Waiting at the intersection of Chapel Hill Road and Central Church Road for the red light to change, some may notice that a group of homes at the corner are up for sale by realtor Tina Fountain. It is not unusual to see homes for sale in Douglas County, but when there is a cluster of homes going onto the market, this can be a potential sign that things are changing.

Losing Georgia has reported on similar cases before (Heritage Valley | Timber Ridge Drive) where homeowners have decided to sell out their properties with the prospect of future commercial development. In reality this is part of the growing cycle that all communities face at some point: agricultural to rural, rural to urban, urban to commercial.

According to online property records the homes make up part of the Turnberry subdivision and it is unknown whether the rest of the subdivision is subjecting to selling out. Now this begs the question, what will happen at this busy intersection?

One resource to look at is the Douglas County Future Land Use Map which illustrates that the corner where these houses are located is zoned for a Community Village Center. The Douglas County Comprehensive Plan 2025, section 10-41, defines a Community Village Center as the following:

“… places where a compatible mixture of higher intensity uses are located, such as larger scaled shopping centers, professional offices and services. Mixed-use developments that combine residential, commercial, service and recreational uses integrated and linked together by a comprehensive circulation system are encouraged in these nodes. Community village centers include shopping and service facilities that offer a wide variety of goods and services, including both convenience goods for neighborhood residents and shopping goods for a market area consisting of several neighborhoods. Whereas someone might live near a neighborhood village center but work outside the county, the commercial village concept includes a variety of housing options, employment opportunities, businesses, office, retail shops, services, well-placed parks, plazas and open spaces that create a community where it is possible to live, work and play. Land use components coexist as part of a collective approach to creating communities that are safe, attractive, and convenient for pedestrians and motorists alike. Natural and historic resources within community village centers should be enhanced and preserved as a means of defining a distinct identity or sense of place. Improved connections to natural assets, both pedestrian and vehicular, particularly from existing and developing higher density residential communities will tie the village together. A Community village center should create a focal point for its surrounding neighborhoods.”

- Douglas County Comprehensive Plan 2025, Section 10-41/42

Just by the definition available, it would seem that a Community Village Center would take up a fairly large amount of acreage and this holds true due to the number of commercial shopping centers entering urban areas. The houses that are up for sale approximately make up 2 acres altogether. Adjacent to the properties is the Kroger which is on 10.88 acres, southward is the Shoppes at Chapel Hill on 15.86 acres and the Shoppes at Deer Creek on 4.64 9.051.

Another speculation is that the City of Douglasville will annex the land for the purpose of commercial. Speaking with a few County representatives they too agree that this possibly could happen and should not be looked over. Referencing back to the Future Land Use Map, one can see that the area is like an island within Douglasville’s city limits, which may further add on to the annexation debate.

Initially it looks as though a commercial development at this location currently is not likely to happen. However five years from now it is very possible considering all the residential growth occurring south of Interstate 20 and the trend is already in sight with the LCI study that is to occur on Fairburn Road.

Despite the low turnout of residents at the District 4 town hall meeting, one of the greatest assets available was the amount of information concerning future roadway projects in Douglas County. On display were 12 various diagrams representing different intersections/corridors in different phases of planning which will be slowly implemented later this year and into 2008.

Also made available was a set of documents going in depth about how Douglas County will confront a 5+ year old weakened transportation infrastructure. Displaying large diagrams on easels, having paper documents and some downloadable content has been the norm for providing the public information. But what if there was a way to display traffic improvement information digitally and interactively with one click?

For any community that is facing growing pains, availability of information is key to establishing a sound base of communication between citizen and government. The more information that is available, the more a citizen can understand the impact of future endeavours while helping maintain a strong community.

The reliance of digital technology will always be skeptical for some since there is always an associated risk of data loss, information being attained in the wrong hands or further complications to older platforms. However proven technology should be embraced in a way that will further aid the availability of information as well as create alternative methods to provide community resources.

In this case I used traffic improvement information collected at the town hall meeting in order to create a demonstration using Google Earth and Google Maps. Of the ten pages that outlined various transportation projects, eight were able to be used based on useable data that could be implemented into Google Earth.

Major project sections were given their own folder where then other projects could be subdivided. For instance the 2006 Douglas County Safety Action Plan is subdivided into four folders that contain colored vectors illustrating different lengths of roadways that will see improvement.

It took approximately five hours to complete using a free program. One of the many advantages about the KML file architecture is that it can be viewed online using Google Maps, which means that anyone who does not have Google Earth installed on their computer still has an alternative to view the information.

The use of Google Earth grows by the day as the application becomes beneficial to so many people, whether it is sharing information on traffic improvements, understanding the impact of Hurricane Katrina or demonstrating the ill effects of mountaintop removal.

There are many large municipalities using Google Earth and SketchUp to demonstrate future development. Should this out-of-the-box idea be something that Metro Atlanta and the West Georgia Region adopt?

Interactive Transportation Demo

• Download for Google Earth
• View in Google Maps - Ignore syntax error, please wait for Google Maps to process the KMZ file

Tomorrow evening there will be a meeting about the paving of Tyree Road at the New Covenant United Methodist Church at 5960 Highway 5. The meeting starts at 7:00 p.m. in order to inform residents about the improvements of Tyree Road between Liberty Road and Post Road. The official description can be found below.

Final plans have been developed for the construction and paving of Tyree Road between Liberty Road and Post Road. The project will correct segments of substandard alignment and provide drainage and new pavement for this existing two-lane dirt Road. The DCDOT will be contacting property owners adjacent to the roadway during March 2007 to begin acquiring right of way for the project. While the right of way is being acquired, contracts will be prepared to move forward with construction by late Spring or early Summer 2007. The project is funded under the current SPLOST transportation program.

This information was provided at the District 4 town hall meeting last week, however is not present on the County’s website.

Last night was the first district town hall meeting conducted by the County in order to better communicate with residents in accordance to the ‘One Douglas’ plan. As reported last year in an article about community input on public goods, the County has not held a traditional town hall meeting in over ten years. Last evening’s meeting was a step in the right direction, however the low residential turnout was somewhat dissatisfying.

The meeting was to be divided into two sections: 1 hour for residents to talk with representatives from County departments and 1 hour for a public forum. Due to the low turnout, the public forum aspect was dropped from the meeting around 7 p.m. (the time the forum was to begin) since the residents that were in attendance were finding the information they needed with talking to different department representatives.

That largest attraction at the meeting were the diagrams of the current and proposed traffic improvements throughout the county, which included Fairburn Road and Anneewakee Road, Highway 78 at Mann Road, and the Highway 5 Roundabout just to name a few. A small display was made available by the Fire Department incorporating some information about the new Mirror Lake station.

A few minutes before 7:30 p.m. the meeting was being official closed, a half hour early than scheduled, with most representatives and residents already vacant. There were no signs outside American Legion Post 145 indicating that a County town hall meeting was being held.

Some of the people that were in attendance included Chairman Worthan, Commissioner Latham, Commissioner Mulcare, Commissioner Camp, E-911 Director Greg Whitaker, Fire Chief Scott Spencer, Communications Director Wes Tallon, Traffic Operations Division Manager Keary Lord, Human Resources Director Ray Martin, many other County representatives and a reporter from the Douglas County Sentinel.

Yesterday marked the day at the polls where voters of Douglas County chose to accept the new school bond by 64.99%. Only 9.57% of the registered voters in the county turned out to vote, which translates to roughly the same amount in the 1970s and about half that from the previous accepted bond referendum in 1984.

Here are a few local websites giving interesting views about the poll results: blogger Elizabeth watches the results overnight, DouglasPolitics.com has some local reaction from residents, and the Douglas County Taxpayers Coalition provides unique percentages.

But what will the future bring? The School Board will now seek for a bond that has a low interest rate, and once that is complete property taxes will likely increase within a year in order to start the process of paying off the 20 year loan. To see the possible impact the bond will have on taxes, residents can view a breakdown on a website sponsored by the School System.

However the bond does not serve as a permanent solution to the overcrowding student enrollment problem.

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Today the Douglas County Sentinel will report that the proposed new jail, which will be attached the latest version of SPLOST, is going to be located near the Douglas County Courthouse. Losing Georgia published an article last October about possible new jail locations based on official documents and property records, and now this article is being extended to allow residents exactly see the possible locations in Google Maps using vectors.

Although the County has not officially announced the location of the jail, the area of concern can be determined in a defined area adjacent to the County Courthouse. Based on the needs for 15 acres, large capacity sewer lines and cutting transportation costs, and comparing the data to property records and the Duralee Lane Extension Project, it can be assumed that the new jail will possibly be built in one of two large tracts of land.

The largest tract is owned by Wayne C. Ricket located on South Cherokee Boulevard, the location of the Flagview Mobile Home Park, and is 36.59 acres. The feasibility of relocating residents who live in the mobile homes will likely be an issue.

An adjacent tract is 16 acres and owned by the W.T. Thornton Family. This particular plot is in an undeveloped area with Slater Mill Creek flowing near the south edge of the property line. Behind that tract is another large piece of land owned by the County, approximately 30 acres, serving as the senior citizens center. Whenever the Duralee Lane Extension occurs, a bridge or large concrete culvert will probably be installed to limit disruption of Slater Mill Creek.

On the last SPLOST referendum that voters disagreed with at the polls, the new jail was projected to cost taxpayers $87,262,200, however the latest figure projects that the cost will be a minimum of $130 million – approximately a difference of $43 million. The $130 million is actually in the form of a bond, broken down into $120 million for construction and $10 million for land, with SPLOST acting as a backup repository for funds.

The percentage that will be used from SPLOST for the new jail has not been disclosed to the public and will be half of the total. Residents will once again traverse to the polls on September 18 in order to vote for or against the latest rendition of SPLOST. The new jail is supposed to have 1,400 beds, 100 less than the Sheriff’s Department projection that was apart of the County’s Identification of Needs presentation.

To look at a few documents about the new jail, check them out in the Document Explorer. Property records are public knowledge and can be accessed online.

Seems some readers are unhappy with the content on the site, so here is a challenge: write up an article that you think should have more attention. Local blogs like The Real News About Douglas County and Douglas Politics publicly post editorials and letters from citizens. But think of it like a contest with the best work being posted online here on LosingGeorgia.com.

Being a citizen journalist can mean numerous things: reporting about an event, fact-checking newspapers articles, or showing pictures of a scene. For a great collective definition, check out Wikipedia’s article. Although I never intended to adopt the role of a citizen journalist (my profession is web design and photography), it has been an interesting 1 ½ years reporting about various topics in Douglas County.

Here’s your chance to let everyone know about a story you think should be heard about. The “contest”, for the lack of a better word, will last one week or longer depending on the number of submissions. The best articles will then be posted. There are a few rules that need to be followed before submitting any article.

Rules

• Must understand the role of a citizen journalist
• All articles MUST BE e-mailed to citizen@losinggeorgia.com
• Article must range from 900-1500 words
• A name or alias for the author
• At least two solid cited resources (will be verified)
• Pictures are acceptable, must be larger than 600×400 pixels
• NO racial profiling, slurs or discrimination
• NO outlandish criticism
• NO finger pointing
• NO bigotry
• NO lobbying

Articles will not be corrected for grammar or spell-checking, merely disqualified. If you need a good word processor, try out these free tools - Open Office and Goggle Docs.

On March 20^th voters will have a chance to vote for or against the School System’s latest bond referendum for $150,550,000, which purportedly will help construct two new elementary, one middle and high schools in the county and acquisition more land, computers and buses. The Douglas County School System has posted a brief overview and built a separate website about the upcoming bond referendum.

The necessity for the bond has been derived from extensive student population increases within the last five years, this being a result of uncontrolled new residential developments. There is no doubt that new schools need to be built, but opposition is growing as the Douglas County Tax Coalition takes a political and economic look at the situation that has played out for the last few years and decidedly has chosen against the referendum.

Despite all the information that is being passed around via websites and printed media about the bond referendum, it seems that everyone has forgotten about the latest referendum that ended in 2006, not less than a year ago. Losing Georgia takes a glimpse at the past by looking at the information and comparing it to today’s situation.

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In a LosingGeorgia.com Community Poll questioning the change in the quality of life in Douglas County, 64% of the votes concluded that the quality of life had decreased in recent years. Although the results do not speak for all residents, it is an issue that will continually increase in magnitude as Douglas County and its communities grow at staggering proportions, straining an already stressed infrastructure.

There is no exact unit of measurement for the quality of life. Rather it is a combination of standard of living, environmental health, economy, community stability and other contributing factors. Concerns for the quality of life in Douglas County has been increasing as new development has spurred tremendous growth in population, thusly affecting every aspect of life – congested roadways, overcrowded schools, increase in taxes and constrained public services.

Then there is the issue where quality of life divides between the individual and a society or collective entity. Can an individual be happy in a society that is struggling to cope with formalities that constrain improvements? Can a society adjust to demands on all levels in equilibrium while providing each individual the necessary needs for fulfillment?

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Tonight on DCTV 23, the County’s public access channel, will air the State of the County address by Board of Commissioner’s Chairman Tom Worthan at 8 p.m., and later re-airs at 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. on Sunday and 8 p.m. on Monday night. However the speech has been made available early on the County’s website and on Losing Georgia.

Instead of focusing about just the accomplishments that have been made in the last year, the speech focuses on some of the problems that have plagued the County in the past, like rampant new development, overpopulation growth and the consequences that are associated, and produces applications that will hopefully upstart better control than documented before.

What is considerably surprising are the new advancements that will come to the County’s website, which will include a better GIS platform for property information (this was confirmed with a conversation with Andy Summers, GIS Manager, who is looking to replace the BinaryBus application for something more pertinent and providing more County maps online which is currently in effect), registration online for all sports programs, and providing live streaming video of public meetings.

Some of the improvements are a reflection of a previous post about the inconsistencies in the County’s data provided on the website across the limited platforms available by third-party vendors. It is good to see some proactive measures finally manifest after years of limited lines of communication with the general public. The year of 2007 will definitely be one of challenges and decisive measures in order to reestablish the lapse in community involvement. As a resident, what do you think of the speech and the future of Douglas County?

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