City Council - Regular Meeting

Thank you for joining us live for the City of South Fulton City Council Meeting. We are proud to introduce the leadership entrusted with guiding our city forward. Mayor Carmelitha Gumbs. District 1 Councilwoman, Dr. Catherine Rao. District 2 Councilman, Aaron V. Johnson. District 3 Councilwoman, Latonya Toni Wright. District 4 Councilman Jaycee Sebastian. District 5 Councilwoman and Mayor Pro Tem Keosha B. Bell. District 6 Councilwoman Natasha Williams-Brown. District 7 Councilwoman Linda Becker Pritchett. Supporting the work of this body and the operations of our city are City Clerk Corey Adams, City Manager Sharon D. Subedan, and Interim City Attorney Sarah Kelly. Thank you for being the best part of the City of South Fulton, a city on the rise.

All right, good afternoon. We will call the City Council Work Session for August the 11th, 2026 to order. Mr. Clerk, please sound the roll.

Good afternoon, Madam Mayor, members of council, and the general public. This is today's roll call. The Honorable Catherine F. Ryle, District 1. Present. The Honorable Aaron V. Johnson, District 2. Present. The Honorable Latonya Toni Wright, District 3.

Present.

The Honorable J.C. Sebastian, District 4.

Here.

The Honorable Keosha B. Bell, District 5.

Present.

The Honorable Natasha Williams-Brown, District 6.

Present.

The Honorable Linda Becker Pritchett, District 7.

Here.

And the Honorable Mayor Carmelita Gumbs.

Here.

Madam Mayor, you have a quorum.

All right. Thank you, Mr. Clerk. Just wanted to make the public aware, City Manager Subedan is online. And we have on the desk with us Assistant City Manager Mark Antoine Cooper. Antony, I'm sorry. Antony, make sure I get that right. So, thank you. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Next item is Roman Numero 3, City Manager's Items. City Manager Monthly Report by our City Manager, Sharon D. Subedan.

Good afternoon. Thank you. Mr clerk. Good afternoon. Mayor and council. The city manager's report has been submitted for your review and I also sent you an email earlier today regarding the comprehensive transportation plan for the South Fulton County area, which I know you many of you are interested in that is about to kick off. i wanted to remind you in case you haven't seen that email but um report is submitted and i am available to answer any of your questions okay looks like the queue is clear this time you have a question all right i will recognize councilwoman linda pritchett

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Miss Subedan, I would like, I guess, an update on the conclusion of the the business license amnesty program and how that worked out.

Sure, you're not the only one who was asked for that. We're compiling the information for you. I think that we didn't have a lot of businesses come into compliance during the amnesty, but what we did have, I think, is a lot of awareness. Many applications have come in. A lot of communication has gone out to the business community, so they are aware that they need to have a business license in the city of South Fulton. And we formulated a plan at a retreat. We talked about using a 3rd party upon further review. The 3rd party would not meet our needs. And so I think you are the 1 who suggested we should hire people. And I think that's the direction that we're going in. And so you'll see more of that in the fiscal 27 budget. which will be presented to you at the end of the month. And one of our new initiatives is going to be to hire a team to supplement business licensing so that we can more effectively respond to the significant amount of unlicensed businesses that are in our community.

Thank you, Madam Subedan. So we all, well, I can't speak for anybody but myself, and I've been getting phone calls from businesses all throughout this city. And I don't know what y'all exactly did when you implemented this plan, but what I do know is that there are a lot of people that are really confused. And some of us are confused. And I know that I asked for staff to be able to implement this process. And I think that it's very doable, even with the staff that we have. A lot of people are being directed to our city website. that people can't easily navigate and people can't find what they don't know that they need. And so my suggestion would be a streamlined process that is in writing. that go step by step and all the anticipated things and even other agencies that are involved and even probably a day where businesses can come in, even if it's a lunch and learn where businesses can come in and have those representatives like they're on site, you know, notaries, Fulton County, whoever, so that we can just get it done. And then also, for businesses to know, I just don't, what people say to me is they do not understand how a business does not know they need a license. But obviously, they really don't, because they're brick and mortar businesses, not just home-based businesses. They have no idea, or I don't know where they don't understand as part of the process, but I think we have to engage in a campaign to make everybody aware so that they'll become aware in a nice way instead of potentially being threatened with being shut down, which some of them should be. But, you know, for the good actors and the people who have submitted applications and not been able to get in contact with people on our staff, but are calling us. And I guess we work for everybody. So I think it's a doable process. And I'm looking forward to seeing it roll out really strong. But I want to make sure that the business owners know you need a business license. And if you don't have one, according to our charter, you will not be operating in this city's boundaries. And I don't think I'm incorrect by saying that. I yield.

All right. Thank you, Councilwoman Pritchett. I definitely agree because there are still quite a number of businesses that are out of compliance. What I did notice was Even during the amnesty program, that period, CDRA did host a really good event where a lot of businesses came out and they got that information, just as you said. So maybe they can do that again. I would like to definitely make sure code enforcement get their shout outs because they have been up and down cascade. They've been up and down on national. helping to get these businesses in compliance. So that's probably one of the big reasons why your phone is ringing, because I believe all of us have been getting it. I do believe that there's some attention that needs to be on how to get that, the business license, just updating them because they've operated out of compliance for so long. But I think CDRA is getting better. I also want to share that when we had our last council meeting, they are streamlining, you know, that they're moving to a process what i think um i don't want to misspeak but like maybe 48 hours going through that process so they're looking at those things and hopefully they'll get it in compliance i want to um take a moment and recognize councilwoman ralph yes this is just a quick question um and the city managers report um as it relates to animal control i think this is

a large number. The stray and loose animals, it was like 420 calls and 116 vicious animal complaints. Those numbers are slightly alarming. And I was wondering, what are we doing? Are they working with Fulton County to educate? Because we do have a vicious dog ordinance, if I recall. And so to the extent that we're educating, you know, animal owners about the ordinance, I'd be interested in and find out if these are repeat cases. So if we can get some analysis, and I know we may not have it, but if we could work with Fulton County to get it, I think it would be helpful.

Yes, I noticed it as well. And one of the complaints we have is they do count every call. So if they get 10 calls on the same animal, it counts as a call. But I'll see if there's a way for us to identify repeats. And code enforcement works closely with animal services. And so we will make sure that they're aware of our ordinances to make sure they're enforced. But I do believe that it is a lot of duplicated calls.

Okay. Since we pay a great deal to Fulton County for those animal services, I do hope they can use the technology to get better at it in terms of, you know, identifying with our repeat calls. I don't know if some technology or that does not make sense to me, but it's something I think we should at least look at and work at, because like I said, we pay the county good money for those animal control services. Thank you.

I would share that in that last meeting, that was one of the things that we brought up and they did say that they were going to start looking at that. But I agree. These repeat offenders, they shouldn't be charging us for that. And it was like, oh, well, we'll look at it because it's ridiculous. And, you know, everybody in South Fulton loses their dogs and cats and horses. Councilman Sebastian.

Thank you, Mayor. Madam City Manager, two quick questions. Was the contract for Cedar Grove Park finalized? And on also Wilkerson Mill Park, I thought we were talking at one point about installing EV chargers. Are we holding that, or what's the status on that one?

That's all I have.

Sorry, I was muted. I know we are working through the contract. Don't know that we have a signature on it. but we are working through that. And my understanding is it's over to the contractor. So it's on them now to sign and return it to us. I had put a hold on EV chargers because we were having so many problems with the ones we had installed and our partner Georgia Power was having problems with their contractor. And so they've subsequently moved to a different contractor. So I can circle back with you on continuing to expand our EV charging network. We have 70 of them out there now. And my understanding is that they have found a resolution. So we should be able to continue on. And we have two different options as it relates to EVs going forward.

Thank you.

And Georgia Power, you said, is our partner?

Yes, we have a partnership with Georgia Power for most of our charges called the Make Ready program. And so their subcontractor was failing to complete the process to get the charges online. they have subsequently moved to a different contractor and now the, the ones we have in partnership with them have been redone and are now coming online. But I had asked that we not add any more until we got to a resolution on the ones that were not working. So I think we're, we're in a better space now. And that, The third party is the ones who monitor the chargers. So it's a very important piece because at any given time, we would want to know which chargers are working, not working, being used, not used, when people stay beyond the timeframe that we allow. So that monitoring piece is very important. And that's the piece that they were having problems with their subcontractor on. But I believe they're working through to resolution.

Okay. Thank you so much. Councilwoman Natasha Williams-Brown.

NATASHA WILLIAMS- Yes, thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Ms. Subbanan, for your report. I actually wanted to switch over to the public works report, the section where there is the street sweeping, the street sweeper schedule. And I guess if you could just help maybe clarify how the scheduling is working because it seems like old national highway is only being done once a month from this report but i really thought that we had a national schedule to be done every two weeks so i'm gonna defer to dr cooper and see if he can help me with that

That's what I thought. Um, councilwoman, yes, public works just confirmed it was, it was being done weekly. So it's not every two weeks. It is being done weekly.

Okay. And so that's because when I, when I looked at this report and this could be like a, maybe I should have printed it out. Um, and it could be the way that it is laid out, but it looks like there's a street sweeper number two that's doing once a month, and then there's a street sweeper number one that's maybe doing once a month. But what's in this report appears to be only once a month, unless I just need to print this and look at it right ways up.

I will go back and kind of print it out and have it done that way, but it is weekly.

It is weekly. All right. Thank you.

Okay. I don't see any further council members in the queue. We'll close this out. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

That brings us to presentations. Our first presentation this evening, this afternoon, the Street Light program update. Antonio Valenzuela is the Director of Public Works Department.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council. Dr. Cooper, residents of the City of South Fulton. Antonio Valenzuela, Public Works Director. We are here this afternoon to present to you a briefing on the status of the master street plan for the city of South Fulton, which was approved on July 9, 2024. I'm going to let Jim Martinez follow through the presentation. Should you have any questions at the end of the presentation, we'll be glad to respond to anything.

GOOD EVENING, MAYOR AND COUNCIL. MY NAME IS JIM MARTINEZ, DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC WORKS. WE'RE GOING TO GO THROUGH A BRIEF PRESENTATION, AN UPDATE OF THE STREET LIGHT PROGRAM. THE MAIN PURPOSE IS TO HELP GUIDE FUTURE STREET INFRASTRUCTURE AND PROVIDE AN IMPLEMENTATION AND ACTION PLAN. The streetlight recommendations are based on the following, adding new streetlights to roads with poor illuminance, traffic volume, and pedestrian activity, adding supplemental streetlights to existing lights, and finally, all transportation projects that are being designed and constructed will meet complete street design guidelines. This means sidewalks, bridges, any intersection improvements will include streetlights as part of that project. The city's streetlight program illustrates a comprehensive approach. It combines strategic planning, community improvements, sustainable technology, a reliable maintenance to enhance public safety and quality of life within the city. Now I'd like to share with you locations where street lights are forecasted and installed to date. Staff has planned to install pedestrian lights along New Hope Road from Danforth to Campbellton Road. We have installed streetlights at the following locations, Green Tree Trail, Elba Drive, Bruce Place, Loch Lomond, Farley, Dove, and Zone Avenue, as well as within the subdivision, Cascade Hill subdivision. We do have plans to install streetlights along Campbellton Road from Union to Chattahoochee River and along East Stubbs from Damuni Road to Stonewall Tale. The streetlight program also includes new initiatives on solar, which will be good and beneficial to the city. We are forecasting to add 160 solar pedestrian lights along Enon Road from Lynn Arbor Lane to Sanford Jones. And upon approval of the contract with the solar company, we'll start installing those pedestrian lights. The proposed budget for 2027 is 3.5 million, and below is a breakdown of the cost. Out of that 3.5 million, we have committed approximately 2.7 million to Georgia Power and Greystone for the annual consumption, the solar initiative, streetlights along state routes, and pedestrian lights within the city. The remaining 800,000 will be put toward a priority list that was adopted from the Streetlight Master Plan, which you'll see within the next slide. As stated, this slide has a list of recommendations from the Streetlight Master Plan. from District 1 through District 7. Staff will move forward with this list as soon as we conclude the assessments for 2026. The list is fluid, so we still can add or modify, remove, or do what we need to do for additional recommendations. And for forecasting for 2028 and 2032, going forward is a list of other recommended locations. Again, this list is fluid, so we can add, subtract, and modify it at your leisure. And again, that concludes my brief presentation. I hope this was illuminating, and I stand ready for any questions.

say light it up light it up let me see the queue while we're uh positioning to get the council members in the queue i have a quick question what is the process for council members to submit new like different locations i think this is their first time all seeing this i'm not sure but what what would that process look like or how would they need to go ahead and start implementing

The best way for us is to go to Dr. Cooper. We will coordinate all efforts with him, making sure that we're online with the request. Sometimes we receive requests from the community as well. It goes through him, and then we'll go to the next steps, maybe Georgia Power, maybe Greystone, and so on.

All right, Dr. Cooper, if you could get that list out to these council members so they can see what's happening in their district and make some recommendations. All right, I will take this time to recognize Councilman Sebastian.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you guys for the report. I just have one area to mention that I think it's been part of some conversations, and that is the whole road street lighting around the schools. That has been something that's been pending for several, several years. I don't see it on this list, although I see things like in the general area. So thank you all very much. It's big and dark in this report. So if you guys need me to submit that as a new request formally, I would really like to do that. But I was hoping that it was on our radar now. I know there's a large community being built up there. So they have some additional lighting along Hall Road that they have installed. But I think an assessment to figure out if there are gaps up there probably needs to be done so we can address this. Because when football season is on, as you know, we have these big games by Langston Hughes up there, championship football team, by the way. And so it becomes a problem because I do get calls about how it's dark up there, especially during football season.

Yes, that's correct, Councillor Sebastian. As you know, Holy Road and Jones Road are being designed, those gravel roads, and as Jim mentioned to you, every project that we're doing within the city is complete street design, so street lights is part of that. But we will look in more detail at anything that we can do earlier than that.

CHAIR BAILET. Thank you. And that's what I was going to say, because I know we are going through the process eventually doing road work up there. But if there are any gaps that at least can ease the darkness a little bit for now, then sure. Thank you.

Councilwoman Linda Pritchett. Thank you, Madam Mayor.

Um, so on I think this is page eight. Um, I'm the only, I'm the only district that has no street names to it, you know? Um, and so, but there is a correction to be made in district five. It talks about Melanie court, Melanie lane. That's in district seven now and Pierce road. Um, from Mallory Road to Feldwood Road, that's in District 7 as well. And those people are really always mad at me about the issue of lighting and sidewalks. So at least I could have something under District 7.

Yes, we'll do.

Thank you. And so also, I do want to bring up that old Jonesboro Road, which like some of these streets, people just forget that like people live back there because it's so dark. So old Jonesboro Road, it's like really, really super duper dark where you just would say, oh, that's just the country. Nobody lives back there. But it's really, really dark. And Westbridge Road going into Fayetteville or Fayette County, that's also super-duper dark. And I know that those are feeders from Highway 138, Jonesboro Road, so that might be why as well. But my last question is, are the street lights some of them being considered or being funded from our pedestrian safety grant. I know we received a lot of money, and Ms. Subedan can answer this question if she's still online. On Beseda Road and Jonesboro Road, that was an area that before i even got here um that year that i was elected three people were killed there and one was a pedestrian that was walking in the dark towards dollar general and i know that that area also doesn't have sidewalks for some reason going into the dollar general and i think to this day if i drive up there at night i still can't the visibility is horrible and that's an area that even since then we've there was a a really bad accident on saturday and they're they're just constant accidents but the visibility is a it's terrible and i don't know that because this is a state highway, if this is something that has to be coordinated with GDOT in terms of lighting or if it doesn't.

Yeah. Can I weigh in, Mayor? Yes. Yes. So there are a couple of things that were not said that I think is important. And if you can bring the slide back up to the budget page, Jim, or stream team. So a few things. Let me start at the end, Councilwoman Pritchett. On state roads, yes, we do have to coordinate with the state, but they will not pay for the lights on the state roads. We have to get their permission And then we coordinate with Georgia Power or Greystone and with their permission, we can install lights. The challenge we had, and the other thing that wasn't said is if you noticed the street light assessment was done, I think in 2023, it was presented in 24 and you all adopted it in 2024. And so, I think it's important for people to have an understanding of how... Go back one slide for me, please. Nope. Other slide. Yeah. Nope. The slide with the budget. I think it's important for people to understand that we don't buy streetlights one time. We pay an annual consumption rate on streetlights when we coordinate with Georgia Power or Greystone. So that 1.6 and that 420,000, that's a $2 million annual expenditure. The Streetlight Master Plan are the projects that have been pulled from the study that are being done. That's going to be an additional $789,000 and so will the other $174,000. Overall, it will be an ongoing $3 million expenditure. As we expand It is an annual carrying cost that we will increase every year. So very specifically to answer your question, we cannot use grant funds for an expenditure that occurs every year. If we buy solar lights outright, we could use grant funds. The challenge with that is um the the magnitude of the cost it you know it is it is true over time it becomes a cost savings and it's a environmental benefit though it doesn't fit everywhere so i just want to manage expectations it is true that we can take all of your requests but we would have to identify a funding source or we would have to swap projects out And I just want to make sure that we kind of honor the streetlight master plan. But as counsel, you can always amend that plan and say, you know, this project takes precedent over that project. Let's do project A instead of project B. But I wanted you to understand, you know, whole study was done. We're responding to the study. And that is the that is the way we determine the projects that said we're happy to take your your request, and if you feel like something is a higher priority. We can we can take care of that and again apologies for any streets that are identified in the wrong district, this was done quite some time ago, we need to make those amendments.

Thank you, Ms. Subedan. So, um, I always say this, I'm the last with the least and it doesn't, I have a frown on my face and I just don't like how I feel when I see all this stuff and I just don't see things that represent my district. And it really, It really puts me in a place where I just don't know how else to emphasize that pedestrian fatality is something that I'm not going to have on my hands because I continue to sit here and talk and maybe I'm just talking to myself. Pedestrians fatalities have to be prioritized and lighting. I'm saying it in my opinion is a contributing factor to pedestrians fatality in district seven, primarily the state road, old national Jonesboro road, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I'd like to work on that. And I just wonder, when we receive a grant, from the federal government to address pedestrian safety, what are we supposed to spend that money on? Because I don't know what we're doing. Because people are still getting accidents. I see accidents all the time. There have been accidents where I can admit I've had to direct traffic and people laugh. But the thing is, if I didn't, people would just keep hitting the people who just got hit. You know, so it's a real problem, and we receive money to mitigate these problems, but yet I still see the problem happening, so I just don't understand, and I want to understand, but I really would like to see something that makes more sense than my understanding.

If I may, I'll just... Can I respond to the grant?

Yes, City Manager.

So the grant we received, the zero fatality grant we received is to develop a plan. I know you hate that, but that's just sort of how these processes work. It starts with a plan. No doubt in the plan it would identify, and that's what the grant was for. No doubt the grant will identify very specific things such as street lighting, traffic calming, sidewalks, ways we can improve pedestrian safety. Once we have that plan, then we can go after implementation money, which will be more tangible, allowing us to actually do things that, like you said, make sense. I don't disagree with you. I think we definitely have a concern across the board, not just pedestrian safety, but street safety in total. more traffic fatalities in our community than any of us feel good about. And so I hate that you feel like you're the last and the least. I don't believe that that's certainly not what I would want you to think. We have a lot of stuff going on in your district. But the grant we received is for planning. And the actual name of the the program is a vision zero master plan, a vision for zero fatalities on our streets. And once we have that, one, it helps us to prioritize, two, it helps us to go after grant funding to help us to improve safety on our roads in general to include pedestrian safety.

Can I be included in that plan? Can I have some input or participate in the planning of the plan?

Absolutely. Absolutely. Every plan that we do, we will make sure that you all are invited to participate. And when we do the comprehensive transportation master plan for South County, I also ask you to participate because that's where we can get GDOT to do more I know that we have some really hot spots and challenges in our community. And so this is our opportunity to get those things on the record in a permanent plan that the goal will be to also use that to press GDOT to invest in our community to help us with traffic and pedestrian safety.

All right. Thank you so much, Councilwoman and City Manager. Mr. Valenzuela wanted to respond. Did you want to continue?

I just wanted to add to give you a quick update that District 7 is not forgotten. We have designed and we're designing the side road for sidewalks. We will have the entire side road full of sidewalks in the next, I would say, three years, three, four years. You will have pedestrian lights and street lights at that location, as well as we have an upcoming roundabout for Bethsaida and Creel West Road that's also under the preliminary design. Nevertheless, Jonesboro Road at Bethsaida Road will have a roundabout. It's a little behind with Georgia DOT. And as you know, Old National Highway, the construction of the sidewalks has started. We still have some items to deal with, such as utility relocations that we've got to go. But our contractors have been instructed to follow until we hit those areas. So we have about seven poles that we have to relocate. And dealing with those utility companies, it takes a minute to get it done. They have to also design the relocations, acquire the rights away for them to relocate and so on. And most of the projects that we have, not just us, GDAT and any other municipality, that's the main reason why construction projects get a bit delayed.

CHAIRPERSON WONG All right. We appreciate you. Thank you for those comments. Councilman Johnson?

Thank you, Madam Mayor. First of all, thank you for the team working on this project. It's very timely. I think, you know, it's long overdue. Not any fault of the city's, of course, but just the mere fact that we're growing exponentially. And so we're having these roads that for years and years, nobody ever went down these roads. And now all of a sudden, you have two or three subdivisions on a road. So now you have to get the lighting. You have to do everything. Of course, everybody always wants the infrastructure put in first. Um, have it pristine and then put the houses in, but we know that's kind of not how it goes. So having a plan and continually working to try to keep up with everything that's going on, we really appreciate the work that you all do. Uh, the only was a couple of rows that I want to throw in, which whenever we're talking together, um, I'll include those, but let's also contemplate around Wolf Creek amphitheater, uh, as we're developing over there. Um, Some people may have gone to a concert or something the other night. It was a little dark. It's always dark. It's always dark when I go through there at night, especially if we can hopefully one day create something where it's a flow through Miles Road or something over there. But the traffic that goes through there is really dark, and especially since we have so many people walking down the street, going over to Camp Creek Church of God for parking, and even down just over to the, shooting range, people walking, you really don't see them. You might see a basket flying by or you see something, but it's very easy to not see people. And not to say that people partake in having spirits during the concerts. They may, you know, a lot can happen. contemplate that area, and I'll be, you know, more than happy to work with the entire team in looking at areas in District 2 and around the city for future lighting. Absolutely. But thank you.

All right. Good suggestion. Councilwoman Rao.

Thank you for recognizing me. A couple things. How do we know when streetlights are out?

That's a good question. Unfortunately, staff works from 7 a.m. to 3.30, and then some work to 12 o'clock. But the only way we can, we've been discussing with Georgia Power, Greystone, because they are the providers. They are the ones that should be letting us know that those lights are not working. But unfortunately, they don't have that system in place. We have discussed with them several times. And the only way to recognize what the light is working at night, and then we receive through cyclic fix or phone calls, or when we are around at night, that's when we report, honestly.

Yeah, I think, again, I'm back to technology. I don't know if we need to look at sensors or what, but I take a lot of calls about them. I tend to go, I'll put them into Georgia Power System when I know, you know, I think in maybe even educating the public. that these signs have a number. You can go in the system. So I believe in empowering our constituents so they can help us with this, because there's no way we will see every street light that's out. But I do believe at some point, I don't know if we do a night count or a night audit at some point, because there are a lot of lights that are out. And I was particularly thinking along the foot and industrial corridor on those side streets. a lot of those lights are out. And I think we could curb a lot of activity just by lighting things up. Another thing to piggyback on what Councilman Johnson said, I think if we look at the solar lights for behind the stage area at Wolf Creek, that would be helpful, because it's very dark where we park. So if we look at some kind of lighting solution there, it's very dark. And last but not least, can we confer with Gil Prado in the Food and Industrial CID in terms of lighting areas? I think it would be helpful. Um, you know, they have a good grasp, but you know, they had a whole public safety team. They may have some thoughts about where we can improve some light. And that was just a suggestion. Thank you. I don't have any further comment.

Thank you. And I do remember them installing solar lights behind, but just for the council, they said that the lights were out. So I know they were flickering this weekend. So if we can address that, that'll be great. Councilwoman Bell, Mayor Pro Tem.

Thank you, Mayor. I think you've answered a lot of the questions. I want to piggyback and I guess go back to the budget. I think on one of the slides you mentioned $3.5 million that will be used for this project.

Yes, that's the current budget, yes.

Okay. And so I do see a list, and I appreciate the District 5 streets, so thank you for that. A lot of that were many of my concerns and the concerns that I've received from residents, especially when we talk about Fieldwood area, Old Bill Cook, very dark. But I wanted to know, I know you said that there was a little bit of wiggle room to add additional streets, and so you mentioned something about $800,000 that may be?

Right, that's correct.

I just wanted clarification on the amount.

Yes, that's approximately like $788,000, $800,000 is a good number. So there's $788,000 approximately that I could add some more streets.

Thank you. That's funny.

All right, I can't remember who was next in the queue. All right, Councilman Sebastian.

Make sure you all resuscitate the city manager because I think she might have fainted. Thank you very much. Mr. Antonio, and of course for the recent work that you guys have been involved in in District 4. And thank you to Ms. Subedan and her team. I don't remember who was here in 23 when we started this study, but what I remember There was no solar option at all on that plan. And I remember being very adamant and saying, we have to do this because in certain areas, as the technology gets more affordable, it's going to be appropriate to use solar. So thank you guys much for doing that. And I always talk about other people's money. So we need to figure out how to get some additional monies from outside to help us with this. big 90 square mile city that have a lot of darkness in it. Right. Uh, well oftentimes said they have been a decades of, of this investment in this area and what is now our city. So it will take us time to dig out.

Okay.

Um, I want to point out something. South Fulton Parkway and Highway 92. It's a corner that is very, very dark. It's two state roads. And I'm not sure how we're going to press this with our GDOT folks and our state representative, but I think those are conversations that we need to have. in terms of lighting, because it's now crucial because two things. Grady is now there, and the bus now runs and stops in the area. So you're going to have more people on their feet and more pedestrians, and you're going to have more people trying to navigate across Highway 92 to get to that Grady site, workers and whatever. And then you may have people walking to get to the plaza up there now that the bus provides access, right? So I think it's a conversation that we need to bring up. I know you guys have a monthly meeting with GDOT.

Yes, we do.

Yep, so that's one of the areas. I heard loud and clear, even though they gave us the permission, we still have to foot the bill, but I think they can help us find some money to do it. And I will continue to say that, and I will lobby for that as hard as I can with the people that I know and I talk to at the state level.

Okay?

All right, thank you.

All right. Y'all are off the hot seat. Thank you so much for your presentation.

Yes, ma'am.

Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

That brings us to the second presentation, Overview of Proposed New Data Center Legislation by Interim City Attorney Sarah Kelly. Hi.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council, Mr. Clerk, Dr. Cooper. Welcome to the DS. They usually say attorneys shouldn't make promises, but I'm going to run the risk of making one and say that this presentation should be a lot shorter than the last one. Alright, so just a brief recap, we did have two subject matter experts present at the last council meeting, Miss Benoit, as well as attorney Bowen. So my presentation is more so focused on the actual proposed legislation and the differences between the previous ordinance and the ordinance that's before you. We're going to talk about the current moratorium, the trainings and considerations, what's new and navigating the law in general regarding data centers. So as you all are aware, there's a current moratorium, Resolutions 2025-94 and Resolutions 2026-43, both created those moratoriums. The moratorium is set to expire on September 9th, 2026. The purpose of the moratorium was in part to gather information around this burgeoning area of zoning, to make stable and predictable land use development and balance growth decisions, and of course, the public safety and welfare. So what has happened in that time? There's been quite a bit of internal consideration, particularly from the sponsors of this legislation. The sponsors of the proposed legislation have been very intentional in reviewing peer review pieces, receiving hands-on and targeted training, as well as including, but not limited to, navigating the regulatory landscape data center development hosted by the council for quality growth data centers powering georgia's digital future while balancing community needs hosted by the national forum of black public administrators made for this moment power policy and progress hosted by the 54th congressional black caucus annual legislative conference attendance at Science Georgia Conference concerning environmental justice and climate protection, where there were presentations by the Director of Data and Mapping, as well as presentations by Georgia Juan's Public Policy Director and the Georgia Public Service Commissioner, in addition to a plethora of conference workshops hosted by the National League of Cities and Georgia Municipal Association. Now, why am I going through this long list? Is it just to brag on our council people? A little bit. But it's to show that quite a bit of thought went into this legislation and quite a bit of expertise went into it as well. I also pulled this from our website. One of our core values is environmentalism. We act in a way that preserves and protects our environment and encourage environmentalism in our community. So what's new in the proposed legislation? Since we had the last meeting, the sponsors have met. I've met with the sponsors and we have made some additional changes to the proposed legislation that I wanted to get to right away. First and foremost, a half mile buffer has been moved to a quarter mile minimum setback from a residential and or mixed use. There has been a removal of the population correlation requirement and we've reduced the mandatory lot size from 20 acres to 10 acres. So here's the difference between the old ordinance and the new ordinance. The old ordinance, the data center, must have a 100-foot buffer from a residence. In the new ordinance, there has been a 1,320-foot requirement, which is a setback from the nearest residence or mixed-use property, which correlates to about a quarter mile. Also in the new ordinance there is a definition section and the definition specifies that the provision of the ordinance apply to converting an existing building into a data center. That's very important. Also, one of the differences is the old ordinance, the prior ordinance did not address the concerns regarding the cost of infrastructure upgrades or the use and cost of energy resources such as water, electricity, and natural gas. As the policy makers for the city, I'm sure you guys heard a lot from your constituents regarding these issues and so the sponsors of this legislation were very intentional about addressing that. In the new ordinance, we have a special use permit assessment which specifically looks at electrical capacity, adverse impact on surrounding properties, environmental compliance and economic benefit versus infrastructure demand. One of the other differences is the energy certification. Sorry, I can't say that quite without my Caribbean accent. Requires certifications from utility providers regarding sufficient capacity. It requires annual certification of capacity, and it requires detailed infrastructure upgrade plan. There's a detailed assessment of existing infrastructure and capacity, projected demand analysis, detailed description of expected improvements, a timeline, and a cost estimate. And this part is bolded for a reason, the certification from the utility that is at no cost of any upgrades will be passed to existing rate payers. And it also requires compliance and enforcement provisions. Regarding water, there was quite a bit of questions at the last work session regarding water. The new ordinance requires closed loop system. or the best available water use technology. And that provision is very important. As you know, the technology around data centers is constantly changing. And so we wanted to word this legislation in a way to keep up with the technology and the times. One of the other provisions is a noise level. The old ordinance had it at 65 DPA during the day and 55 DPA at night. The new ordinance significantly lowers that to make sure that the noise imprint on the surrounding neighbors are less. Environmental standards, the old ordinance did not address environmental standards. The new ordinance went through quite a few lengths to address it. Of course, a special use permit review will include environmental compliance review, references compliance with existing federal EPA and Georgia Environmental Perfection Division requirements, and diesel generators shall meet the EPA Tier 6 emission standards. Regarding buffers, the old ordinance had a 100-foot buffer from the street if located near residence, a 25-foot undisturbed buffer if located near residence, and no buffering requirement if not located near residence. Here it has a quarter-mile setback from the nearest residence or mixed use. And I do want to take a point to differentiate between a setback and a buffer. The buffer is the undisturbed landscape from the property line. and the setback is where you can actually start building the structure, so that's the difference. It does have a 100 foot buffer if adjacent to residential zoning, 50 foot buffer if it's not adjacent to residential zoning, and a 30 foot buffer from any street. It has a specific tree and shrub requirement for the number and types of trees, 8-foot fence requirement around areas facing residential properties and around mechanical equipment and fences must be masonry decorative concrete or composite as You can see it has a lot more detail than the last ordinance Regarding lighting the old ordinance required fully shielded lights directed downward the new ordinance again to keep in step with the changes that are happening in technology requires compliance with dark sky standards to minimize light pollution and Also, again, going back to the water component, the old ordinance did not address stormwater. The new ordinance references compliance with the city's existing stormwater regulations. And this was really important for my office in particular to make sure that the ordinance that we're passing are cross-referencing and staying in lockstep. As always, the legislation that you all are proposing, and this one in particular, preserving the character of an existing neighborhood is a legitimate purpose of zoning and planning. And a specification of performance standards is a zoning ordinance is valid if the standards are tied to enforcement rather than prevention, and that's exactly what this law does.

All right, let's talk briefly about the zoning standards under the ZPL.

So as you know, you all get your authority from the Georgia Constitution. And each local government, which is you all, shall adopt standards governing the exercise of zoning power. And such standards may include any factors which the local government finds relevant in balancing the interests in promoting the public health, safety, morality, or general welfare against the right to the unrestricted use of property. So these are a few factors. In the legal community, we call them the gold factors. It includes existing uses of zoning of nearby property, the extent to which property values are diminished by particular zoning restrictions, the extent to which the destruction of property values of the plaintiffs promotes the health, safety, morals, or general welfare of the public, the relative gain to the public, the suitability of the subject property for the zoned purpose, and the length of time the property has been vacant as zoned considered in the context of the land development. So these are just a few factors that a court would take into consideration when looking at our law. And so with the end in mind, we took these factors into consideration in writing this law. Special use permits, as you all know, these are uses that are permitted in a district only with special approval. So that is something that would come to you all to consider these factors and to make a decision. It's similar to a conditional use approval, except that any special use requires special approval from you all. The importance of the criteria is very important. And some of these examples are landfills, crematories, asphalt plants. These are all categories that the Supreme Court has determined are legitimate special use permits. City of Roswell recently had a concern about some zoning laws, a special use permit was denied because of traffic concerns, and the court found that a statement of a traffic concern by neighbors on the record was sufficient evidence to support a decision by the local government. And as you all know, our constituents have been very vocal concerning data centers, so I would submit that those are all legitimate concerns that would support us should this be challenged. And I would say on that front, in the state of Georgia, and I check with my colleagues, there has yet to be a municipality that has lost on a data center legislation. All right, so staying out of trouble. We have a vote coming up on this. So of course, as you all know, avoid prejudgment, avoiding pre-hearing public comments, avoid ex parte communication, legislative versus quasi-judicial meetings and limit comments at the hearing to relevant criteria as discussed in this PowerPoint. And of course, disclose and recuse if conflict of interest is questionable, which I don't perceive that being an issue here. All right, so this is something, and I know it's a little hard to see, but this is something that has come up quite a bit. In the community, there are quite a bit of comments regarding the number of data centers that are either here or on their way. This is the full, total, comprehensive list of all the data centers either already in operation, under construction, or permitted in the city of South Fulton. I do law, I don't do math, but I can count that that's just six. Here is also a comprehensive map showing where those data centers are. The circles in blue are the ones inside the city of South Fulton, and the circles in orange are the data centers near our borders. So that one all the way south, just outside of District 4, is in fact outside of District 4. Again, this is just kind of showing how diverse the zoning is in the city as a whole and why we had to write the legislation in a way that allowed you all the flexibility to meet the unique needs across the city. And that's it.

Just in time. All right. I see. Thank you, Attorney Kelly. I see Councilman Sebastian.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. First of all, I want to congratulate my colleagues on council who led this effort. I think we have all heard the concerns. We know of them. And I don't know of any council member up here who would not have concerns about what is happening. Thank you for providing this map and showing where the data centers are, especially around our borders. And I hope what we accomplish here, hopefully, if we can get this across the finish line, then others would take a look at it. Because I think where we're ending up, there's no legislation that's perfect. But, you know, there's always room in the future as we learn things as technology change to come back and tweak it. But I think this is going to get us off to a good start if we can get it across the border. So, again, thank you for your presentation and thank you for working with the team to put this together. Thank you.

Yes, sir.

Thank you, Councilman Sebastian. Just a reminder, this is on for a vote conversation. A little bit. All right. Councilwoman Rao.

Well, I want to thank my colleagues who work with me on this, Councilwoman Natasha Williams-Brown and Councilwoman Bell. And I also want to thank Councilman Sebastian for reaching out to provide us input in terms of how we can make it better. As City Attorney said, it was a lot of effort put in this legislation. I mean, I can't even tell you how many trainings we went through to get this right. So thank you for this. And I think, I hope it gives the residents at least some level of satisfaction that we are working on your behalf to make sure we keep you safe. As we learn more about this, like you said, we'll tweak as necessary. So thank you.

Thank you, Councilwoman. Councilman Johnson.

To heed your warning, now I just wanted to say great job on the legislation, especially the changes that I think are conducive to making sure, like Councilwoman Rao mentioned, is that we're doing the best thing for the citizens of the city of South Fulton. There are a lot of things happening around us, and we want to make sure that we are taking care of our residents. So, thank you.

Yes, sir. Thank you, Councilman Johnson. Councilwoman Linda Pritchett.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. So I do represent Oakley Industrial, which is the second industrial corridor in the city, and no one came and talked to me about any of this. Nobody asked for my input or, you know, any of this, considering that I mean, I have consistently voted against data centers. But I do recognize that I'm on the border of Fayette County, who just had, I think, probably the largest data center in the world. I mean, I'm serious about that. And I border Fayette County, I border Clayton County, I border the city of Fairburn, Union City, which we know has a different outlook on business, industry, and so I would like for everyone to consider the fact that other jurisdictions, not whether they're going to feel some type of way, but the impact that this legislation may have on them from a strategic standpoint if they feel that we're doing something that encroaches on a business opportunity and it can backfire where we can have a data center in our backyard and we can't have, we can't do anything about it. So I mean, and then I know many of you all have talked to, um, union city council members and worked with them, but y'all work with them, but y'all ain't worked with me, but that's that. But it's just two cents, drop it in the bucket and I'm done.

We hear you loud and clear. Thank you, Councilwoman Pritchett. I would say that this is good legislation. I appreciate you all's work and effort you put into this. I do know the community will need more information. So, of course, I invite the sponsors out. We are having a talk around town on the 13th. So you all will be there and hopefully answer any other additional questions. We do have some representatives from the data center. I believe Microsoft is coming as well as a few others. So hopefully residents will join us along with the council. All right. Thank you so much. Thank you, ma'am. Colleagues, it is 5 o'clock. So I will ask that we can have Grace to roll into the next meeting. If there's no objections, we can go ahead and adjourn this meeting and roll over to our 5 o'clock. No objections? All right. So this meeting is adjourned. Mr. Clerk, can you open the next meeting? Y'all ready? Make sure you switch over into your next meetings. All right. Welcome to our Alcohol License and Zoning Public Hearing for August the 11th, 2026. Mr. Clerk, please sound the roll.

It's today's roll call. The Honorable Catherine F. Ryle, District 1. Present. The Honorable Erin V. Johnson, District 2. Present. The Honorable Latonya Toni Wright, District 3.

Present.

The Honorable J.C. Sebastian, District 4. Here. The Honorable Keosha B. Bell, District 5. Present. The Honorable Natasha Williams-Brown, District 6.

She's here. She just had to step up.

The Honorable Linda Becker Pritchett, District 7. Here. The Honorable Mayor Carmelita Gumbs.

Here.

Madam Mayor, you have a quorum?

Mr. Clerk, I understand there are a number of deferrals.

Yes, we have one deferral listed on the Roman numeral 3, and I believe Council Member Ryle and Council Member Sebastian have items. And Council Member Mayor Pro Tem Bell.

So, Mr. Clerk, do I have to open a public meeting, or do we go ahead and have the deferrals voted on?

Yeah, I don't think, since the public hearing is not going to be held, I don't think you need to open it up. We just need to get those items going to be held and handle them appropriately.

Council, if it is your desire, can we please address the deferrals so we can move on to the next ones?

Number E, I mean, letter E. Deferring letter E. Z26-014 to September the 8th, 2026. As requested by the developer.

My understanding there is a request for item D, which is the applicant greater Turner Chapel Hill that they've had or are trying to work with the community, if that's not correct, and for a deferral until November 10th. It looks like it's... And I know it's quite a few people here from... I've been getting your calls, and I hear you.

Okay, so it looks like it's a number of...

residents here do you still want to have the meeting public hearing or do you want to defer well I just want to confirm I did have a request that was sent to the city by the applicant that they had a meeting maybe last Thursday and that they wanted to have some subsequent meetings with the community see if they could get to a place that they were on the same page so I was willing to grant for that period of time

Okay. What number is this?

This is D. All right.

Anyone else?

I think the next zone would be, that would be, well, November 10th.

All right. Is that all? okay so we have items d and items e that are requested for deferral one september the 8th and the other is november 10th council if that is your desire we can move on with unanimous consent

So for the record you have Letter a also which is listed that's for deferral until the next council meeting which is August 25th So that's letter a on the Roman numeral three and then the two that you just announced on the Roman numeral four which is letter e and and letter D All for deferral All right amending

what we just stated, so we all have unanimous consent for the next three. All right. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

That brings us to rezoning and use permit cases for presentation and public hearing only. First case is Z26-001 and CDP26-003. It's a public hearing. Bridge Logistics, care of Henry Bailey, requesting rezoning from Sub A in the sandtown overlay district to m1 in the light industrial district to develop one thousand one million six hundred thousand and five hundred square feet of light industrial warehouse distribution campus consisting of six buildings on 157.86 acres requesting a future land use amendment from the suburban one neighborhood character area to industrial character area at zero camilton road and 0, 336, 2230, 6460, 2391, and 2331 Chattahoochee Drive. This is located in City Council District 1. Staff recommendation was approval conditional. Planning Commission recommendation was denial of both requests. Staff?

Thank you, Mr. Clerk. Madam Mayor and members of council, I'm Reggie McClendon, Managing Director of Community Development and Regulatory Affairs. I communicated with the applicant and attorney for this matter earlier today. They also want to request a deferral for this case to make some changes to the requested site plan. I did think they were going to be here to make that request in person, but I'm not seeing them present, so I'll make it on their behalf. We're asking to defer this case to September the 8th.

Opposition in reference to this we can adopt this through unanimous consent All right, mr.

Clerk, please sound the next item This letter a was deferred to September 8th and Letter B is KZ26-010 and CV26-002. It's a public hearing application by 2020 Enterprise Group LLC, care of battle law requesting a rezoning from CUP in the Clifton Dale Overlay District to S8 Senior Housing with concurrent variances to Section 509.05C to eliminate the 50-foot zoning buffer and improvement setback on the northwestern tip and reduce the 50-foot buffer to 25 feet on the western property line to develop a 50-unit mixed residential senior community for residents age 62 and older on approximately 13.8 acres at 7490 Butner Roads. It's located in Council District 4. Staff recommendation is approval of both cases. Planning Commission recommendation is denial of both cases.

Is the applicant here? Please. All right. At this time, I'm opening a public hearing for item 4B that is on the agenda. Sir, you have a total of 10 minutes to give your presentation. You do not have to use all of that time. You may want to reserve time for rebuttal. Also, keep in mind that any time allotted includes public comments for any of the citizens who are also in favor of your application. That same time is granted for those in favor of the application must be given that to those in opposition. You may proceed with your presentation.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Good evening, members of council. My name is Josh Mahoney, Battle Law PC, 3562 Habersham and North Lake in Tucker, Georgia, here this evening on behalf of the applicant. Council members, we're here this evening discussing a proposed rezoning with concurrent variances to allow for 50 senior housing units on some property off of Butner Road. The land is approximately 14 acres in size. The project will be split between 22 cottage units and 28 townhome style units. So here's the property in question highlighted in yellow just off of Butner Road. You'll note that we have a very narrow access or frontage on Butner Road. That's going to come into effect later where our variances are concerned. You'll also notice that the surrounding land is either developed residentially or vacant. Looking at the zoning, we've got CUP zoning in pink as well as agricultural zoning. That's all we've got going on out here. And when it comes to the zoning, the planning staff found that our project would be consistent with the established zoning pattern in the area because we are requesting residential use alongside the other residential uses in the space. Additionally, the planning staff found that we are in conformance with the comprehensive plan because of our Suburban 1 land use designation, specifically supporting the SH zoning district that we're requesting. So council members, this property was actually subject to a rezoning in 2006. And at that time, it was approved for 133 single family detached homes on 66 acres of land. So our parcel was just a small piece of that overall assemblage of land. And so what's happened since is that that development was never built. And so my client has reacquired a portion of that land and is seeking to try to get out of those that 2006 zoning by bringing these these senior housing units. And so this is that plan that was approved in 2006. You'll note that it is much larger than what we're proposing. And we've got our plan here. So you can compare these two. You can see that we are a much more moderate approach to two residences here. We're also bringing senior housing rather than just regular old single family detached to help address the city's stated desire for senior housing, as well as a mixture of housing types in the area. Of note here, we've also got plenty of green space, our central kind of green linear park here between the cottage units for the senior residents to enjoy and plenty of walking trails and a pavilion in there as well. So I'd like to shift over to talking about our variance requests just briefly. I'm going to jump back to our site plan so you can see. We're requesting really one variance, but it's two. The first is to address that small strip of land I mentioned at the top of my presentation. The Clifton Dale overlay requires a 50-foot buffer when the property is adjacent to other residentially zoned or used property. That strip of land is only 100 feet. So we've got 50 feet of buffer from the top and 50 feet of buffer from the bottom, which means our entrance is completely covered by buffer. If we were to leave that in effect, we would have no access whatsoever to Button Road. This doesn't just apply to us, but it would apply to any development whatsoever that were to try to develop the property as you see it here. And so we're requesting a variance from that section of the codes that we can have access. What's also affecting this portion of the site plan is Hornsby Cemetery just north of our property. It's very close to our property line. We've heard concerns from the community that we need to make sure that we're protecting the cemetery. And I was actually able to speak with Mr. Charles Mitchell of the Historic and Cultural Landmarks Commission. And we agree that the highest priority when it comes to the cemetery is to protect the cemetery. And so in addition to the conditions that staff has put forward, we are willing to accept the condition to abide by OCGA sections 3672-1 through 3672-16 to the extent they're consistent with the other conditions and the ordinances of the city. What those sections do is they provide a procedure to protect cemeteries or abandoned cemeteries when they're on property to be developed. Technically, the cemetery isn't on our property, but we're willing to go the extra mile to make sure we do protect it. And the second variance is along the western property line. It's very similar to the first one. CliftonDale requires that 50-foot buffer. What we're requesting is to be allowed to grade and replant in just half of it. And in order to do that, we would technically need the variance to reduce it to 25 feet rather than 50 feet. In the end, you will still have a 50-foot buffer. It's just that we have to access 25 feet of it in order to secure the site to make sure it's not dangerous. These are just some representative home designs that we're considering. On the left, we're looking at the cottage-style homes, and on the right, the townhomes. These are ranch-style townhomes that are still just attached, but not two stories. Throughout the process, we did hear a number of community concerns, such as traffic, school capacity, the cemetery, and buffers. Planning staff found no burden on streets, transportation facilities or utilities. Uh, this is going to be a senior community, so there won't be any impact on schools. Uh, when it comes to the cemetery, we've accepted that condition that, um, the historic commission put forward. So we're ready to protect it. Uh, and when it comes to the buffers, um, again, we need that one on the Northwest side and on the West side, we will effectively have the 50 foot buffer. We just need to grade and replant. The planning staff recommended approval with conditions. My client accepts those conditions wholeheartedly in addition to the other one proposed by the Historic Commission. And with that, I will reserve the rest of my time, and I'm here to answer any questions you all have.

All right. Thank you for your presentation. You have 3 minutes and 19 seconds left. Mr. Clerk, was there any names in opposition?

Yes, ma'am, we do have two citizens who have signed up to speak. So call your name, please, approach the center microphone, and you have a total of 10 minutes collectively. I guess this is Charles Mitchell, last name Mitchell, and Mr. Mike Johnson. Please state your name and address as you make your comment.

Mike Johnson, District 4, Cameron to Fabbin Road. First of all, I hear what Josh said. Sound good. Remember the shell battle? Both of them basically been selling a bill of goods to District 4. Basically, everything that they said is not true. I'm going to stop shortly just calling them an outright lie, but it's not true. One of the pictures that they just showed showed a garage on that particular unit. They told us in the community that there will be no garages there, that the 62-year-old seniors will have to kind of lug their groceries to the front door the best way they can. Speaking of Charles Mitchell, Charles Mitchell, he represents the historic deal, but Charles has agreed to that. I mean, I don't even think Charles, I'm going to let him speak for himself when he comes up here next. But for number one, those houses, we were told $350,000 starting out to probably upward of half a million dollars. You ask him what the square footage of those particular places, 900 square feet to 1,100 square feet. What senior, 62 years old, is going to pay upward of a half a million dollars for 900 square feet, basically the size of a storage unit in my backyard? But to put 50 units on 13 acres in that area is ridiculous. I personally do not believe they intend on developing that property. I think Baker, he bought that property for $225,000 in 2022. He listed for $2 million. In a couple of different instances, I think they're only trying to get it rezoned just to boost its price up. But our area couldn't handle that anyway. You got Hampton Oaks right behind there. You got Lake Jordan right around the corner. I live probably 45 seconds from there. We don't want 50 units on 13 acres. It don't make sense to our neighborhood emergency vehicles getting in and out of there. They couldn't get in and out of there. And like Josh said, that's about one thing he did say was true. It's about 99.8%. Uh, we give him a hundred feet, but when I walked it off, it wasn't even quite a hundred feet. Uh, the width of that particular, um, interest coming off a button, the road, that cemetery been there since 17, 18 hundreds. I'm sure some of those graves that probably shift, uh, the city and take away a 50 foot buffer. So you can go digging grades from 17, 1800 disturbing that it's ridiculous. It just don't make sense. And our schools. Our schools can't benefit from that. We love our seniors here in South Fulton. All of us voted to give our seniors a break from school taxes. But Westlake and Langston Hughes, they're busting at the seams right now needing to do something, and they need money. They need taxes. So we jammed 50 units on 13 acres with our beloved seniors. The school won't benefit from that tax revenue because we allowed the citizen a tax break. from school taxes, which I totally support. So I'm going to leave the rest of this time for Charles. Thank you. I know you guys are going to vote how you vote, but it don't make sense for our particular area.

Good afternoon, mayor and council. I'm Charles Mitchell, but in a row district four, I am the chair of the historic cultural landmarks commission. Our commission has looked at this and it's our opinion that the buffer variances will remove protection for the cemetery. The ordinance that Mr. Mahoney and I talked about is actually a state code. The only thing, and I appreciate them agreeing to provide for sections one through 16. The one thing though that we don't have there, they are looking to identify if any graves may exist on their property, but they are still not having a buffer to the existing cemetery that's just immediately off their property. We are requesting that they still impose a buffer from the existing fence portion or any graves found outside the fence portion of 50 feet and this may actually cause them to have to shift the roadway further to the west but we think it's necessary for the protection of the cemetery thank you very much

All right. Mr. Mahoney, did you want to rebuttal?

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Yes, I'll be brief. When it comes to the cemetery, I hear loud and clear from Mr. Johnson as well as from Mr. Mitchell that we need to protect the cemetery. Mr. Johnson stated that the cemetery has been there for quite some time. Graves may have shifted. And Mr. Mitchell noted that we need to impose a buffer around the cemetery. And I think the first step to doing both of these things is to identify where exactly the edge of the cemetery is. Right now, it looks like the cemetery is completely off our site and we would technically not fall under the purview of the statute I stated earlier. However, what we're willing to do and what my client has already started to do is engage an archeological survey of the site to establish where exactly the boundaries of that cemetery lie. And when we do that, then we'll know for sure if graves have shifted, if there are satellite graves that need to be accounted for and protected, and where the edge of that 50-foot buffer that Mr. Mitchell suggested would be. And until we do that, we really just need to start with that. And we're already agreeing to do that via the condition that I stated earlier. However, if I need to be more clear, we will state that we are willing to hire an archeological surveyor to identify the bounds of the cemetery so that we can help to protect it. Additionally, during development, we can put up the fence around the edge of the cemetery so that when trucks are coming in and out and the crews are working, they know where not to go. These are all things that we can do. We would just need to add them maybe to the conditions so that it's very clear to everybody what we're trying to do. And with that, I will yield.

Okay. Thank you very much. Mr. Clerk, the times were off from one to this one. I don't know what was happening, but the times were off, so I don't think I was the only one that noticed that. All right. At this time, I will be closing public hearing, and we'll take questions from the council, starting with the district representative, which is District 4.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I actually have no questions. I think it sounds as if... People need to get together and do some more work with the community, and then we'll figure out where to go if we move forward with this. Thank you.

Councilwoman Rao?

Yes. I just wanted to make sure. I didn't hear that the applicant was looking for any revisions or modifications, so the roads have to be designed to the current code. Correct.

Yes, they do have to be designed.

And if we do move forward, I would like to see something about ground penetrating radar to just make sure that we are not encroaching on this cemetery.

Totally agree.

Mr. Clerk, when will this item be heard again?

This will be up for a vote at the next meeting, which is August 25th.

You're a little ahead of yourself. August what?

25th.

All right. Thank you so much. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Brings us to letter C, which is KZ26-011. It's a public hearing. Applicant Diane Lloyd requesting a rezoning from R6 in the Cliftonville Overlay District to AG1 to subdivide property in the four lots for residential use on 10.68 acres at 0 and 7390 Cedar Grove Road, located in City Council District 4. Staff recommendations approval. Planning Commission recommendations approval conditional to rezone from R6 to AG1.

Thank you, Mr. Clerk. If I may be heard, Madam Mayor, so this case actually had to be re-advertised. There was an original application that went to Planning Commission. After Planning Commission, that application was actually changed, and so we had to go back through the process of re-advertising the case. This case will be back again in front of you next month, but it's also going to have to go back in front of the Planning Commission as well. So technically you can do a deferral, but really we've kind of re-advertised it to come back. So I think a deferral would be appropriate just for clarity.

All right. Counsel, you've heard the recommendation from staff. If there's no opposition, we can adopt this with unanimous consent to defer to when? What is the date, Director McClendon?

He indicated September 8th.

To September the 8th. That's going to be a long day, I know. All right, so at this time, Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Okay, letter D was deferred to November 10th, 2026. Letter E was deferred to September 8, 2026. And that brings us to letter F, Z26-015, U26-007. It's a public hearing application by Welcome Foods. It's requesting the rezoning from the MIX to C2 along with a special use permit to develop a 5,000 square foot gas station convenience store with fuel pumps. and 1,800 square feet drive-thru restaurant on 2.13 acres at 4225 and 4165 Flagsholes Road. It's located in City Council District 4. Staff recommendation and Planning Commission recommendation is denial of both requests.

District 4 is awfully busy today. Yes, it is. All right. Is the applicant here? Mr. McClendon.

The applicant should be present. Is there a representative from Welcome Foods? All right. It appears they are not here.

Mr. McClendon and City Clerk, what is the desire at this point in time? If they are not here, are we deferring or are we opening a public hearing and closing it? Attorney? It's up to us. This is in your district, Councilman.

I would say if we can't have the hearing, we should defer.

All right.

So I'll move for a deferral. All right. If... Sorry.

Please not September 8th.

September 22nd. September 22nd. September 22nd. All right. If there's no opposition, we will move and defer this to September the 22nd.

All right. Mr. Clark, please sound the next item.

That brings us to letter G, which is a use for it for case you 26 dash zero zero six public hearing an application by David Renfro requesting a special use permit to allow a farmer's market in aging one zoning district on 6.1 acres at 42 69 stonewall. Chell road is located in the city council district three staff and planning commission recommend approval.

Is the applicant here? Please come to the front. Welcome, and thank you for being here. I have to read you a few. At this time, I'm opening the public hearing for item G that is on the agenda. Sir, you have the total of 10 minutes to give your presentation. You do not have to use all of that time, and you may want to reserve time for rebuttal. Also, keep in mind that the time allowed includes public comments for any of the citizens who are also in favor of the application, and that same time must be granted to those in opposition. You may proceed with your presentation.

Oh, thank you. I didn't even know I would be speaking today, so this is great. So at 4269 Stonewall Tell Road, everyone, I'm excited to say that we are on the final leg of this. This has just been a fantastic journey. We're getting all of the vendors together now, which is just fantastic. I've researched to get everyone within 10 miles to come through. Everyone's very excited to get this going. I have really nothing to say. Everything's on approval. If there's anyone here that wants to speak on the thumbs up portion of it, there's a microphone guys. Y'all can speak. This is great. I'm open to any questions or anything.

All right. Just a second. Mr. Clerk, do we have any that are in opposition?

No, ma'am. I did not receive any cards in support or opposition to this case.

All right. So this is a short one. So at this time I am closing the public hearing and we'll take questions from the council, starting with the district representative for district three council women, right?

Hello, how are you doing?

Fantastic, but I'm getting better.

So I'm excited to have you come to the district in regards to the farmer's market. Everyone says we're in a food desert. So to have this new opportunity, in the city of South Fulton, especially in District 3, is rewarding. So my question for you is what benefits do you see the farmer's market bringing to the city of South Fulton and District 3? Where do you see your business growing?

I'm sorry, I couldn't get the first part of that.

Where do you see your business advancing? Like how do you see the growth in the farmer's market?

I think it's going to start slow for about a week or two, honestly. And then as soon as it pops, because on that road, it's like everyone just seems to slow down right in front anyways, just naturally the way the traffic flows. And for them to be able to go, ooh, I think I'll pull into the farmer's market and have a little soda pop or whatever, grab some vegetables. We're getting all the vegetable and fruit vendors and everyone together. I think it's going to be a nice hub for people to pull in, park, have a hot dog, grab some vegetables and fruits and whatever they want, some knickknacks that other people are selling, because we're getting a wide variety of vendors that are going to be there. I think it's going to explode really quick. I think we're going to be hard proud. I think we're going to end up being back over here saying, hey, we need to remove some trees back in the back so we can expand parking and stuff. That's how I think this is going to progress.

And what is the marketing plan? Because I live off Stonewall Tale, so I don't remember seeing any signage. So what is your marketing so people know exactly how to get into the farmer's market once you're up and running?

Well, and there, I haven't researched the exact codes on the sign limit. From right now, we have the Share the Farm out there, and that is the biggest limit that we can have, but can't convince how we're having a Share the Farm farmer's market. And we're eventually going to, we're getting ready to submit some plans to do a kitchen and restaurants on the same place. So at that point, how much signage can we have? Because immediately, we just want to open the gate, put some balloons up so people know hey, I can drive in there now because it's always closed. So just by merely opening the gate, whenever we open the gate, people just pull in. That's standard. As soon as the gate is open, even if we just leave it open, people are like, hey, I've always wanted to stop in here. Look at these. Look at this. What's going on here? What's going to happen? So there's a lot of excitement with the general population now anyways. So just having the gate open, even just a balloon up, a slight little, hey, we're open sign, You know, it's going to be fantastic. We're tossing around the idea for a farm stand. You know, also having a little farm stand there. By right, we can have a farm stand anyways. But going to have a farm stand with some eggs that we have on the farm. You know, things like that. Put some stuff on the farm stand. So constantly throughout the day, you can pull in anyways, grab that stuff, grab a cup of coffee, grab some eggs, grab some vegetables, move on down the road, and then also be informed of when the farmer's market is, when our next events are, what are we doing, what's coming up, follow us on social media. So that's our biggest ploy right now is to open the gate, have some balloons, open the farm stand, and let people naturally come in.

Thank you. That's all I had. So welcome to District 3.

Thank you so much. This is great. It's a lot of traffic on Stonewall Hotel. Totally, totally.

All right.

Excuse me, Councilman Morale. Thank you. Can you just help me visualize where this is on Stonewall Hotel? And second, do you live on the property?

No. Okay.

Where is this?

Well, it's in the cool part of Stonewall Hotel. The cool part of that road, that's right where it's at. Thanks for the chuckle, everyone. This is my A material, so I appreciate it.

Where is it at?

Don't ask me.

We know where the little plaza will be. If you come out of the plaza and turn to the left, going back towards South Fulton Parkway, you go probably, what, 20 yards, 25 yards? It's right on the right.

Okay.

It's literally.

So is it a gate in the front? It's a gate. Okay, I think I see my way. Okay.

Yeah, the big, that black fence. Metal, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay, thank you.

Big share of the farm, green sign out front. All right, thank you.

Well, maybe the council needs to take a field trip.

I think we all should. Yes.

All right. We don't have any other speakers in the queue. Mr. Clerk, when is this item on for the next board vote?

Next council meeting, which will be August 25th.

All right. We'll see you on August 25th.

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

That brings us to Roman numeral five, which are the modification cases for presentation and public hearing only. Reminder that these cases were not heard by the Planning Commission. Letter A is case M26-003, so public hearing. by Elite Engineering requesting a modification to petition 2000Z-0123 to remove condition 3A which requires a minimum 100 foot wide natural buffer with an additional setback for all improvements of 10 feet as depicted on the approved site plan at 5400 Bethlehem Road in City Council District 4. Staff recommendation is denial.

Thank you, Mr. Clerk. This case is a modification. And so, as the clerk said, these were not heard by the Planning Commission. I know we have some newer members on council who might not be as familiar with the modification process, but a modification is a request to change a condition that had been previously placed on the property, usually via the original zoning case. The original case for this property was was 2000Z-123. So this was zoned back in the year 2000. And this is a community where part of it was developed and part of it has remained vacant. Interestingly enough, this is a mixed-use zoning district, but it's only single-family homes. When we researched the history of this, we found that the original request was going to include some apartments. As it went through the process, the apartments were removed from the request, and so even though it's a mixed-use zoning district, it is all single-family detached housing. Also, what happened in the process of getting to an approval on this case is that a 100-foot buffer, which was originally slated to only apply to where the property is adjacent to South Fulton Parkway, the decision was made to extend that 100 foot buffer around the entire perimeter of this property. And so everywhere where this property meets any other property, there's supposed to be a 100 foot buffer. NOW THIS GROUP IS COMING IN TO TRY TO FINISH BUILDING. THEY RAN INTO SOME PROBLEMS WITH, I BELIEVE, WITH SOME STREAMS ON THE PROPERTY AND THEY NEED TO MOVE THE HOUSES AROUND AND PENS ON THAT BUFFER. While staff did recommend denial, we have had some recent conversations with the developer. And we'll just say that if council approves this request, we're going to ask that some additional conditions that were part of the original zoning be maintained. Namely, there was a requirement for there to be a 50-foot setback for any structures on this property that are adjacent to any AG1 zoning districts. We've spoken to the developers and they say that they believe they can continue to adhere to that request and I believe they'll address that tonight. And we'll also ask that the 100 foot buffer be maintained adjacent to Bethlehem Road.

All right. Thank you, Director McLendon. Is the applicant here? Don't be shy. All right, so I have to read this to you. At this time, I am opening the public hearing for item 5A on the agenda. Sir, you have a total of 10 minutes to give your presentation. You do not have to use all of that time, and you may reserve some time for rebuttal. Also keep in mind time allotted for public comments for any of the citizens who are in favor of your application. That same time must be granted for those in opposition. You may proceed.

Good evening, Mayor and Council and staff. I'm Jeffrey Peters with Elite Engineering, representing Monarch Luxury Builders, specifically Zach Calhoun. We're seeking to request a modification at our project that's located at approximately 5400 Bethlehem Road, Fairburn, Georgia. We have a total site area of 92 acres, excuse me, with a proposed lot of 146 single family lots. And the minimum lot size is gonna be 9,000 square feet. And then our range goes to 22,000 square feet. And we're dedicating open space of 15.57 acres Um, total trees to be removed, uh, according to, uh, our landscape plan is 807.9 tree units. We're replanting 873 trees and we're saving 289.3. And then we're going to do a tree recompense to be paid into the city bond for 692,485 dollars and 71 cents. And I guess I'll go ahead and address, uh, what, what staff had said. So during our conversations with, uh, staff, we, we are willing to accept the, uh, 50 foot, uh, perimeter building setback from our parcel, that zone mix to any abutting parcels on AG one. Uh, we can accommodate that. We cannot accommodate the 100-foot exterior perimeter buffer as approved in the prior zoning case file back in 2000 due to on-site state water protected buffers and also our seismic rocks survey study that we had conducted with the extreme conditions of the topography. Just to give you a simple illustration, the topography is basically setting on one of the highest not a mountain, but a peak elevation wise. And it goes straight down to the state water and floodplain. It's a very challenged, extremely challenging site to, uh, to develop. Uh, but we were able to take all the, uh, state federal and local, um, and city ordinances into consideration to produce, uh, a good development plan that we presented, uh, to staff.

Oh, I'm sorry. Okay. Thank you so much. Mr. Clerk, do we have any that are in opposition?

Yes, ma'am. We did receive three cards in opposition. To call your name, please approach the center microphone. You have 10 minutes collectively. Ms. Maggie Lee, Mr. J.T. Woodle, Ms. Peggy Woodle.

Hey, good evening, council and staff. My name is Maggie Lee. I'm on Hall Road, and our property would kind of back up toward the back of this. I saw that city staff recommended denying modification, and I agree with that. I agree with people moving to the city of South Fulton, too. I see why they do. We have a great city. Speaking only for myself, I'm not against subdivisions and apartments. But I also think that every tree we can keep will make everything nicer for us and for our new neighbors. More shade, cleaner, cooler air, less erosion, and a nice view. So we should keep the tree buffer. I went to the presentation by Elite Engineering that was at the Advent Center over near Publix, and I think it was June 1st. What we were told there at that time was they wanted to get rid of the buffer so they could fit in 14 more houses. That's obviously not what I've heard here tonight, you know, and I don't know what to make of that. If the site is challenging, again, the buyer should take that into account before they pay whatever they pay for a piece of land. I know people need a place to live and I want to bring a constructive solution that protects trees and increases housing. I don't want to be the jerk who comes to council and says no, no, no to everything. I know it's unpopular, but the idea I'd propose, not for tonight but for the future to think about, is maybe every subdivision should have that mixture of housing we're talking about. What if every subdivision did have maybe a few granny flats, maybe a few duplexes? Again, that's out of the scope tonight, but that's a thought for the future. And again, let's keep the 100-foot buffer around this one, if that's what the rules say. the buyer should think about that before they buy the piece of land. Thank you. Thank you.

Next speaker.

Mr. Woodall, Peggy Woodall, JT Woodall.

Um, good evening. I appreciate the opportunity, um, to speak to this modification. Um, we live directly across the road from the signage that indicated the meeting for tonight, uh, for the modification, which I believe is, um, an incorrect location for the signage. Uh, as far as we know, uh, the particular, uh, plot that the, signage is in front of is part of family land that, while it is no longer in our family, it is still a contiguous piece of property. If it is indeed part of the property and has been bought more recently than I am aware of, to change those buffers would drastically change the character of our neighborhood, our piece of Bethlehem Road. When you drive down our section of Bethlehem Road, all of the houses are set way back from the road. There's one or two that have been more recently built that are a little closer to the road, but we all enjoy enough woods that there's a hawk that lives in our woods. There are owls that that hoot all the time. And so to change that character would be very detrimental. We also know that that particular piece of land not only has streams on it, it has a huge Gully in it because we've been putting trees and things in that gully for years. My husband's going to give you a number of Number of trucks that it would take to modify that keeping in mind that that stream does run through there and that is a fed a Spring-fed stream so not just a wet water a wet weather stream so the main thing is Once again, we like neighbors, we just don't want our neighbors right up on the street with us. We wanna maintain that AG1 feeling of the neighborhood. Thank you.

All right, thank you very much. Next speaker.

Madam Mayor, howdy. This is not what I do best, so I'll just be real brief.

I need your name and address.

Very brief. I've lived there my whole life. I'm drinking water out of a well.

I need your name and address.

I'm sorry, ma'am.

Name and address.

My name is Jack Woodall, John Woodall, JT Woodall, 5435 Bethlehem Road, Fairbanks, Georgia, 30213-2318. We got it. Don't forget that plus four.

We got it.

Like I said, I've lived there 71 of my 71 years. That's good dirt. And this man's not wrong. That is some tough woods. My mom and daddy bought and timbered that property multiple times since 1938. When you get in there, you're going to find 150 year old trees because they'd have been a timber man yet willing to get his truck in there and try to lay it down. So I'm against it, but mostly it's because If I wanted to live cheek by jowl with somebody, I'd move and find one of them neighborhoods where I live in somebody's side yard. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. All right. Sir, you have some time for rebuttal.

I hear the concerns of the citizens and residents of the city. Again, this was a previously approved zoning case. I understand we are requesting to remove the 100-foot perimeter buffer. The perimeter buffer along Bethlehem Road isn't but like 600 linear feet. The adjacent exterior boundary resides with Cedar Grove Village Phase 1, and Kate's promised land that includes mainly wetlands and floodplain. So you're only talking about probably four residential houses that's up off of Bethlehem Road. We're willing to consider staff's recommendations and keep the 50-foot perimeter building set back as it relates to the proposed traffic conditions. We have a traffic impact analysis conducted. In the engineer's opinion of that study, it was just to construct a right deceleration turn lane into the development per Georgia DOT requirements and a full left storage turn lane. And we're proposing to do exactly that with a six-foot shift. We are saving the amount of trees as feasible to be able to develop, um, protect state waters, um, and also to try to, uh, bring new residents to the city of South Fulton, um, to, to help with revenue taxes, schools, et cetera.

Okay. Well, thank you very much at this time. I'll be closing the public hearing and we will take questions from the council. starting with the District Representative, Councilman Sebastian.

Thank you. So, the question that I have, because I'm looking at two different site maps here, and if I'm reading this correctly, one of them appears to have several homes on Bethlehem Road, while the other one just show a few homes close to Bethlehem Road. So I'm not sure if I'm understanding this correctly because I thought there was supposed to be some distance away from Bethlehem Road for most of the homes as these lots are laid out. So can you provide some clarity here?

Correct. According to our latest boundary survey, the proposed entrance that comes off Bethlehem Road, that track of land my client owns, there's adjacent residential subdivisions that abut. that entrance that's off of Old Fairburn Road, but you're not, we're not coming in to impact. We own that land. My client owns that land. So there's very minimal impact to the existing residence off of Old Fairburn Road as it stands.

Bethlehem Road, sorry. Excuse me, Bethlehem Road. Okay. Yeah, I know Director Reginald mentioned South Fulton Parkway. I think he meant Bethlehem Road. Talk a little bit about the history of the community and the conversations with the citizens.

So when we had our public participation plan as required by the newly adopted ordinance, I think it was last year that was mandated that you have to provide a public participation plan. We brought the site plans, the rezoning plan, the amenities, We made about the same presentation, asking, we're requesting a modification to remove the 100-foot perimeter buffer and the 10-foot additional setback. I gave them the size of the property, how many homes we're proposing. The open space, we're going to put in a conservation easement. We can either do that to the county, the city, or the HOA. and also the trees, the tree recompense that we're going to pay in to have this developed into the city of South Fulton. Um, we clearly illustrated everything. We represented the streams, the floodplain, um, and From my take on it, they just didn't want the development to be developed. If they felt a way because of our modification request just to stop it, that's the goal. This was previously approved, you know, back in the early 2000s. Um, and we're trying to finish out this development. If you go into Cedar Grove village phase one, now the roads just dead end in the four or five different locations. Uh, the community needs to be built out and not think that would be in the interest of the city.

Okay.

All right. Councilman council member route.

Just to clarify, and this is a question for the staff, is it that the staff recommendation is because of the just solely the 100, because I did hear the applicant say that they take the staff's recommendation for the 50-foot. Is that the primary reason, or are there other reasons?

That is the primary reason when we initially looked at this case and we took all of the conditions into totality and the presented site plan, we determined that even if we granted the 100 foot buffer relief, they would still be in violation of that 50 foot setback. So that was one of the major reasons why we made our recommendation of denial as well as just taking into account the history of how the conditions on this case came to be when we went back in and did the research and read through the minutes of Fulton County. And so those were Those are the main reasons for the denial recommendation. I'm trying to remember if there were any others in particular, but I don't believe so.

And just to clarify and make sure I didn't hear that, did the applicant say that you could adhere to the 50?

Yes, ma'am, it's feasible to adhere to the 50 foot, and we're willing to do that. Now, let me be clear, it's a 50-foot perimeter principal building setback. Okay.

No further questions.

All right. Thank you. And Mr. McClendon and City Clerk, do we have a date for when we will actually hear this again?

Scheduled for August 25th.

All right. Thank you so much. See you August 25th. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Brings us to letter B, which is case M26-004, it's a public hearing. Applicant Kiana Augustus requesting a modification to condition one of the zoning case 2004Z-0072 to amend the permitted uses to allow an adult daycare serving adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities. with an approved capacity of 50 adults at 3890 Stonewall Trail Road. It's located in City Council District 3. Staff recommendation is approval.

Thank you, Mr. Clerk. I'll do a very quick introduction of this one just because this is not something that we see very often. But the original conditions on this property from 2004 limited the operation to a daycare center that serviced children. And those are licensed and regulated differently by the state and by the city than than facilities that service adults. And so they have come back and they want to now service adults either instead of or in addition to children. But in order for us to allow that, we would need to modify that condition. And so you will see that this is a structure that is, I believe it was originally a single family home. There's a picture of it in your staff report. And the current zoning is C1 or C2. But the applicant will C1. The applicant is here.

All right. Please, if the applicant is here, please approach the podium. All right. Thank you for being here. At this time, I am opening the public hearing for item 5B that is on the agenda. Ma'am, you have a total of 10 minutes to give me a presentation. You do not have to use all of that time. You may want to reserve some time for rebuttal. And also keep in mind, time that is allotted for public comments for any of those in favor will also be granted for those in opposition. You are to proceed.

All right. Well, good evening, everyone. My name is Kiana Augustus. The location is 3890 Stonewater Hill. And with KA Solutions, we are just doing a modification to an existing daycare center zoning to allow for adult daycare. So if you have any questions, I know that the recommendation was for approval. So if you have questions, I welcome them.

All right. Mr. Clerk, are there any in opposition?

We did not receive any cards in support or opposition to this case.

All right. So at this time I will be closing the public hearing and we will, um, have comments starting with the district three council representative council woman, right?

Thank you, Madam Mayor. So, I just want to say, first, when I was reviewing this, it took me back to when I graduated college. I actually worked with intellectual, consumers with intellectual disabilities. And one of my favorite cousins lives with an intellectual disability. So, that is something that is near and dear to my heart. So, one of my questions, so in regards to the student capacity, and then what are the different type of programs that you are offering the consumers who attend? Is it like a 24-hour facility? What in particular will you be offering? What type of services for those with ID? Yes, so it's an adult daycare, and it will operate from like 8 p.m.

It will operate from, like, 8 to 4, daytime only, Monday through Friday. We will offer, like, living skills, basic independence etiquette, just to give them a break from being with their parents or, you know, their loved ones and be able to come to a facility with structure activities during the day.

Well, I would love to stop by and reminisce of my days with doing ID care and, you know, just being able just to view the facility and just see how the consumers are enjoying it.

Yes, wonderful. You're welcome all.

All right. Thank you, Councilwoman Wright. I do have a quick question while they're pulling up the queue.

so is it 50 adults and children no it'll be 50 adults only we only said children in case we decided to keep the adult i mean the daycare compared to doing an adult daycare so right now we want to do adult daycare but who's to say later on we want to go back to doing children one day

And is this in a residential?

No, C1.

It's C1? Okay. So 50 is the max at one time, or is it, how many people do you, how many adults do you have enrolled at this time now?

None. Right now we don't have any. We just need to get this process completed and done before we can move forward. Okay.

but on a given day from 8 to 4, you could possibly have up to 50 adults at one time. Okay. I didn't read the square footage and all that good jazz, but thank you so much. I will recognize Councilwoman Pritchett.

Thank you. In the packet that we received, it talks about, like the mayor was saying, it talks about to develop 100 child 4800 square foot daycare facility on 2.166 acres. So this is the documentation that you submitted, but yet it's not consistent with what you've presented, right? So Mr. McClendon, does she have to update that? Does that have to be updated? No? Okay. So she's clarifying. So for So it's a 4,800 square foot building. Correct. And that building is existing.

Yes.

And so it's a house. So 50 people in a house, an adult daycare. Um, I do know that that's 4,800 square feet is a lot of, um, a lot of space. Is it one floor?

No, it's a ranch on a basement.

It's a ranch with a basement. So some of those individuals in adult daycare, some people may have disabilities and then some people may not. Some people may just be adults that need somewhere to go, you know.

Well, it's more like intellectual disabled. Okay. So they wouldn't just be your average adult. if that answers the question.

Okay. I understand. So, I guess I'm confusing it with adult and elderly. So, I guess that's my question. It's just for that classification of adults?

Correct. Yes.

Okay. And so, and those adults would not have a problem going into a basement, like the access, you know, accessibility.

So they'll be walkie talkie, uh, adults. Um, I think maybe if it's seniors in wheelchairs, if these would be more like 21, 22 year olds, 19 young adults that are not in high school, um, can't really work on their own. So they'll be with an adult to take them to work or, you know, watch them while they go out. It's real minute type of jobs that they may do. So it wouldn't be anything major.

Okay. And then so how much staff are you planning to have? Because 50 adults is a lot of people.

Yes. I believe it's two to 10. So total out of 50, it would be like 10 adults around, plus the director.

And how many rooms, did I ask that?

No, you didn't. But it's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven rooms throughout the facility. And then there's a back area with patio. I have a gardening area, like a walking trail. We have a basketball court. So it's 2 and 1 half acres, almost 2 and 1 quarter acres. So it's plenty of outdoor space and indoor space.

And I'm not sure, I don't see it here, whether there's a requirement for parking.

So it is a, we have a big parking lot outside in the front area. So when I initially did the C1 zoning, we had to do the parking lot to accommodate the commercial zoning.

Okay. Thank you. That's all my questions. Thank you.

All right. Thank you very much. Mr. Clerk, can you share when this item will be up for a vote?

August 25th.

All right. We got a lot going on on August 25th, so we'll see you on August 25th. Okay. Thank you so much. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Next item is letter C, M26-005. It's a public hearing. Applicant is Shavar Brown, care of Michelle Gann, is requesting a modification to zoning condition two of zoning case 1978Z-0142 to remove the limitation restricting a construction company office and storage building and to instead permit the use of an automobile sales and related commercial uses and to remove the 5,544 square foot total floor area limitation at 5120 Cascade Palmetto Highway located in City Council District 4. Staff recommendations approval.

Mr. MacLennan.

Thank you. All right, this is a modification request. wherein they are looking to utilize the property that's currently zoned C2 for automobile sales. It currently houses a small office building in a warehouse. This is in a transitional neighborhood area where there is some commercial, but there's also some adjacent residential. Based on that, we've recommended approval, but we've recommended approval with some conditions, those conditions being that fencing be installed on the south side of the property line, which is the side that is adjacent to a residential property, we're asking that the hours of operation cease by 6 p.m. each day, and we're asking that the parking surface be finished with either asphalt, concrete, or other materials as approved.

All right. Is the applicant here? Yes. Please join us.

Hello. My name is Shavar Brown.

all right one second mr brown all right because i have to read you a few things so at this time i am opening up public hearing for this item which is 5c that is on the agenda sir you have a total of 10 minutes to give your presentation you do not have to use all of that time you may want to reserve some time for rebuttal also keep in mind that the time allotted includes public comments for any of the citizens who are in favor of your application and that same time must be granted to those who are in opposition, if any. And you may proceed with your presentation.

Okay. Yeah, so the property at 5120 Cascade, Palmetto, we did a lot of research before we went into the lease and everything, and it was on ZC2. We didn't realize until we submitted for the occupancy permit that there was this zoning on there. That means the ordinance on there from when it was built, basically. So I guess whoever built it, those were the uses that they were going to use it for. So once we found that out, we started doing the research and seeing what we need to do. We set up the first meeting, and then we spoke with councilmen, and then we tried to move forward. It's in Fairburn, you know, south home. We actually live five minutes from the office location. We've been open since 2019. So, you know, our goal was to stay in our community versus find somewhere different. So we're just looking for the modification on this. We have no problem with everything that the director said would need to be done for the final approval.

Okay. Thank you very much. Mr. Clerk, do we have anyone that is in opposition?

No, ma'am, we did not receive any comments in support or opposition to this case.

Oh, that's very easy. Okay. So at this time I will be closing the public hearing and we'll take questions from the council, starting with the district representative.

Thank you, ma'am. Um, first of all, thank you for, um, taking the step out to open a business in your own community. You are, I think you shared with me a couple of weeks ago, district four resident. Right. This, you know, Mayor, you're right, this should be an easy one. If it had not been for a 50-year-old conditioner, you probably would have been sudden cause already. So thanks to everyone who kind of helped to work through this, and we'll see what happens when we move forward. Thank you. Thank you.

Okay. Do we have any speakers in the queue? All right, Mr. Clerk, when will this item be heard again?

August 25th.

Oh, boy. August 25th. All right, sir, we'll see you August 25th. Okay, thank you. All right. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Madam Mayor, the next item is proclamation presentations, which we do not have any that I'm aware of.

All right. Thank you. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Brings us to enrollment number seven, executive session if necessary.

All right, executive session is necessary, team. If we can recess for executive session for real estate litigation personnel and cybersecurity, if there's no opposition, we will recess to executive session. Alright, thank you so much for your patience. We will now reconvene if there's no objection from executive session Mr. Clerk was there any action taking an executive session? There was no action taking an executive session that requires a public vote All right, if there's no objection, we will adjourn this Work with them the alcohol license and zoning public hearing meeting

and let's begin to open up our next meeting thank you for joining us live for the city of south fulton city council meeting we are proud to introduce the leadership entrusted with guiding our city forward mayor carmelita gums district 1 councilwoman dr catherine rao district 2 councilman aaron v johnson District 3 Councilwoman Latonya Toni Wright. District 4 Councilman Jaycee Sebastian. District 5 Councilwoman and Mayor Pro Tem Keosha B. Bell. District 6 Councilwoman Natasha Williams-Brown. District 7 Councilwoman Linda Becker Pritchett. Supporting the work of this body and the operations of our city are City Clerk Corey Adams, City Manager Sharon D. Subedan, and Interim City Attorney Sarah Kelly. Thank you for being the best part of the City of South Fulton, a city on the rise.

All right, good evening. We will now call to order the City Council regular meeting for August the 11th, 2026 at 715 p.m. Mr. Clerk, can you please sound the roll?

Yes, ma'am. This is the roll call for tonight's regular meeting. The Honorable Catherine F. Ryle, District 1.

Present.

The Honorable Aaron V. Johnson, District 2. Present. The Honorable Latonya Toni Wright, District 3.

Present.

The Honorable J.C. Sebastian, District 4.

Here.

The Honorable Keosha B. Bell, District 5.

Present.

The Honorable Natasha Williams-Brown, District 6. The Honorable Linda Becker Pritchett, District 7.

Here.

And the Honorable Mayor Carmelita Gumbs.

Here.

Madam Mayor, you have a quorum.

Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Brings us to Roman numeral 3, invocation by the city chaplain.

Let us all stand for prayer, please. Let us pray. Father God, in the mighty name of Jesus, first we come before you saying thank you, Father. We thank you for waking us up this morning, oh Father God. We thank you for the travel and mercy, oh Lord. We thank you for the hedge of protection that you have placed around each and every council member, oh Father God. and all the residents of the city of South Fulton. We ask that your presence be felt in this place, this Father. And remember, it is not our will, but let your will be done. And it is in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. So let us pledge allegiance, please. I pledge allegiance to the flag from the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. You may be seated.

Thank you so much. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Madam Mayor, that brings us to the adoption of the council agenda. There are three items that I wish to bring your attention under the consent agenda. Item C, which was a donation from Greystone Power. Council Member Johnson has asked that that be removed from the agenda. Also, we have two items that we are adding to the agenda. The first is a minute event date, District 5 Health Event Saturday, October 10th, 2026 at Burdette Recreation Center. This is a new date to replace the previously approved August 29th and September 8th approval dates. And then secondly, uh, is a board appointment council member Williams Brown, which is nominates to an appoints Rodney littles to the board of zoning appeals. And she also nominates Benny crane to position six on the downtown development authority board.

All right. Are there any additional changes? If there's no objection to the agenda as amended, we will adopt this with unanimous consent. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

That brings us to Roman numeral six approval of city council meeting minutes, regular meeting minutes, July 28th, 2026 work session minutes, July 28th, 2026 and alcohol zoning public hearing minutes, July 28th, 2026.

If there are no corrections to the minutes, we can adopt this with unanimous consent. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

That brings us to the consent agenda, Roman numeral seven, and that's items A through D. All right.

If there's no issues or no corrections, we will adopt this with unanimous consent. Looking at council. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

That brings us to roll number eight, alcohol license, rezonings, variants, and modification cases for motion and vote. The first is request council consideration of alcohol beverage license application for Southside Touche, LLC, doing business at Southside Touche, has been submitted and is requesting approval for the consumption sales of wine, beer, and distilled beverages located at 5495 Old National Highway, Suite B15, South Fulton, Georgia, 30349. It's located in Council District 5. This item was held at the July 28 Council meeting.

Okay, Council, I think Councilwoman Bell from District 5 wanted to say something. Go ahead.

I motion for approval.

Second. It has been moved and properly seconded. Can I get this by a show of hands?

In discussion. Wait a minute. You got to do discussion first. I want to do discussion.

You got to do discussion first before we take a vote. So no vote? We want to do discussion. Yes, go ahead. Okay.

So thank you so much. And I want to just take a moment to address the current request for alcohol beverage. So we do have our City of Southwestern Police Department who provided a safety plan. I had a few questions as it relates to any complaints, any type of concerns that you may have as it relates to this particular approval.

Good evening, Council. Madam Mayor. My name is Lieutenant Blaylock with the City of Southwestern Police Department License and Permits Unit. Yes, we had several concerns in the parking lot area of 5495 Old National Highway. Right now we're working alongside with code enforcement and our joint special operations staff to kind of combat those issues in those areas. And along with keeping up, we're talking with the property manager to see if we can kind of come together to resolve some of those issues over in that parking lot.

And just for clarification are any, I know we have received many complaints as far as unsanctioned activities. Just want to make sure that this is not, or if you could advise if this is related specifically to two shades, Southside Touche.

Okay. Yes. Uh, during our investigation, we found out that majority of the problems, um, occurring in the areas not related to Touche. It was really from that parking lot with citizens coming there, loitering, illegal vending, and just other criminal activities in the area just hanging out.

Okay, so perfect. And I do want to put on the record that I have had an opportunity to speak with the owner of Touche's who has modified the request. So there has been some changes since the last public hearing. Initially, during the public hearing, the minimum age was age 21. That has increased to age 25. And as the safety plan was approved for two security officers, the owner of the business has agreed to include two additional off-duty police officers just to kind of beef up and make sure as it relates to any safety concerns. So I did want to list that before we approve. Okay. Thank you so much. Thank you.

All right. There's a motion on the floor. If you all are ready to carry, can I please get a show of hands?

Court that motion approved unanimously 7-0.

All right. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Next item is item B, second read and request council approval. of TA26-003, an ordinance to amend the City of South Fulton zoning ordinance as amended to repeal Ordinance 2024-034 and replace with an ordinance to regulate the development and operation of data centers within the City of South Fulton to establish zoning, permitting, population limits, and performance standards to protect public infrastructure and neighborhoods. Staff recommendation's approval. Planning Commission's recommendation was approval with several conditions.

If there is no opposition at this... Okay, so we have two discussions. I will recognize Councilman Sebastian, and then is it Councilmember Pritchard?

Okay. Thank you, Mayor. Just for clarity, because in the table that was presented, we had these zoning districts, M1 and M2. This condition here that is being recommended It's just saying it's M2. Are we going with that, or are we supposed to have M1 and M2? OK. So right here, item 1 under the recommendation says restrict data centers to M2 districts rather than M1 and M2. So are we striking that? DR.

The draft is in there. We made significant changes.

OK. So on the legislation itself, it's correct. Okay. Just want to make sure. Thank you.

One moment, and I'll recognize the attorney.

Thank you, Mayor. The recommendations from the Planning Commission are just that, recommendations. What you all are voting on is what's specifically in the portal. I did want to note one change to the title, Mr. Clerk, is just to remove the population limit since that's been removed from the substance of the ordinance. But to answer your question, Councilman, it's what you all are voting on is what's in the portal, not necessarily what's in the recommendations from the Planning Commission.

And I figured, because it wouldn't be on your table, but I wanted people to realize that what is printed here, if they have eyes on it, is not correct. Okay? Thank you.

Yeah. Yeah. Councilwoman Pritchett.

just wanted to state for the record the legislation that is in the agenda package is what came from the portal so that is the final version that was uploaded I believe late Saturday so that public does have access to that as well okay thank you very much councilwoman Pritchett okay at this point we've had our discussion if there is no more discussion and all that has been

Amended. Do we plan to adopt this for unanimous consent?

Yes.

All right. Congratulations, South Fulton. Okay. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

That brings us to the public comment portion for tonight. Comments regarding zoning cases will not be allowed. Speakers will be granted a total of two minutes each, and public comments will not exceed 30 minutes. Speakers will not be allowed to yield or donate their time to other speakers. Speakers must identify themselves and their addresses prior to speaking. Speakers may only address the presiding officer shall observe all rules of the quorum. No debate, disrespect, or obscenity shall be tolerated. The presiding officer shall rule any such individual out of order that fails to comply with the foregoing. With those rules read into the record, we do have a number of speaker cards this evening. As I call your name, please approach the center microphone and state your name, address, the district that you reside in. You will have two minutes to make your comments.

Okay. Mr. Clerk, before you call, I do have a council member that would like to take a personal point of privilege. Council Member Pritchett.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. So I just can't remember when we amended this, amended our, I introduced legislation to allow for public comment. So I want to put this in context. So the First Amendment of the United States Constitution, it protects five core freedoms, the freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, the right to peaceably assemble, and the right to petition the government for redress of grievances. So with regards to speech, It says that you can share your thoughts, your ideas and your opinions out loud or in public without the government punishing you or stopping you. So I want to make it clear that private citizens that are speaking on public issues receive the strongest constitutional protections. So there may be things that residents may say. that we may not like, but yet they will say them. And as far as I'm concerned here, everyone that I see in this audience, I don't see any children here tonight, everyone's grown. I'm just stating this for the record because I want to make it clear that everyone's comments that comes up to the podium are their own. They're not my comments. They have nothing to do with me and I don't want anyone putting it on me because I am clearly stating that I am fully capable of addressing anything that I would like to address to anyone that I would like to address at any point in time. I don't have surrogates, don't need surrogates. And so also the residents have to understand that it took a lot for this council who does not want to get bashed, trashed, insulted to actually give everyone the right to speak in public comment. So let's just balance this out and understand where we all stand because although we're going to hear you out, You know, there are decorum and rules, and then there are certain parts of speech that are not protected. Even though people have free speech, there are certain things that can be said that do not have constitutional protections. So with making that clear, I will yield. Thank you.

Thank you, Councilwoman Pritchett. Mr. Clerk, please proceed.

Yes, as stated, please approach the center microphone as I call your name, and you have two minutes. Mike Johnson, Tomiko Leverett, Mel Keaton, Jewel Johnson, Roger Mathis.

Mike Johnson, District 4, Cameron to Fabbin Road. Tonight I want to start by addressing accountability and accepting it. It's a shame that Sharon D. Subban is not here tonight, being that she's the city manager, because I wanted to make sure she understood and heard this, along with you, Comrade Gumbs. Accountability means accepting it. Stop passing blame and fault finding on others. Everybody can see it, the citizens, the team members within the city. Accept your own shortcomings. You know, stop acting as if you're more holy than thou. But as I read right here, yeah, I'm gonna stay away from the real hot button subject about our majors and our captains here within this department. I'm gonna stay away from that. I think you guys are fully aware of that. We will address it at another time. But on the Roman numeral B3, I'm looking at, Comrade Gums, you want to request that we pay your legal fees just because you're an elected official. The citizens are not into that. We don't want to pick up your legal fees. You get your buddies in trouble, you pay your own legal fees. We're not trying to pay an elected official legal fees if you cross the boundaries within this city and break the law. And for his name in that center after Bill Edwards, the art center, you guys should consider renaming the Wolf Creek Amphitheater since he's the one who built it as a county commissioner for $6 million and negotiated the sale for $1 million to South Fulton. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Mel Keaton.

Mel Keaton, Alice Sheba Drive. I just wanted everybody to remember the campaign promises that everybody made. We agreed to combine a lot of the events because it was overworking staff and putting a lot of stress on the staff. We agreed to put limits on the amount of deferments last year. That still hasn't been done. We did an impact study fee. Y'all did an impact study and we still don't get impact fees right now. I would like to see that addressed. Last year we kind of rush the gas station ordinance. And I think impact fees were probably more important than the gas station ordinance. And I would like to see us put things in place that we are benefiting from the things that we are bringing to the city of South Fulton. Because as it is now, we should not have to borrow money. Fulton County should not have to borrow money to make up for the money loss that we have gotten over the years. So I think that impact fees should be on the next agenda. We should rush that into legislation because, you know, we need to benefit some of the things that are coming in. We need to benefit from the things that are coming into this community. So I want to make sure, you know, I know we talked about World Cup coming and World Cup has left and we didn't do anything but give out food baskets and parties and you know, events and stuff. I would like to see us move past that and start to come through with the things that we've promised the citizens because, you know, we're here to do a job and negotiate good deals for us so we can all benefit from it because, you know, I know it's hard to put impact fees in place, but it's necessary. So I would like to see us move forward with that and make that priority. So thank you.

Hi, my name's Tameka Leverett. I live at 5825 Mallory Road. Good evening, mayor, council, and city staff. The city of South Fulton is proudly designated as the city of civility. by the Georgia Municipal Association. The council adopted a formal Civilty Resolution and Pledge committing our government to be transparent in communication, respectful public debate, and courteous conduct among elected officials, staff, and the public. The pledge outlines key principles of respectful communication through open eye and dialogue, tolerance for diverse viewpoints without prejudice, professional conduct that ensures every resident, business owner, and colleague is treated with basic courtesy. So tonight I want to highlight concerns that show we're falling short on some of those standards, specifically within code enforcement and the business license division under CDRA. Recently, a code enforcement officer entered a business to verify its license and demanded that an employee who had no authority over licensing produce his personal identification. When he would not, the officer threatened to call the police. In another case, a business that was compliant except for one document for its 2026 renewal was marked abandoned without any communication of a specified timeline for correction and was told to reapply, adding additional costs up to $500. Those incidents stem from new enforcement efforts around DBA trademark compliance. These businesses were not refusing to follow the rules. They were navigating the new requirements. This issue is not compliance. The issue is how staff are treating people during the process. No resident or business owner should be spoken to in a way that makes them feel ignorant for not understanding internal procedures or newly enforced policies, especially when the city itself did not consistently enforce these rules prior to 2026. If an application has mandatory or optional sections and a person who cooks, cleans, or runs a small business or whatever misses the optional field, Grace should be given, not extended, just as grace was extended to the departments when they were learning the new rules.

Thank you.

Good evening, y'all. My name is Roger Mathis. I live at 6400 Polar Fox Court, Riverdale, Georgia, 30296. My district representative is Cleo Chabelle. Thank you, Councilwoman Pritchett, for that disclosure in the beginning because this is kind of intimidating to be speaking to our council members and stuff like that. I am a teacher for Atlanta Public Schools and I want to first thank the council for ridding our city of our corrupt police chief Keith Meadows. I of course had a difficult time adjusting to my move here to South Fulton from California. I've been a resident here for about eight years now and unfortunately I've had an unfortunate event happened to me and my family at my address. So I wanted to remind you all that we did do our city a service by keeping it safe, by making sure that our community is safe, but Keith Meadows had some more officers that are willing to, you know, violate the citizens' rights in our community. And we need to make sure that you guys are doing exactly what you need to do to make sure that everyone's safe. I don't have a criminal record. I'm a teacher of 17 years and it was unfortunate what I had to go through here, but I'm going to stay here. I'm not moving. I live here. I pay my taxes here and I trust and believe that of course you mayor, um, currently a go thumbs. One of my really close colleagues has told me how great you are. So I'm entrusting that you guys are gonna make these changes to make sure that our families are safe. Mine wasn't. So I'm actually coming up here now because I wanna make sure that my community knows and everybody that lives in the South Fulton area feels safe. Cuz I bought my house here cuz I loved it and I felt safe and it was a new city and I was amongst people, peers like myself. But this experience has rotted that experience. and there's a benefit from that. You know, rotten fruit, they bear seeds too, and they can flourish as well. So I want to make sure that you guys understand that good people are being affected by bad apples, and we want to make sure that we don't do that anymore. Thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening. I'm here to... tonight and as night for a friendly reminder of all of us. And I need not go through why I'm so passionate and concerned about where I live. I think everybody here knows my history. I want to talk to you all tonight about the administrative changes that we're making. Everybody here knows about the three or four things that you cannot talk to us about. And I just want to remind everybody that we should be talking to the stakeholders if we are going to be making changes to our streets and buildings and things, because that's very important to us. I'd like to make the suggestion tonight that everybody, when I say everybody, mayor and council, city managers and everybody else that need to, And I'm going to ask that you ask your lawyers and things that you work with to also do the same thing. The Georgia Constitution and the National Constitution, that's what I want you to visit. Because as it relates to stakeholders, it will definitely give you what I'm talking about. There is nothing that I want to say that is going to offend anybody. Because number one, I have sent at least two or three emails asking for a meeting with everyone. including the city manager and the chief financial officer, because we are the stakeholders. So I'm still looking for that. I think it's so, so important. And I'm going to say this, and I'm going to sit down. One of the most profound things that I have learned from going all over the region, and that is we're not talking to each other. And the stakeholders want to talk to you.

Thank you very much.

Madam mayor that completes the public comment. We did receive a couple of cards regarding the zoning case and alcohol license, but of course our rules don't allow it. And also I would like to state for the record, um, we did receive emails that I forwarded to you before the meeting that are part of the record.

All right.

Thank you, Mr. Clerk. All right. Can you please have the next item?

That brings us to council comments.

All right. Let's start with district one.

I want to thank everybody who came out for our R&B night a couple weeks ago. We had a really good time, and residents got to interact with their fellow neighbors. So thank you for coming out to participate in that event. In addition, we have a couple events coming up, most notably our National Seniors Day, which will be on Friday, August 21st at the Black Box at the Southwest Arts Center. We'll be talking about everything from estate planning to just a range of topics for seniors to take advantage of. And so that's from 11 to 2. We have some great speakers lined up. You'll see the flyer coming out in the next day or so about it. In addition, the day before, on August 20th, we are having a session called Lights, Camera, Action, where we are telling you how to monetize your property. So the film industry, as you know, is booming in the state of Georgia, and they're always looking for places they can film. So we're going to tell you how to take advantage of that. And again, that is from five to seven on the 20th at the Southwest art center in the black box. So stay soon. You'll see it on social media, um, on the city side, as well as my, um, social media platforms. So you'll have to register for those events, but it's, it's going to be a good time. A lot of great information. And that concludes my comments.

Thank you. Council member Rao district two.

Thank you madam mayor and I will be extra brief today The thing that I want to do is thank everybody who came out to national night out last week. It was an amazing event Thank you to the staff. Thank you to our public safety officials as well as our parks and rec and all the other staff that had anything to do with the And our folks, we know we got our swag and surf on, so it was a great night for us, but that's it from district two. Thank you.

Thank you. District three.

Yes, good evening, everyone. I just want to be brief as well. I just want to thank everyone who came out to the community experience that we had in District 3 at Salon International. We gave away over 200 book bags. We had watermelon cantaloupe. We had a great time. And it was a good fellowship. We had all the seniors volunteering, the young and the old. So it was a great time. So thank you all so much for those who donated, who came out and just showed your love because that's what we are. And I want to invite everyone to the first installment of Tea with Tony. It is the T in District 3. It will be next Thursday, August the 20th at Clifton Dale. And my special guest will be City Manager Sharon Subedan. And it's going to be the T on city government. What is the responsibility of the city manager and your city council representative? So come out. get the tea in regards to city government, as well as get you some tea and some danishes to go along with the conversation. And each month we will have different department heads that will be special guests and featured each month for the Tea with Tony as we travel around District 3. So thank you all so much, and that's all I have.

Thank you, Council Member Wright. District 4, Council Member Sebastian.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I am going to be short as well, just reminding everyone of our monthly summertime, early fall community market. This month, on August 27th, we're going to have our youth market is the second annual one that we're doing. And we're going to have lots of focus around young people, young farmers, young entrepreneurs, services for young people, sports. Some of our partners have already listed, including the Legacy Leadership Academy and autism branches. And we're hoping to get a partnership with Fulton County Schools going as well for that market. So thank you to the people in economic development, Teresa, Adriana, and our assistant city manager, Carmen Davis. who is spearheading and helping us to push these through. And again, big shout out to the folks at CORE who are also part of that market program for our community. In September, just a heads up, we'll have our third annual International Cultural Festival at Wilkerson Mill Park, and that will get underway on the 19th of September from about 2 p.m. All right, and that's all I have. Again, thank you to everyone who have continued to come out and support the things in District 4, including all our great volunteers out here. Thank you.

All right, thank you so much. District 5? Thank you, Mayor.

I'm glad my colleagues were brief. I won't be. But nevertheless, I want to thank everyone for coming out to the back to school community event this past Saturday. But we had a really great time fellowshipping with our parents. The kids have went back to school. The hair and the school supplies have been given out. But we wanted to take that moment to kind of recognize and celebrate our parents so i just want to give a shout out to grown folks cafe owner and staff harriet bryant for all of their amazing work to help pull this event together this past saturday thank you for those who came out and were celebrated and received their free gift cards free food and free gifts and so we pray that you use that wisely to help benefit and really take care of yourself so again thank you to grown folks cafe and the back-to-school community for coming out and really celebrating our parents this past weekend. I also want to thank those individuals that came out. We had a wonderful time at the South Fulton Dance Studios benefit concert, which was at Southwest Art Center. I want to give a special thanks to our Cultural Arts Department for setting everything up. It was great. I was dancing in my seat with the kids that were on stage, but it's a great way to give back to our community to make sure that we're supporting organized, I guess, sports, but also activities for our young ladies in our community. So thank you all. They are still accepting donations. This was a benefit, an opportunity to raise money. because what that does is it supports the youth and the young adults that are able or may not be able to pay for dance classes right in our city. So if you are interested, please go back to the Southwoods and Dance Studios. They're right off of Old National. Make a donation. We love the kind that falls, but we will take the kind that jingles as well. We are gearing up this weekend for our Dream Big. It's our second annual Dream Big lock-in. It's the teen girl lock-in or Team take over a bird at Park and so we're looking forward to spending a evening 24 hours with our young ladies Registration are closed. I know we've received some emails just in the past couple of days as far as spaces We are full and at capacity And so that event will take place on Saturday from 12 noon until Sunday at 12 noon. So I look forward to the volunteers coming out, but also a time to kind of fellowship with our young ladies outside of the parents and their me-me's and so forth. So I look forward to having that this weekend. And special thanks to Parks and Recreation for everything that they're doing and helping us to prepare and set up with all the TPs and all the beds and so forth. We are gearing up. Many of you are aware of the Workforce Academy, triple award-winning Workforce Academy. And registration is underway for our newest program, which is the Fresh Kicks program. This is an opportunity for our youth and young adults to come out and learn entrepreneurship skills. They'll learn about AI, but they'll also become their own business owners. by simply learning how to design customized shoes. So if anyone is interested throughout our community from districts one through seven, and you have youth and young adults who are interested in learning some entrepreneur skills, definitely sign them up. Registration is underway right now for the Fresh Kicks program that will be at Burdette as well as Sandtown. We're expanding, right? And so I want to also introduce and Well, I guess invite you all out next Thursday for the grand reopening of Grown Folk Cafe right off of Old National. It is scheduled for next Thursday. We're inviting the community to come out starting at 6 p.m. next Thursday, August the 20th. This is a 30-year business that has been in our city, and they have went through a full renovation. And so we encourage you to come out, see it, get some great food, lick your fingers, and have a good family fellowship and fun evening with the owners and the staff as we re-open there or re-grand open and re-present and introduce the new Grown Folks Cafe. And then lastly, as I'm brief, I want to welcome to the community our newest restaurant. Many residents have been asking for restaurants, places to sit for quite some time. And I believe all of the leaders up here, we are doing our best to make sure that we promote those businesses and grow. When we talk about economic development, we're listening. And so I want to welcome to the city of South Fulton, but most importantly, to District 4. Five, this I believe is our 14th business in the last three years, the one and only Southside Touche. And so they are open. They are a new restaurant located right in the old National Common Shopping Center. I promise you, you've got to go and eat the food, from the pizzas to the collard greens to the fried broccoli. Ooh, I just made my mouth. I mean, everything, name it. So, again, this is another new addition to the City of South Fullerton on Old National Corridor because we're booming, we're keeping it live in District 5, and so we want to welcome Southside, touche, to the City of South Fullerton. And I have, that's all I have.

Oh, thank goodness. Goodness gracious. But I would say, uh, congratulations and welcome to the city. I celebrated my birthday there last month and I really had a good time. So welcome district six.

Yes. Thank you in here. Um, as always, I want to, I may or may not be brief. We'll we'll see how it goes. Um, As always, I want to thank all of the partners and volunteers who show up each and every month to keep the six districts sensational. Thank you especially to Microsoft who sent a team of volunteers as well as the 100 black men of South Metro and our very own fire and rescue department who came out to love T. Nolan for the first day of school to welcome the kids back. Um, of course, you know, first day of school is exciting for some and not so exciting for others. We did have one child literally fall out and have a temper tantrum because she did not want to be there. Um, but then she saw the firefighters and she pulled herself together. She was excited about the uniforms. Um, so thank you for making the first day of school special for, for my babies that love T Nolan. Um, and of course, thank you to all of our citizens that represented district six. and the city at the Fulton's Citizens Environmental Mixer. That being said, this Saturday is the Miracle-Eat Barbecue at Creole Park from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. And then on August the 22nd will be our monthly food distribution in partnership with the Atlanta Community Food Bank beginning at 10 a.m. You know, please do continue to spread the word. If you know anybody experiencing food insecurity, please send them my way on the 22nd at 10. And on the same day, beginning at 11 o'clock, just down the street at New Life Presbyterian Church, I am partnering with a number of organizations, real estate organizations, organizations to sponsor a foreclosure prevention and homebuyer summit. If you know anybody that is in danger of losing their home please let them know that they can come to New Life Presbyterian on August 22nd at 11 a.m. to receive information and services and support. We are working to keep people in their houses, especially in these economic times which don't seem to be getting any better. We want to do what we can to provide assistance to residents so that we can keep them housed. And then looking ahead to the month of September, we, Districts 5, 6, and 7, we are partnering with Shock Fitness in the Tri-County Plaza, which is actually in District 7, on a 5K that is designed to not only be an opportunity for fitness but an opportunity for fellowship and an opportunity to showcase all of good things that are happening on old national highway um you know my colleagues um councilman bell councilman pritchett the three of us are working very hard to ensure that old national highway remains um a destination in the city of south fulton um and to change the narrative about Old National so that people will stop trying to pretend as though it's some crime ridden hood that, you know, is overrun with ganged drugs and all types of unsavory activity because it is not that. And we are trying to get the word out that we are just as good as every other district and section of this city. I think that is it, but this is the part of the program where I look in the back and ask the hardest working man. September 26th for the 5K. This is where I would ask the hardest working man in municipal government. Did I get it all? All right. I've been given the all clear. These have been your what? Church announcements for the week, and we're going to all do what? Govern ourselves accordingly.

Okay. All right. Moving on to District 7.

Since I've been saying a whole lot this whole day, I'm not going to say much now. So on Saturday, I'm hosting a town hall meeting to talk about Senate Bill 406. This is about the new HOA laws that take effect, and this is in conjunction with Georgia HOA Alliance. So it is a lunch and learn. It will be at our Economic Development Office. at 6385 Old National Highway, Suite 210, and it's from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. You have to register, and you can find the registration links on social media and I think on the city's website. Look forward to having a good conversation about the different things that have been going on in your HOA, but this is not a complaining session. This is an explanation of the law. so that you can understand how to apply it in your HOA if you are experiencing problems or abuses.

And that's it.

Thank you.

All right. Thank you very much. Okay. And I'll be as brief as I can. I was going to address some things, but I believe that resident left out but i do want to put it on the record that those impact feed the impact fee legislation is coming through the portal um it is just not ready yet for prime time so we are speeding it up i see your finger back there but i just want to let you all know that the impact fee legislation is moving through the portal Also, there was a mention about World Cup activities. As you know, in Sandtown, there was a soccer clinic that was hosted, and you all saw that the mayor and council was out there as well. The day that we were going to host our big event, it rained terribly, so we saved us some money. So that was a last-minute decision, but yes, at the same time, we made an executive decision to be fiscally responsible, and as many of you know, that the activities that were happening on the south side for World Cup were not very well attended because Atlanta hosted the majority of the events. So I just want to let you all and put that on record because we had a resident that addressed it. We also kicked off Black Restaurant Week right here in our city last week. We started off at Gold Shades at Sandtown Crossing, and we had a few other restaurants as well. So that was very well attended. Also, this council attended the Georgia Chamber Congressional Luncheon. So we are still trying to amplify and be in the right spaces for the city of South Fulton. So we all attended that. And that was a great room to be in. I do want to mention that we have upcoming events for August the 13th, which is the Talk Around Town. That is the data centers that we will be talking about at Welcome All. We currently have Microsoft that will be there, Greystone Power, H.J. Russell, and the Chattahoochee Riverkeeper. They will all be on a panel as well. So I do hope that you all will be able to attend that. That is this coming August the 13th at 630. Also, on August the 15th, Roger Bruce will be honored with an intersection renaming at Camp Creek and Fulton Industrial. If you ride by us right near the quick trip, it's covered up, but that sign will have its unveiling on August the 15th. I do encourage the residents from the city of South Fulton to attend. And August the 23rd, the Gunner Back to School event will be held at Welcome All Park. It has been rescheduled, so August the 13th, they will be hosting that big community event at Welcome All. And September the 10th, we will have our next Talk Around Town, and we will be talking about something really important to this city, which is MARTA, public transportation, and the South Fulton Transportation Plan. So with that being said, Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Brings us to Roman numeral 11, agenda items, letter A, administration. Number one, request council approval of a resolution to erect honorary street signs as follows. New Hope Road, Roger Bruce Way, and Wallace Road, Reverend Dr. Walter Kimbrough, and the Congressman John Lewis Way, sponsored by Mayor Gumbs. Also, you can sound the next item as well Item two is request council approval of a resolution to rename the Southwest Arts Center in honor and recognition of former mayor William Bill Edwards sponsored by mayor guns If there is no objection to this We will adopt this with unanimous consent Mr.

Clerk, please sound the next item

That brings us to letter B, first read ordinances. And I would like to note that number four, number six, number seven, number eight, and number nine were deferred during the 5 PM zoning meeting. So these items are being removed from first read for this meeting. The remaining first read items are number one, first read, an ordinance to amend the administrative guidelines for tree preservation of the Code of Ordinances, City of South Fulton, Georgia, sponsored by Council Members Sebastian, Williams, Brown, and Johnson. Number two, first read, an ordinance to amend Title I administration of the City of South Fulton Code of Ordinances to help ensure high ethical standards within the city, sponsored by Mayor Gumbs. Number three, first read and ordinance to amend Title I, Administration of the City of South Fulton Code of Ordinances to allow for coverage of legal fees for elected officials sponsored by Mayor Gumbs. Number five, first read of a zoning ordinance, KZ26-010, CV26-002, application by 2020 Enterprise Group LLC, Care of Battle Law, questionary zoning from CUP to senior housing. with concurrent variance to Section 509.05 to eliminate the 50-foot zoning buffer and improve the setback on the northwestern tip and reduce the 50-foot buffer to 25 feet on the western property line to develop a 50-unit mixed residential senior community for residents aged 62 and older on approximately 13.8 acres at 7490 Butner Road located in Council District 4. Also, and the last one is number 10 First read of a zoning ordinance case z 26 that's 0 2 0 an ordinance by the city of South Fulton City Council to rezone a portion of plus or minus two hundred fifty five point three five acres of property located at zero Indian Road zero Vanderbilt Road rear zero Merck Road zero Merck Road rear and to TR, townhouse residential development, from CUP to TR, to R5, and again to R5, and then lastly to R4 and R5 and TR. This is located in city council district 2. And for your information, this is a city council initiated from the city attorney's office.

Okay. All right. Being that these are first read, there's no action that needs to be taken at this time. Mr. Clerk, please sign the next item.

That brings us to the walk-on add-on items. Two, we had the clarification of the District 5 health event, October 10th, 2026. And then the second item was the approval of board appointments of Rodney Littles to the Board of Zoning Appeals and Benny Crane to Position 6 of the Downtown Development Authority.

All right, Council. If there is no objection to Item 12A and B, we can adopt this with gross unanimous consent. All right. Mr. Clerk, please sound the next item.

Executive session, if necessary.

So, counsel, we do need to go in an executive session to address personnel. If you have no objections of that, we will recess to executive session really quick. No more than 30 minutes.

Recess at 8.06. All right, we got 25 minutes.

Let's go. We will now reconvene from executive session. Mr. Clerk, was there any action taken in executive session?

There was no action taken in executive session that requires a public vote.

All right. Thank you, Mr. Clerk. If there's no objections, we will move forward with adjournment. We are now adjourned at 923. Thank you.