City of Sandy Springs

[ironchapman]

Well, the US Justice Dept. OK'd the vote on Sandy Springs next month. At least according to today's AJC Metro Section

This came after Civil Rights Activists protested incorporation of mainy white Sandy Springs saying that it would be racially unfari to mostly black southern Fulton (which, of course, is where some of the Sandy Springs' tax $$ goes).

P.S. Incorporated or not, Sandy Springs, you're a part of Fulton County whether you like it or not, so get used to it.

[paulblackgsx]

Metro Atlanta is bizarre in one undeniable way. A very small percentage of the metro population lives in the City of Atlanta, which is about 430,000 people. Metro Atlanta is around 4,600,000 or more, so that means the City of Atlanta has less than 10% of the metro's people in its boundaries.

It's not the only large metro where the city only holds 10% of the metros population. It's not very common, but it's not the only one.

[ironchapman]

I'll quickly call someone racist when I think racism is behind it. But it's pretty clear, this isn't a racism at work. This is a case of a wealthy enclave being used as a cash cow. I'm glad Sandy Springs is going to be become a city. I think it will actually get better, more dense, and more urban because if it too.

Just for the record, I was only summarizing an article. The situation with Sandy Springs is a difficult one. S It doesn't need to be used as acash ow, but S. Fulton needs money.

I am in favor of the city incorporating. That way, what's their money won't be used in other areas disproportionately to their own.

What to do with S. Fulton?

Incorporate it into its own community? A new Campbellton, perhaps?

Should Atlanta annex it?

Shoould Douglas County take it?

I could support either one of those.

[paulblackgsx]

Just for the record, I was only summarizing an article. The situation with Sandy Springs is a difficult one. S It doesn't need to be used as acash ow, but S. Fulton needs money.

I wasn't necessarily directing my response at you. Sorry if it got confused.

I would definitely agree that S Fulton could use an additional revenue stream and even some updated developments. They are coming, but slowly.

What to do with S. Fulton?

Incorporate it into its own community? A new Campbellton, perhaps?

Should Atlanta annex it?

Shoould Douglas County take it?

I'm not sure Atlanta should take it. I would support Atlanta annexing any area ITP, I'm not sure it would make sense for Atlanta to get involved with S. Fulton. The area just south of the city is low density mess and would be a drain on the city's budget, and the areas in southern southern Fulton county is a land of nimbyism. It's far from the core, and it would be difficult to garner support for the type of development that would be a benefit to the city. Personally, I'd much rather the city focus on it's redevelopment efforts than be concerned with getting more land.

Prehaps the best option would be to simply incorporate as much of Fulton as possible and let the individual commuities work within themselves to provide the funding and services needed.

I think the fact that the county is physically very long it will always be difficult to have a successfully system that is fair to all of the parties without more local government to support it. The idea of lots of cities doesn't bother me, the idea of lots of counties does.

[ironchapman]

So, S. Fulton should incorporate so it can work out its own problems?

That would make sense.

Just out of curiousity, if those two proposed towns in N. Fulton incorporate (I have another post on it), Sandy Springs incorporates, and S. Fulton incorporates, what would be left of Fulton?

In a sense, it would end up a municipalized county. However, some counties across the US are municipalized, too.

Another topic in this forum was on this.

[charlotte_bon_vivant]

This is all so funny... The reason Sandy Springs and other cities were unincorporated in the first place was because they cost the state more money than they pay out. (SS would pay out less tax dollars than, say, Macon yet consume more of the state's respurces...) If the disparity in how GA taxes are paid out to municipalities is not addressed, Sandy Springs will cause more problems than it is worth. The AJC has been framing the discusion around Atlanta and how this move would hurt Atlanta. They have yet to address how this will affect the state.

[cstivers78]

I think everything within I-285 should just all be incorporated into the city of atlanta.

[dixiecupdrinking]

All this talk about how "Atlanta should annex everything in Fulton County" or "everything inside 285" demonstrates a real ignorance of the region. There are several municipalities within 285 that are wholly independent of Atlanta, both legally and in identity. I promise Decatur does not want to be part of Atlanta; I imagine College Park, East Point, Hapeville, Clarkson, Doraville, and Chamblee all feel the same.

The idea of an Atlanta with city limits stretching the entire length of Fulton County is ABSURD. This city can barely get its crap together enough to handle what's going on within its (already sprawling) city limits. If anything I'd like to see the city of Atlanta contract to the most urban areas and have the fringe parts of the city incorporate separately. Let Buckhead become its own city and do its own thing, let the far-western part of the city do its own thing. Let Druid Hills, Sandy Springs, Brookhaven incorporate separately.

That would certainly highlight the urban issues plaguing the actual city core of Atlanta. The city population would probably fall by 100k. The discrepency between the central popualation and the metro population would skyrocket even more; instead of ~10% in the city we'd be looking at maybe 7-8%.

But I do agree that the widespread dominance of county government is a huge mistake that needs to change as the area moves away from its rural past. The most successful urban areas are composed of small, focused municipalities that cooperate, not enormous, nebulous, unaccountable county governments that don't.

[ironchapman]

I don't want to see ATL break up it's city limits into smaller municipalities...yet. It should keep the limits it has now and go no further if it's not going to annex anything. To break off places like Buckhead and West ATL would ruin what tax base the city has.

ATL is a developing city still. Not in the since of a city that can't sit still, which ATL is, but a city that has not fully matured. Give it some time, and it'll fill up in the central districts (Buckhead, Midtown, and Downtown). Once it densifies, then it can think about letting go of West ATL and so on.

Many cities have places that make people wonder why that neighbohood is part of a city. Up until recently, the NYC borough of Staten Island was mostly suburban (much unlike most parts of the other four boroughs). It didn't really seem to be that much of a part of NYC up until they built that nice bridge to it. Now it is starting to be really settled.

[Metroinspect.]

I think Atlanta would do alright strecthing it's city limits within I-285

[ironchapman]

That would be nice to see, I guess.

I just don't think Atlanta should give up its current city limits.

[Aessotariq]

So, what would the ramifications be, in any aspect you can think of (political, socioeconomic, taxes, etc) if any of the following are done (most of these have been brought up already):

• Atlanta annexes any unincorporated territory inside the perimeter (is there any left?) and within Fulton County

• The DeKalb portion of Atlanta is brought into Fulton County

• Remaining unincorporated territory within Fulton County either incorporates or becomes annexed by neighboring municipalities

• A new county is created for the "orphaned" areas of Fulton County (southwestern, especially) or that territory is brought into neighboring counties.

It would be interesting to compare these options, whether all or some are applied. I'm not 100% up to speed on local politics up there, so I'm curious what the you think and what kinds of sentiments would be aroused with these hypotheticals. The issues I tend to think about are service equality, fragmentation of emergency services, etc.

[ironchapman]

A large bit of South Fulton is unincorporated and rural. I'd say at least enough for Atlanta to double it's city limits...at least.

There is also a good bit of the land inside the perimeter that isn't incorporated, but belongs to an unincorporated settlement.

[dixiecupdrinking]

It's true that Atlanta could double its city limits by annexing parts of unincorporated Fulton, but to benefit whom? The furthest parts of Fulton south of the city run probably a good hour south of downtown, and are extremely sparsely populated. What services could the city of Atlanta offer them, and how could they possibly justify paying the additional taxes? Not to mention that those parts of south Fulton are for the most part rather poor and lacking in commercial activity -- I can't imagine Atlanta being interested in taking on the burden for what would certainly be a relatively small boost in the tax base.

As far as annexation the only thing that makes sense to me is if Atlanta could annex Sandy Springs. It's a dense area (by ATL standards) that is affluent, fairly close to the central city, and full of commercial activity. Of course, that's exactly why Atlanta wants to annex it, and Sandy Springs doesn't want them to.

The I-285 thing just seems silly to me. I guess I don't understand the need. I would like to see the unincorporated areas annexed by neighboring municipalities -- just not all by Atlanta. This is happening slowly but surely in north Fulton, mostly in the areas west of Alpharetta; I think if Johns Creek is not able to incorporate independently, everything east to Gwinnett county and north to Cherokee and Forsyth eventually will be part of Alpharetta or Roswell. Roswell already has annexed all the way to the Cobb border.

[Chris121091]

I was just curious, Are there sandy springs in SANDY SPRINGS?

[teshadoh]

I was just curious, Are there sandy springs in SANDY SPRINGS?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Once upon a time there were...

[ironchapman]

Isn't the vote tomorrow?

Anyways...City of Sandy Springs, here we come!!!!

[ryanmckibben]

We should know tomorrow night how the vote goes. The end is far from over though. The Fulton County Commission had already started laying the ground work for a lawsuit.The vote to look into a lawsuit was split along party lines.

Anyway, if the early voting is any indication, we will need to re-arrange the "largest cities" list.

[ATL4EVER]

What about the parts of Atlanta outside of the Perimeter?

[ryanmckibben]

I may be wrong, but I'm fairly confident that there are no areas outside 285 that are within city limits. There are areas that have an Atlanta mailing address outside the perimeter, but they are not technically part of the city.

[ATL4EVER]

This May not be the best picture for an explanation, but you can see that a small portion of Atlanta's city limits stretch outside of I-285.

[ironchapman]

So what are the results of the vote?

Fulton County is preparing a lawsuit against the new city, if the votes favor incorporation.

[Hybrid0NE]

At some point last night it was 94% in favor of incorporation. It was a done deal from the start. Now it's time to get the ball rolling on Milton and John's Creek.

[ironchapman]

^ Those are those unincorporated areas in North Fulton, right?

Any pics of them?

[Brian]

Why weren't every registered voter in Atlanta and Fulton allowed to participate in the vote? This would have helped to keep Sandy Springs unincorporated!