Eastside Church senior-living proposal delayed to August Archives

A proposed senior-living complex at Eastside Church will not be heard again until August at the earliest.

The Cobb Planning Commission delayed the application in June for another month, but the church’s attorney has asked the Cobb Zoning Division for additional time.

The matter has been taken off of Tuesday’s Planning Commission agenda, according to filings this week, and is continued until Aug. 4.

Kevin Moore, who represents Eastside, said in a June 25 letter that the delay is needed to conduct a traffic study and to “evaluate comments received from a recent community meeting.”

That community meeting took place last week, after the Planning Commission heard from some nearby residents concerned about density, traffic, stormwater and other issues.

Eastside wants to build a 95-unit assisted living/memory care building and eight independent living cottages for seniors as part of its expanded church mission.

The main three-story building would have full services and amenities, including medical care and food service, as well as exercise and recreational space.

A retention pond would be landscaped and surrounded by a walking trail to serve the senior community, which would have 133 parking spaces.

Eastside would build, operate and maintain the complex, which it would run through a non-profit entity.

“We want to be good neighbors,” Eastside executive pastor Darrell Whipple told East Cobb News in outlining the proposal.

Lyndsay Webb, a nearby resident on Little Road, told East Cobb News this week that she attended the June 23 community meeting at Eastside Church, and that more than 50 people showed up.

She said most of those who spoke were against the proposal for some of the same reasons, and said the church didn’t adequately inform nearby residents of the Red Oak Park community and other neighborhoods about the plans.

“People were upset and they were emotional,” Webb said of the gathering, which included Cobb Planning Commissioner Deborah Dance.

Webb said that they wanted to know more about not only about the scale and size of the project, but how it will be paid for and run.

“What are they going to do with this and who are they giving it to?” she said.

Red Oak Park is an older neighborhood in East Cobb, built in the late 1950s and will smaller homes and smaller lots than newer subdivisions.

While some longtime residents there remain, Webb said many of the residents are like her and her family, raising children.

“There are lots of families in our neighborhood,” she said.

They have continuing issues over traffic and walkability on streets without sidewalks.

Also opposing the Eastside project is the East Cobb Civic Association, which balked at density levels in a single-family residential area that would come to 13 units an acre.