OPINION: Planning department warring against long-standing Peachtree City plan

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OPINION — It does not cost a lot for a community to achieve a high quality of life, requiring mainly thoughtful planning and implementation. However, poor governance can wrench a hefty amount of money from your checking account while leaving the community on the list of places to avoid.

The goal should be to develop ways to provide the highest level of service at the least expense. Finding elected officials who are willing to lead in that direction is rare these days, even from officials who declare themselves “conservative.”

First to worst

The entire West Coast of the United States, once the destination of prosperity, is spiraling into decay. Cities of all sizes that had everything going for them elected the wrong candidates with the wrong ideologies.

No place screams “government negligence and incompetence” more than San Francisco.

Yes, in addition to the Golden Gate City’s natural beauty and exquisite quality of life, the city was the center of world technological intellect and one of the wealthiest cities on the planet. What could possibly go wrong?

After being given the best-case scenario on a platter, indeed prosperity for San Franciscans appeared secure. But the elected officials just could not help themselves.

A lot of the slogans on decriminalizing drug use, shoplifting, and other crimes seemed too good to pass up. Californians passed Proposition 47 in 2014 with the support of political figures like Gavin Newsom and even out-of-towners like Senator Rand Paul and Newt Gingrich to rectify society.

Candidates running for office began appealing to voters with language promoting a more ethical, equitable, and compassionate society. They believed there was nothing they could not accomplish on the social justice front with an increased stream of the taxpayers’ money. The theme was more Marx than Jesus.

The elected officials made excuses for crime, pushed a right of vagrancy, and accommodated drug addiction.

San Francisco’s star was dimming fast. Drug-addicted and mentally ill homeless people lined main thoroughfares and subway stations, shoplifting became an epidemic, businesses and retail stores ran away to other states, and corporations allowed employees to escape and work remotely elsewhere.

On April 1, 2023, the San Francisco Chronicle Editorial Board claimed the city is heading “into a ‘doom loop’ that would gut its tax base, decimate fare-reliant regional transit systems like BART and trap it in an economic death spiral.” Additionally, they claim the state’s golden goose city “is projecting a $728 million deficit over the next two fiscal years.”

Don’t think we are immune

The main thing that kept Fayette County apart from the rest of metro Atlanta’s problems was we have no immediate access to an interstate highway. The homogeneous suburban sprawl, its traffic, its overcrowded and failing schools, and its crime grew over time along the interstate highway system because of the quick access it provided to downtown Atlanta.

Fayette was not on the real estate development radar for decades except for the planned community of Peachtree City (see: https://thecitizen.com/2023/01/30/peachtree-city-history-part-4/). Our county was able to grow at a much slower and controlled pace.

You had to be devoted to the mission of the “planned city” Peachtree City and the surrounding locations because Fayette County in the 70s and 80s lacked many of the shopping, restaurants, and entertainment opportunities available to the north.

Peachtree City in the Fleisch and Learnard administrations appears to be municipal governance with San Franciscan characteristics. They purport to be of a higher moral authority, telling citizens that radical change is necessary because they say so (see: https://thecitizen.com/2020/11/01/lci-meeting-insult-to-peachtree-city-residents/).

Peachtree City’s planning department has become the foot soldiers in the war against our incredible planned community.

The Planning Director Robin Cailloux created an unfortunate banner that she displayed at an October 22, 2020, meeting that showed the severe disregard the local government has for the city’s dramatic planning success over the decades.

The title on the banner was “Dispelling some myths: planning facts” as if all the local citizens who have lived here for decades who disagree with her absurd plans were not telling the truth. It was like something out of Maoist China.

In giant bold letters, Cailloux, in support of building stacked apartment complexes all over the city, writes on the sign, “No build just means No Plan” which essentially means she holds our traditional land plans in total disregard, and she considers all our planning up to this point to be null and void.

She boldly proclaimed on the sign, “Individuals have property rights and they could rezone or build undesirable things according to the current zoning.” Be careful when your city officials engage in fear propaganda.

First, no one can rezone without a vote of the City Council. Second, the “undesirable things” they can build under the current zoning are the very things the City Council told us we needed, light industrial and the like. The real undesirable things, according to the taxpayers who fund her employment are the irresponsible traffic-heavy, multi-family complexes that Fleisch and Learnard keep wanting to force all over town.

Next, the ill-conceived sign says, “The city is not purchasing and assembling land to build these concepts.” In talking to the city’s urban planning consultants, I was told that the initial focus was building on Drake Field and demolishing the Tennis Center because the city already owned those sites. Their “we know better than you on land planning” attempt was crushed in a revolt by the taxpaying peasants.

The last tragic statement on the Cailloux sign says, “Current zoning led to developments in the last 20 years that have caused traffic congestion because they serve the car.” That is the most thoughtless fabrication I have ever seen from our local government.

Of course, Ms. Cailloux has not been here over the last 20 years. Most of the traffic-laden developments including the Home Depot/Wal-Mart and the Overlook shopping center on Highway 54-W were opposed by the citizens and the City Council changed the zoning and forced them anyway. Our last City Council, including current Councilmen Mike King and Phil Prebor, is also responsible for the overdevelopment of the MacDuff Parkway corridor which should have been zoned light industrial and office institutional.

It is only when the city drastically deviated from the traditional land planning that we witnessed such failure.

Making it up as they go

The same local officials who have been granting variances of up to 50 percent of the building setbacks behind closed doors without a vote of the city council (see: https://thecitizen.com/2023/07/10/opinion-if-city-oks-half-of-all-variance-requests-in-private-how-can-zoning-ordinance-survive/) are also attempting to delete the city’s planning history and rewrite it to their ends.

The Citizen Publisher and Editor Cal Beverly unearthed attempts by the local planning officials to bury any mention of our traditional villages and the policies that created them (see: https://thecitizen.com/2023/08/19/opinion-requiem-for-our-villages-or-a-new-unexpected-arrival/).

Beverly also found that Planning Director Cailloux is promoting a revisionist history plan that adds villages where none exist or has even been discussed in an effort to justify more dense development on our borders, something that was prohibited in our traditional planning.

This revisionism is a falsification and distortion intended to validate the need for more annexation of land for real estate developers and the creation of more dense residential development.

What the revisionist efforts exclude in the narrative are the significant increases in city services that will be necessary and the substantial increases in annual residential property taxes needed to provide them (see: https://thecitizen.com/2023/08/14/higher-taxes-on-the-way-for-most-property-owners-everywhere-in-fayette-county/).

What can you do?

We all need to be paying attention and know who is trying to devastate our prized quality of life (see: https://thecitizen.com/2023/08/14/opinion-municipal-elections-watch-whos-backing-candidates/).

Every registered voter in your family needs to vote this October-November in the municipal elections.

Ensure you know where the candidates stand on annexation and stacked dense multi-family development before you vote this October-November. It matters. If the candidate can’t give you a straightforward position, vote for someone who can.

Don’t be like the citizens and business owners of San Francisco and wait until the bottom falls out to act.

[Brown is a former mayor of Peachtree City and served two terms on the Fayette County Board of Commissioners. You can read all his columns by clicking on his photo below.]

17 COMMENTS

  1. Doug-My apologies for my delayed and untimely response. Actually, I think you and I agree more than you realize. Your narrative has been the cornerstone of my argument against the Kedron pool. It has cost tax-payers over $12,000,000 and only 2% of the PTC citizens use this facility 4 or more times a month. Almost 40% of the car tags in the summer are from out of county.

    In reference to TDK, my position is to annex in the 1600 acres on the border so that PTC has control over density and architectural design. Much like Fischer Crossing, once development begins their desire to annex will no longer be needed. Even this current council agrees that TDK is coming via local or state government (DOT). The issue is control and tax dollars. We can either get in front of it or wait and let it happen to us. Control is key. The by-product it helps with 74/54 traffic.

    • Dar, no apologies needed. We do what we can, when we can.

      The Kedron pool is a hole in the ground for dumping money; I get it. I think restraining from replacing the overhead structure in the future will help curtail some of the costs to maintain it. I do believe the State will one day try to force the TDK extension. I just reviewed again the “2014 Growth Boundary Study,” but didn’t see 1600 acres to annex on the border. However, I think the City has at least one more option to stop GDOT from forcing the TDK extension. A to when we need to use it, timing, I think, is going to be a significant factor. Like you (and Spyglass), the only reason to annex is to control development on our frontiers.

      • Doug-Review the the Coweta County Tax maps. It is 2 parcels that sit along our border on Lake McIntosh and west of the airport. You can’t wait and see. Leaders understand control and control when you can. Fischer Crossing iis a prime example.

        All those trax dollars going to Coweta and it’s PTC residents who are throwing the party.

  2. Peachtree City was originally built to have over 2x the current population. It’s important for people to know that you’re preaching revisionist history specifically against the original intent of the founders.

  3. I went to San Fran last year, and I can’t imagine letting a city around here get that bad. I also lived through the urbanization of the far north of Atlanta for 20 years before moving to PTC for refuge.

    Up north, highly variable zoning replaced “horse country” with huge apartment complexes and large homes so close together you could lean out your window and shake hands with your neighbor. As a result, stifling traffic got so bad that local trips weren’t measured in miles, but rather time.

    How much clearer do PTC residents need to be to our city leadership? We rely on you to maintain our quality of life, our family-friendly neighborhoods and our home values in a fiscally responsible way.

    There should be no need for a “Planning Director” in PTC. The winning plan was set decades ago, if we only had leaders with the sense to follow it.

  4. The planning director is doing her job according to her boss.
    You need to address the real problem, those who profit from the development and are able to get what they want through the elected officials. Want change, change those elected officials.

          • All is well, Dar. Thanks. The TDK extension still remains a difference. However, I liked your efforts with Lexington Square. I remain opposed to just about anything that brings out-of-town “guests” who are not necessarily good guests with a vested interest in our neighborhoods and community. For example, Great Wolf Lodge, installing a beach at Lake Peachtree, public restrooms at Battery Park. It is in my interest for Peachtree City to sustain itself to as great extent as possible and not invite the pressures of outside interests. Peachtree City isn’t for everyone, other than those who live here, and nor should it be.

          • Doug-My apologies for my delayed and untimely response. Actually, I think you and I agree more than you realize. Your narrative has been the cornerstone of my argument against the Kedron pool. It has cost tax-payers over $12,000,000 and only 2% of the PTC citizens use this facility 4 or more times a month. Almost 40% of the car tags in the summer are from out of county.

            In reference to TDK, my position is to annex in the 1600 acres on the border so that PTC has control over density and architectural design. Much like Fischer Crossing, once development begins their desire to annex will no longer be needed. Even this current council agrees that TDK is coming via local or state government (DOT). The issue is control and tax dollars. We can either get in front of it or wait and let it happen to us. Control is key. The by-product it helps with 74/54 traffic.

  5. The original planners of PTC are rolling in their graves. We aren’t a Buckhead like some want with multiple apartments and trendy upscale shopping. I wonder if these Einstein’s who called for changing the concept of Peachtree City realize the crime in Buckhead is high and the people of Buckhead want to break away from the city of Atlanta? It seems as though those who want change in PTC never lived in a city that turned to high crime, dilapidating buildings, high population, and one big eyesore. I suggest they move there. Peachtree City is full. Now protect what we have and preserve the will of the founders.

  6. Mr. Brown and Mr. Beverly certainly make one thing clear…PTC has changed in radical ways.
    I’m just an observer who has lived here almost 34 years. I can say that in my life I’ve moved 3 times because of over building/zoning/quality of life issues in South ATL towns that became “mature” and started recycling space or were pressured to build for populations and influences coming from metro ATL.
    When I came here in 1990, I thought it would be my last move because PTC was co unique…there is still time to keep it that way.