DeKalb’s Comprehensive Plan Ready for Commission Approval

–With One Big Exception

by Allan Bly

After two years in the making, the Planning and Development Department has submitted the draft Comprehensive Plan to the BOC for its action during the month of November. Visit your local public library to view a hard copy of the final document and you will not find it. What you will get is a humongous binder rendered obsolete by subsequent changes to the local plan requirements made by the Georgia Department of Community Affairs made in May 2005. Also, you may not find the new 89 page draft of the DeKalb CP on the web site, http://www.co.dekalb.ga.us/planning/mainPage.html Strategic Planning - Comprehensive Plan, but it does have a phone number you can call to receive a CD copy.

The County’s new draft CP has four components:

Quality of Life

This depicts standard of living conditions in DeKalb that include population demographics, economic development measures, housing conditions, and public health indicators. The most significant data is the future population and employment forecasts that will be used to help determine the future land use and infrastructure needs. The 2025 projections are:

• 894,418 residents-- a 26 percent increase over 2005
• 471,418 jobs; a 27– a percent gain over 2005

Again, the Planning and Development Department has chosen the higher numbers provided by DCA over the 13 percent lower ones of the Atlanta Regional Commission. A bad choice. ARC’s sophisticated projections come with a fifteen-page explanation of the methodology used; DCA states its simpler forecasts "are based on the average rate of change from 1980 to 2000." The result of the County’s projection selection is probably an overstatement of land needed for future development.

Community Vision

In a series of public meetings throughout the county "stakeholders" were asked what they wanted DeKalb to be. The responses were used to help craft the following:

Vision Statement

• By 2025, DeKalb County will consist of walkable communities connected to recreation and green space areas by trails and sidewalks. Neighborhoods will be protected and enhanced with compatible development. The county will develop with less sprawl, a full range of housing opportunities that is affordable to the residents, clean air and water with the protection of the environment, a good transportation system (less congestion) that uses alternative modes of travel, redevelopment of declining neighborhoods, and a strong economic base which includes job opportunities and training. DeKalb County believes in citizen involvement and the planning and development process in order to improve the overall quality of life.

The next step in refining the community vision statement was the development of:

Character Area identifications

Fifteen types of areas of communities with visual and functional differences, of corridors and of natural areas were identified and mapped. Smoke Rise has been designated as:

• Suburban (Built Out)- An area of fully developed subdivisions with low pedestrian orientation, little or no transit, high open space, and varied street patterns. Proposed development policies for this type of character area that might be applicable to SR include traffic calming, sidewalks, and increased street interconnections that could improve walk-ability.

The Tucker area is also designated as the same type of character area except for the downtown portion which is labeled Town Center (see below).

Future Development Concept

Forty-one Character Area Centers were selected for inclusion in a Future Development Concept for the entire county. None are designated for Smoke Rise but the following are close by:

• Employment Center- A campus style development in the vicinity of Stone Mountain Freeway and Mountain Industrial Boulevard that is to include a mix of offices and light manufacturing uses that would be transit related.
• Town Center- A revised and expanded downtown Tucker following the plan recently prepared through the Livable Centers Initiative.

Community Issues and Opportunities

Based on the Quality of Life analysis and input from the community, Issues and Opportunities were prepared for the following topics: aging, housing, intergovernmental coordination/planning process, land use/ sense of place, natural resources, historic resources, facilities and services, economic development, public health, and transportation. Here are a few of the many Issues/Opportunities and Recommended Strategies that might be of interest to SR.

Housing

• High number of foreclosures--educate for home ownership as investment.
• Lack of affordable housing in "high end" areas--establish inclusionary zoning.

Intergovernmental Coordination/Planning and Development Process

• Community Councils need improvement–-provide more structure.
• Building code enforcement needs improvement–-require all building trade inspectors to be certified and have proficiency in appropriate Georgia codes.

Land Use/Sense of Place

• Changes to Future Land Use Plan too frequent–-limit number of changes allowed each year and analyze them separately from re-zonings.
• Several small area development studies have been prepared–-these and future small area studies should be adopted and made part of the comp plan.

Natural Resources

• Availability of greenspace is shrinking–-encourage the creation of network of trails and greenspace.

Economic Development

• Not enough dine-in restaurants outside the perimeter–-increase opportunities in under-served areas.

Transportation

• Many streets do not reflect the neighborhood context through which they operate–-continue prioritization of sidewalks connecting schools and neighborhoods.

The above components of the draft CP are very general. What’s missing is the more specific and all-important Future Land Use Plan Map. "Without the Map the rest has limited meaning," admits a Planning and Development Department staff member. "DCA has allowed us to submit that part later."

Smoke Rise and Tucker residents need to keep a watchful eye on the preparation of the absent key component. The draft Land Use Plan Map prepared last year proposed increased development densities for our two communities. This year’s draft CP contains two red flags:

• The continued use of the population and employment projections of DCA, which are significantly higher than the better ones of the Atlanta Regional Commission.
• The broad Character Area designation of "Suburban (Built Out)" for SR and residential Tucker has a Land Use description of "Mod-High Density".

Downtown Tucker does have the benefit of it’s LCI plan to guide the preparation of the County’s Land Use Plan.