total around $1.2 billion, an increase of nearly $180 million more than the current fiscal year 2022 budget.
Much of that comes from combined requests to add nearly 700 county employees to address staff shortages in a number of departments.
Only four new full-time positions were filled in the current budget and none were approved for FY 2020.
Commissioners are expected to adopt a fiscal year 2023 budget by the end of July.
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Work crews were putting the finishing touches on the newly reopened Willeo Creek Bridge Friday, 10 months after it closed for an overhaul.
There were construction trucks on the Cobb County side of the bridge and the roundabout linking Azalea Drive in Roswell with Lower Roswell Road and Timber Ridge Road when we drove by.
A few pedestrians were making their way along the expanded multi-use trails on either side of the $3 million bridge, which replaced a 60-year old bridge.
The joint project between the City of Roswell and Cobb DOT was delayed several times by the contractor.
Originally set to reopen last September, the bridge reopening was pushed back to last December, then March 2022 when Baldwin Paving Co. said it couldn’t meet that deadline.
The county threatened to issue fines for any further delays. On Wednesday, with just a day left in March, all forms of traffic reopened, just in time for spring break for the Cobb school district and the start of a busy spring and summer season for recreational activities along the Chattahoochee River.
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Cobb commissioner JoAnn Birrell got in touch to let us know a few more details of the start of the demolition of the Sprayberry Crossing Shopping Center.
Birrell said that process will start at 1 p.m. and that the public is invited.
Joe Glancy of the Sprayberry Crossing Action Facebook group that’s been pushing for redevelopment of the blighted retail center posted on Wednesday that fencing is starting to go up around the property that will become a mixed-use development.
“Cut throughs connecting Post Oak Tritt to East Piedmont will no longer be possible,” he said.
Construction on a project to include senior apartments, townhomes and some retail is expected to begin in August.
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
The following Cobb food scores for the week of March 28 have been compiled by the Cobb & Douglas Department of Public Health. Click the link under each listing for inspection details:
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
Earlier this week we saw not one, but two, giant signs against the May 24 East Cobb Cityhood referendum that were posted along the edges of the East Cobb Crossing Shopping Center.
They were produced by the East Cobb Alliance, the main group opposed to cityhood, and were planted in prime viewing range in the heart of the community—the Roswell Road and Johnson Ferry Road corridor.
But the Alliance noted in a Facebook post Wednesday night that the signs will have to be removed because “there was an internal miscommunication with the property owner/manager.”
The message didn’t indicate what the miscommunication was.
East Cobb Crossing is managed by The Shopping Center Group, and recently it welcomed a new Publix store.
East Cobb News has left a message with The Shopping Center Group seeking more information.
The sign above fronts Roswell Road at the intersection of East Cobb Drive; another is adjacent to Dick’s Sporting Goods on Johnson Ferry Road.
The Alliance has been handing out smaller signs with a similar design that have been placed in residential yards.
There are a few along Robinson Road and the Chimney Springs subdivision, as well as Indian Hills.
Some pro-cityhood signs were spotted along Paper Mill Road in the Atlanta Country Club area.
Representatives for the Committee for East Cobb Cityhood and the East Cobb Alliance will be squaring off in debates: April 19 by the East Cobb Business Association, and May 4 by the Rotary Club of East Cobb.
As for the East Cobb Crossing signs, the Alliance is asking that “if you have locations for these bold beauties let us know.”
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Cyclical school enrollment growth patterns that began in Cobb County in the 1950s are continuing again, according to demographic projections prepared for the Cobb County School District.
After decades of continuing growth, enrollment projections for public schools in East Cobb are expected to remain relatively stable in the near future.
A demographic report presented to the Cobb Board of Education in February showed that areas of the highest growth in Cobb County continue to be in the Smyrna and South Cobb areas.
That’s the focal point of new and near-future construction projects in the Cobb County School District.
Pockets of increasing enrollment in East Cobb have resulted in expansions and new classroom space in selected schools.
The newly adopted Cobb Education VI SPLOST calls for the replacement of the main classroom building at Sprayberry High School, as well as expansions and additions at Dickerson and Dodgen middle schools, and Bells Ferry, Kincaid, Mt. Bethel, Murdock, Sope Creek and Tritt elementary schools.
Dr. James Wilson, a former Cobb and Fulton superintendent, told school board members in February that Cobb County is back to where the suburbanization trends began in the 1950s.
“It just moved around,” Wilson said. “It has moved all the way around, and it has moved back to the south.”
The counterclockwise trends then shifted to East Cobb through the 1980s and then to North Cobb and West Cobb.
He showed a county land-use map showing that most of the undeveloped areas of Cobb are in western and southern areas. Cobb commission Districts 2 and 3, which include East Cobb, have less than 5,000 acres of undeveloped land combined.
“We’re running out of land,” Wilson said, noting that continuing the kind of large-scale residential development of previous times, including Chimney Lakes in East Cobb “is just simply not there.”
He cited 2020 Census statistics showing a sharp drop in county permits from the start of the economic recession in 2007.
“We’re not going to get back to the building of 2003 and 1998 and so on,” Wilson said.
Wilson also showed board members a chart (above) breaking down school-age groups in each high school cluster, with the Campbell High School attendance zone experiencing the biggest increases.
These figures too are based on 2020 Census data; the high numbers of ages 15-19 in the North Cobb zone are because of students enrolled at Kennesaw State University.
“This allow us to plan accordingly, Cobb Superintendent Chris Ragsdale said during the presentation, “where we might need a new high school, a new elementary school, and what the trend is telling us about families.
“They may start out in one area and then relocate to a different area. So this is very important data for us to be able to utilize.”
Wilson also showed enrollment figures by school from the start of COVID-19. The Cobb school district enrollment has fallen to around 107,000 from the nearly 112,000 students pre-pandemic.
You can watch a replay of the enrollment presentation by clicking here and then going to the Feb. 10 work session; the presentation begins around the 53-minute mark.
The tables below show five-year enrollment figures at East Cobb schools, starting with the disrupted 2019-20 school year, including the present 2021-22 school year, and projections for the 2023-24 school year.
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The Cobb County School District is continuing online registration for kindergarten and first grade for the 2022-23 school year.
There’s a special link to sign up for students who are new to the district. For parents who already have a child in the district, they can use their ParentVue accountto register additional new students.
The parents of new students must provide the following information:
Proof of residency: Home ownership documentation or lease/rental agreement; and current utility monthly statement;
Certificate of Immunization (Form #3231): Available from a Georgia physician or the Cobb and Douglas Public Health Department;
Certificate of Vision, Hearing, Dental, and Nutritional Screening Form 3300B:Available from a Georgia physician or the Cobb and Douglas Public Health Department and must be dated within 12 months of the first day of school;
Proof of Birth Date: The school will accept one of the following documents: a certified copy of Birth Certificate, Military ID, Passport, Adoption Record, a religious record authorized by a religious official, an official school transcript, or an affidavit of age;
Social Security Card or CCSD waiver Form JBC-4: The state will require the social security number for students applying for the HOPE scholarship.
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
Cobb Police said a woman and her dog were killed after they were struck by a pickup truck as they were crossing Sandy Plains Road near Sprayberry High School Monday night.
Police said the woman was walking her dog around 9:13 p.m. at the intersection of Sandy Plains Road and Whitlock Road when she crossed into the path of a Ford Ranger heading south on Sandy Plains.
The woman and dog were both killed on impact, according to police, who have not released her name pending notification of kin.
Police said the driver of the Ford Ranger, Robert Liebmann, 53, of Marietta, was not injured.
Police are asking anyone with information about the crash to call 770-499-3987.
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Pictured L-R: JR Connolly, Connolly Investments; Bob Ott, former Cobb County Commissioner; Mike Servold, VP of Operations, Kroger; Jerica Richardson, Cobb County Commissioner; Victor Smith, President, Kroger Atlanta Division; Ruben Fernandez, VP of Merchandising, Kroger; Patti Rice, Powers Ferry Corridor Alliance; Henry Simpson, Project Manager, Kroger; Brandon Ashkouti, Eden Rock Real Estate Partners; Paul Harrell, Robertson Lois Roof Architects.
The centerpiece of the MarketPlace Terrell Mill mixed-use project will be under construction soon.
Kroger held a groundbreaking celebration Tuesday for its planned superstore at 1310 Powers Ferry Road.
It’s on the site of the former campus of Brumby Elementary School, and is the last component of the development to get underway.
Cobb Commission Chairwoman Lisa Cupid, current commissioner Jerica Richardson and former commissioner Bob Ott were on hand, as were representatives of the Powers Ferry Corridor Alliance.
The Kroger store will total 90,000 square feet and will include a gas station. Completion is expected by March 2023.
Inside the store the features will include a cheese shop, expanded deli offerings, grocery pickup and self checkouts.
It will replace the Kroger store at Powers Ferry and Delk Road.
“This new store signifies Kroger’s ongoing commitment to the community and to the ongoing economic prosperity of the region,” said Felix Turner, Kroger’s manager of corporate affairs for the Atlanta division.
Kroger received $35 million tax abatements from the Development Authority of Cobb County, but a Cobb judge rejected issuing those bonds after a legal challenge from Larry Savage, an East Cobb resident who has run for Cobb commission chairman.
But in 2019, the Georgia Supreme Court upheld the issuing of the bonds. Kroger had indicated it might pull out of the project if it didn’t get the tax breaks.
The 23 acres at the southwest intersection of Powers Ferry Road and Terrell Mill Road was rezoned for the mixed-use project in 2018, and regarded as a transformational redevelopment in the community.
In addition to a 289-unit apartment building, the $120 million MarketPlace Terrell Mill development includes retail and restaurant space.
Among the new business there is a Regions Bank, Lush Nail Salon and Ideal Dental. Restaurants include Chick-fil-A, Panera Bread, Wendy’s and Los Abuelos Mexican Grill.
The first building to be completed in the complex is Extra Space Storage, a self-storage facility.
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Cobb Commission Chairwoman Lisa Cupid will deliver the annual State of the County address on Thursday.
The event typically has been sponsored by the Cobb Chamber of Commerce but this year she opted for it to be conducted independently by county government.
The address comes as Cobb commissioners and county government officials are preparing for budget season—Cobb’s fiscal year starts on Oct. 1—and with four cityhood campaigns on elections ballots this year.
County department heads have been submitting their budget requests in recent weeks, and their requests total around $1.2 billion, an increase of nearly $180 million more than the current fiscal year 2022 budget.
Much of that comes from combined requests to add nearly 700 county employees to address staff shortages in a number of departments.
Only four new full-time positions were filled in the current budget and none were approved for FY 2020.
Cobb officials also have been addressing the three cityhood referendums coming up on May 24, including East Cobb, Vinings and Lost Mountain, and a likely referendum in November in Mableton.
At a town hall meeting last week at the Sewell Mill Library, they repeated estimates that if all four cityhood referendums pass—affecting more than 200,000 people, more than a quarter of Cobb’s population—the county would lose an estimated $41 million a year.
In April, Cobb commissioners will get a preview of the 2022 county tax digest, which typically is formalized in July as they are completing budget adoption.
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
The Merchants Walk Chevron station building before it was demolished in 2021.
What had been the site of a longstanding Chevron gas station at one of East Cobb’s busiest intersections may soon house an oil change business.
Valvoline Instant Oil Change has requested a site plan revision from the Cobb Board of Commissioners to develop the acre lot for a 2,088-square-foot oil facility.
Filings with the zoning office indicate the facility will have three bays and will have right-in and right-out access only on Roswell Road (see rendering at the bottom).
There also will be landscaping a trash enclosure and 15 parking spaces.
Since rezoning isn’t required, the application doesn’t have to go to the Cobb Planning Commission. But county commissioners must approve changes to site plans.
Commissioners approved general commercial rezoning for the property in 1999, and it’s been the site of gas stations since the early 1970s.
The Chevron station closed in late 2020, and was demolished in early 2021, not long after we stopped in and snapped the above photo.
The Valvoline filings and county property tax records indicate that the two parcels making up the 0.95 acres have a combined appraised value of $822,240.
The owner of a 0.89 acre tract in that assemblage, Ruth McLaughlin, also owns 0.71 acres directly behind it that’s valued at $1.24 million.
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The debut food truck lineup includes Island Chef (Caribbean items), Willie B’s Sisters (soul/comfort food), Baltimore Crab Cake ATL and Hermanas Italian Ice.
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
Money Smart Week 2022 will be held Saturday, April 9 – Saturday, April 16. This week-long free virtual programming provided by governmental, non-profit, and educational institutions will focus on supporting the needs of low-to-moderate income households to encourage greater financial well-being in our communities.
This year’s line-up includes:
Monday, April 11: 2 pm: Spend Smart. Eat Smart, Iowa State University Extension and Outreach (register here)
Tuesday, April 12, 2 pm: Credit: Build & Improve It!, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (register here)
Wednesday, April 13, 2 pm: Buying or Refinancing a Home: Options & Tools, North West Housing Partnership (register here)
Thursday, April 14, 2 pm: Social Security: Understanding Retirement, Spouse, & Survivor Benefits, Social Security Administration (register here)
View more details at www.moneysmartweek.org. Registration is advised. Questions for the panelists can be submitted during the registration process.
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
Cobb communications director Ross Cavitt (at lectern) reads questions for department heads at the Sewell Mill Library.
The latest in a series of what Cobb government officials are calling objective “information sessions” about four cityhood referendums came to East Cobb this week.
One of those referendums will take place May 24 for a proposed City of East Cobb, which was the focus of a town hall Thursday at the Sewell Mill Library and Cultural Center.
(You can watch a replay of the nearly hour-long town hall at the bottom of this post.)
Commissioners JoAnn Birrell and Jerica Richardson, whose districts include East Cobb, also attended, but they spoke only briefly, saying they can’t publicly take a position.
“I encourage you to ask the hard questions,” Richardson said, “because this is about your future. We want to make sure that you’re equipped with the information that you need so you can make the best decision for you and your family.”
She said she didn’t know at the time that she was supposed to have been impartial, although county officials typically have been mum on other referendums, including Special Local Option Sales Tax (SPLOST) extensions.
Cobb finance officers estimate the county could lose more than $41 million in annual revenue if all four cities—East Cobb, Lost Mountain, Mableton and Vinings, totalling more than 200,000 people—are created, with only a few hundred thousand dollars in savings.
Of that, around $23 million of that would come out of East Cobb, which unlike the other proposed cities wants to provide police, fire and E911 services.
That was the subject of many of the audience questions read by Cobb communications director Ross Cavitt.
Cobb public safety department heads repeated many of the same points they made at a March 10 town hall, saying the East Cobb financial feasibility study has incomplete information.
They said that transferring equipment and facilities and mutual aid agreements would have to be negotiated, and response times and fire insurance rates would likely rise for those living in a city of East Cobb.
Interim Cobb Police Chief Scott Hamilton said that response times vary, depending on what kind of call is dispatched, but that a “city would probably have fewer officers for major calls.”
Interim Cobb Police Chief Scott Hamilton, left, and Cobb Deputy Fire Chief Michael Schutz
Michael Schutz, the deputy Cobb Fire Chief, noted a recent house fire in Indian Hills that prompted a response from nearly 30 personnel and several engines and trucks.
In rattling off the staff and equipment at the two proposed East Cobb fire stations (currently Cobb 15 and 21), he said the numbers don’t come close to that total.
The East Cobb city hall would be located at the East Cobb Government Service Center, and a question was asked about how much it would cost to transfer that facility.
Cavitt read a statement prepared by the Cobb County Attorney that state law specifies only two hard figures about transferring county properties to a new city—$5,000 for a fire station (minus engines and other equipment) and $100 an acre for public park land.
After the town hall, Sarah Haas, a member of the Committee for Cityhood in East Cobb, took issue not only with some of the county finance and staffing estimates, but also with the scope of the county’s information campaign (including an online resource page).
“It’s hard for me to believe that this information is purely educational,” she said. “I get the sense that they’re trying to instill fear, uncertainty and doubt, more than to provide information.”
Haas said the “financials don’t pass the smell test,” including county estimates that fire expenses in East Cobb would come to $12 million (the cityhood group’s financial study estimates an annual fire department budget of $5.7 million).
She said that previous cityhood efforts have always come with issues to be hammered out during a two-year transition period, including finances. A feasibility study provides only an outline for what a future city might provide.
“I’d love to have a crystal ball and say that this is what we should create as a budget,” said Haas, who led the cityhood group’s recent town hall meeting.
“There are always going to be unanswered questions about cityhood. We’re doing our best job to educate people about the benefits of a city.”
He’s concerned about high-density development issues that have prompted all four cityhood campaigns in Cobb County.
A member of the Cobb Neighborhood Safety Commission, Smith said he’s perplexed about the addition of public safety services in East Cobb, which also would provide planning and zoning and code enforcement services.
But he said recent zoning decisions on the Cobb Board of Commissioners—including the East Cobb Church mixed-use development and a controversial rezoning around Dobbins Air Base that resulted in an unusual land swap—have led to him support cityhood.
“It’s about having local control of zoning,” Smith said, adding that Cobb’s building codes are also a problem.
Smith said given recent developments, it’s crucially important to have a more locally focused governing body writing those codes to retain East Cobb’s suburban character and control how redevelopment—commercial and residential—is handled.
Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!
