Zoning Board of Appeals - Special Meeting

Good morning. It is 11 o'clock, and we want to go ahead and get this meeting to order. So I welcome you to the emergency special call meeting for August 18, 2026. It is 11 o'clock a.m. Mr. Clerk, can you please sound the roll?

Yes, ma'am. Good morning to everyone. This is the roll call for today's meeting. The Honorable Catherine F. Ryle, District 1. The Honorable Aaron V. Johnson, District 2.

Present.

The Honorable Latonya Tony Wright, District 3.

PRESENT.

The Honorable JC Sebastian, District 4. Here. The Honorable Keosha B. Bell, District 5.

Present.

The Honorable Natasha Williams-Brown, District 6.

Present.

The Honorable Linda B. Pritchett, District 7.

Here.

The Honorable Catherine F. Ryle, District 1. Present. And the Honorable Mayor Carmelita Gumbs. Madam Mayor, you have a quorum.

All right. Thank you, Mr. Clerk. Please sign the next item.

The next item on the agenda is action items. Request council approval for the city's participation in the Atlanta Regional Commission's 2026 link mission to Mexico City, Mexico.

All right, council. As you know, we adopted a policy that any type of international travel needs to be approved for the council. Explaining what the Atlanta Regional Commission is is a very prestigious organization that many of you have all been a part of and have been a part of their regional leaders campaign. It just so happens that this trip falls as an international trip, so that is why we are here. This is very important to the city of South Fulton because out of our nine years of existence, we have never been invited to a link trip. And this is regional collaboration with leaders from all over the Atlanta metro area, CEOs of major companies, investment groups, as well as chief elected officials from across the Metro Atlanta area. So as we are here, we need to codify based off of the legislation. So that is the request, and that is why we are here today. So at this point in time, if there is no opposition, or if there is, I would like to make a motion.

I'm in the queue. Madam Mayor, I'm in the queue. Yes, ma'am. Can you make a motion?

Yes. Can we have a motion?

Second.

It has been moved and probably second. I will take a moment to recognize Councilwoman Pritchett that is in the queue.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. So this policy last year, April 8th, 2025, the international pot, the international travel policy was drafted by resolution and in the policy statement in point number one, it talks about eligibility and approval. Um, 1.2 talks about pre approval requirements. So, Mayor, there was a newsletter that you sent out yesterday that I never subscribed to, but I received it. And you stated that you informed this council on Friday of your intentions. You sent an email to us on this council on Sunday. And that's when I first became aware that your memo is dated on Friday. However, uh, pre-approval 1.2 B one says the purpose and objectives of the travel. I think that you have met that with the memo that you sent us. Number two, it says a detailed itinerary and duration of the trip in your memo. You state the duration of your trip, but not a detailed itinerary. Number three, the estimated cost. I don't have that. Perhaps you have submitted that. I'm sure you have for approval under our regular travel policy to the city manager. Expected outcomes and benefits to the city. I think you covered that. But point number A says that all international travel must be in the form of a written request and approved by the city council by a majority vote of at least 30 days before departure. My understanding from your memo is that your travel begins tomorrow. So my purpose for bringing this up is Last year, when Council Member Williams-Brown was traveling with a delegation with Fulton County and Chairman Pitts, she was met with a lot of opposition. She had to jump through all kind of hoops. I personally don't think that this travel policy is even particularly necessary, because it's no different in what you do. in when we travel domestically. However, and I didn't agree with this policy when it was passed. However, people were insistent on passing it. So now we have a policy that has passed and now we're looking to approve something that I haven't seen the requirements, all the requirements that I have read that are outlined here in this policy. And some of the members on this council, which may not even be familiar with this policy. So, um, I just haven't, I have not seen these policies met. Um, I haven't received a written request with the detailed itinerary, the estimated costs. I just haven't received it. And I'm noting that for the record.

Thank you. Can I see the kid please? Who's next? Councilman Sebastian.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you, Councilman Pritchett, for your observations and comments. I always think about legislation as being things that are alive and they're not static. I think we have a responsibility as a body that Even if we have something on the books, we see how it's being operationalized and how it's working, and if it's the best thing to do, we tweak accordingly. My recollection, and I think I'm the oldest up here on council, my recollection is that when Councilwoman Williams Brown had to go on that, in that delegation with Fulton County, there were some circumstances around that trip that caused us to approve that trip pending, I believe, a report that she would have presented to this body on return. So even back then, we knew that the legislation was not perfect or we were still working on it. But because of the importance of the trip and the commitment that was made before, we went ahead and we approved it. Just like a lot of things in the city, it's a work in progress, I believe. Even going back to when we had that situation that caused us to create this policy, I remember making a statement that said along the lines of, we cannot be a large city and people take us seriously if we don't have these international trips and delegations. Those are just things that we have to participate in. I think there are circumstances surrounding this particular trip that does not quite align in terms of timing and everything. Also, I would love to hear where the money's coming from for this trip, because if I'm correct, just like we have travel budgets, the mayor have a travel budget, and whether she spend that money domestically or locally, it's the same money being spent. So with that said, I ask the question about the, the source of the funding and also the timing of this is something else that I think I would, I would like the mayor to, um, to explain for the clarification of everybody.

Do we have any more people in the queue?

Yes. Mayor Pro Tem. Uh, Bell is in the queue.

Hey, good morning. How everybody doing? I just had a quick question just to piggyback on what Councilman Sebastian mentioned. I know that at this point you have information as far as the cost. When you do your explanation and provide feedback, can you just provide an overall as far as cost or if you'll be traveling with anyone, if you have that information to provide?

Okay. So yes, to answer your question, um, it did come out of my discretionary funds, which I have a travel budget that is available to travel. So I use that the estimated costs and I will provide you all of this as well. So Mr. Clerk, if you have that, you can, uh, send that to the council. The total estimated costs was $5,800. That includes airfare and the link registration for the program fee. Um, the city of South Fulton was placed on a wait list and we were approved after we were approved in July to attend, um, the link trip. As I've shared before, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity for the city of South Fulton to be at the table. We have not ever been invited on a link trip, and they said purposely they did not invite us on this trip. So at this point in time, the reason why we are here is to make sure that the city of South Fulton is at the table. There are a lot of things that are being discussed. This program that ARC, the Atlanta Regional Commission, provides, it just happens that this year it falls in an international country. So they take trips all over the United States. I believe last year they were in California. And I'm not sure. I think this is the first international trip in quite some time. But it just happens to fall on that. If we were invited and it wasn't an international country that we would be visiting, then this would not even be a conversation. But at this point in time, following protocols and procedures, here we are. At this point in time, if there are any other questions and discussions, I do see Councilwoman Pritchett in the queue again for her second time.

Thank you. So I still don't see, I don't know if you plan to address the part about the itinerary. I still don't see that in the information that was given. I have a question for the city attorney and the city manager, whoever would like to respond. Obviously, One of you or both of you are aware of this, and you do realize that there are requirements here, specifically the 30-day requirement. The city attorney, how could we approve this knowing that there's a 30-day requirement that cannot be met?

So based on how the legislation is written and also the way that we've applied this policy in the past, if the council were to choose to waive that provision given the exigency of the situation, the trip starts tomorrow, we were on a waiting list, things of that nature, then the council could elect to waive that provision as we've done in the past, given that seemingly all the other requirements are met if they're met.

I guess city manager just don't have nothing to say.

I think it was a legal question, so that city attorney answered. There is sufficient funding in her budget to cover this, and so I don't really have anything to add.

And when this trip was, I guess, when we were being considered for this, Would that have been an appropriate time to have just placed it somewhere for a pre-approval if we were selected?

I had to make the decision whether or not I was going to attend. They offered it. I made the decision. It's not a requirement. I made the decision of whether or not I wanted to attend to represent the city of South Fulton. And at that point in time, after speaking with a lot of people, this is an opportunity not to miss for the city of South Fulton. So at that point I made the decision that I will travel to Mexico on behalf of the city of South Fulton and represent them at the table, which is what I'm supposed to do as the mayor.

So when, when, so someone says something about July. So July is when we were presented with this opportunity.

Yes.

And then you made your decision a month later, which is outside of the 30-day window. However, I guess that's just your decision-making process that you just, it took you a month to decide. I'm just trying to get clarification.

Yes.

Okay. So, you know, um, we have come, there are people on here that have jobs. There are people on here that have schedules. So we came in here today because you decided that you were going to ask for this to be approved way after the fact that you knew because you just decided when you felt like deciding it. And so we have spent this time and this expense of this special call emergency meeting because now what you decided to do after knowing for 30 days is an emergency for us when you decided to do it at your pleasure. And that's a statement.

Thank you. I believe councilwoman Rao was in the queue.

Thank you for recognizing me. Um, I want to say, Whatever the timing is, ideally, we would have had it in advance. But I think the reality is it's important that, as a city, we're represented at these tables. And so I guess, at this point, I want to know from the city attorney, how do we move forward from taking action and being appropriate in doing so?

Yes.

So it would be up to the council to vote to waive that provision of the legislation. to either approve or deny it at that point if they felt that all the other provisions have been met. As you mentioned, if it's the will of the council for the mayor to go, then the council just needs to vote accordingly.

CHRISTIE WOODARD- As a follow up, I do think we should look at it 30 days, ideally. appropriate to get the best rates for these things, but I would like to move that we approve and waive the 30-day provision to allow for the mayor to attend that 2026 ArcLink trip.

Oh, okay. We'll vote.

Can we vote?

No, we have to amend the motion. I'm going to queue next. May I?

Yes.

All right. So I want to amend my motion to approve the trip to waive the 30-day notice requirement and also to waive the agenda submission requirement.

And it's in here. The agenda's already in here.

The agenda's in here. Sorry, I didn't get to that. So the agenda is here, Councilman. So basically, we have one item. To approve the trip with the 30-day requirement waived and to accept the agenda as presented in this pile.

Mayor, if I may, I think the most appropriate action would be for him to withdraw his motion and then make a new motion, just to be very clear for the record. Withdraw the initial motion and then make a new motion.

OK. So I withdraw the original motion. Do I just go right ahead and we have to vote? All right. All in favor of the withdrawal, right?

All in favor of those who withdraw the original motion from Councilman Sebastian. That is unanimous.

All right, so new motion to approve this link trip to Mexico for a mayor and to waive the 30-day notice requirement.

Second.

It's been moved and properly seconded. Y'all ready to vote? Can I see a show of hands?

Court, that motion approved. Will Council Member Bell, Mayor Pro Tem Bell vote affirmatively? That was approved 7-0 unanimously.

No, it was not.

6-1.

All right. So at this time, Mr. Clerk, is there any other items that we need to discuss?

There's no other items listed on the agenda.

If there's no objections, we will adjourn this meeting. Thank you.

adjourned at 1118 a.m. Thank you.