Commish Business

Dogs, Building Noise, Drought

originally published October 24, 2007

A proposal to bar dogs from being chained up - already law in many places - has generated more emails to commissioners than any other, one commissioner said at the Athens-Clarke County (ACC) Commission’s agenda-setting meeting Oct. 18. Most of that response has been favorable, Commissioner Kelly Girtz said, but he and other commissioners had some reservations about a part of the proposed ordinance that would also allow dogs to be confined in pens only large enough let the animal “stand, turn around, and lay down, and make all other normal body movements” appropriate to the animal’s health. Commissioner George Maxwell liked the ordinance even less than other commissioners, saying many pet owners can’t afford (or don’t have room for) fenced yards. “What’s going to happen to that dog when these people can no longer afford to keep them?” he asked. Studies show people with pets are healthier than those without, he added. “Pets bring a lot of good things to us old folk.”

But several citizens involved in dog rescue efforts told commissioners that chained-up dogs are often the most neglected animals, and can suffer serious neck wounds from pulling against their collars. They also tend to become aggressive, advocates said. County rules already require a chained dog to have a chain that measures at least three times the length of the animal that it is confining. If a chain were too long, ACC Animal Control Superintendent Patrick Rives told Flagpole, then the drag of the chain would become a problem. Chains can also get twined around trees or obstructions, he said. Dogs on “trolleys” or wire-slider runs “would probably have more space,” Rives said, but he was asked to write an ordinance that outlaws any kind of tethering. That’s because, without a fence, children or other dogs might wander within biting range of a chained animal, Commissioner Kathy Hoard says. Rives said he recalls at least one case in the past 11 years when a child was badly bitten by such a tethered animal.

And despite little enthusiasm in an earlier committee meeting for putting any limits at all on construction noise - currently exempted from the county’s noise ordinance - commissioners seemed ready last week to take another look. Citizen Rebecca Hood told commissioners that for the past two years, construction work (including blasting) has been going on near her home, and routinely starts at three o’clock in the morning. She has a young child and “we feel like we’ve been more than patient,” she said. Last month, the Commission’s legislative committee discussed prohibiting construction noise between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. (when asked, the Athens Area Home Builders Association argued for 6 a.m instead). But after hearing from county staffers that only 17 noise complaints last year concerned construction noise - and only four of those would have been affected by the ordinance - the committee recommended “no action.” But why should citizens bother to complain, one citizen asked, if it’s not illegal?

“Twenty-four hours a day, construction noise is exempt,” Commissioner Hoard pointed out. “I wouldn’t consider a building construction ordinance to be completely dead,” Commissioner Elton Dodson said, “but I don’t think we’re anywhere near the place where we’re prepared to recommend anything.” He went on, “We’ve been trying to pass a lot of real blunt laws lately that I think try to impact a specific problem in a very general way. And I think there’s a danger there.” Roofers, for example, can’t work during Georgia’s hot summer afternoons, he said.

Several commissioners agreed that broad limits would cause problems. “One of the things we’ve been encouraging is in-town development,” said Girtz, “so this means that construction is happening, not in the middle of nowhere, but right next-door.” Neither can the county’s own crews always get their work done during daylight hours, added David Lynn. “The possibility of this government tearing up streets at three o’clock in the morning is a very real possibility,” he said. And while Commissioner Carl Jordan suggested appointing a citizens’ committee to draw up a possible construction noise ordinance, Mayor Heidi Davison was noncommittal but agreed it might be placed on hold at the Nov. 6 voting meeting.

The mayor also asked citizens to continue conserving water. “We are now at more than a 25 percent reduction” from normal water demand, she said. “We have a good plan, we did a good job here, and it’s working,” she said. “The state is looking at this community as a model for what other communities can do.” Two citations have been given for second violations of the outdoor watering ban, Davison said. (A citation carries a $1,000 fine.) She asked citizens to “say something” to anyone they might see violating the water ban.

John Huie

jphuie@athens.net

More Commish

Street Plans, Parks Fees

originally published October 24, 2007

A countywide “corridor management” study headed for approval by ACC Commissioners “was never intended to be any type of a design manual” giving detailed street designs, Planning Director Brad Griffin told the five commissioners on the Government Operations Committee on Oct. 16. And the consultant (the Jaeger Company) that produced the study “to my knowledge has never done this type of work at this level of detail before,” added Deputy ACC Manager Bobby Snipes. But the $42,000 study does make general recommendations on future designs for various categories of streets, such as “urban industrial” streets like Chase Street, “urban institutional” streets (like Lumpkin), and “suburban mixed-use” streets (like Jefferson Road).

Snipes told Flagpole the study amounts to “a strategy” to improve the function and appearance of the city’s “gateway” or entry corridors, and encourage adjacent landowners to develop their land “in a way that will be complementary and supportive” of the document’s vision of the various street types. The study divides about 60 Athens-Clarke roads and streets into a dozen different categories, with general recommendations given for possible future development of landscaping, medians, sidewalks, crosswalks, bike lanes, “curb cuts” (i.e., allowable driveway entrances), and drainage facilities.

But Commissioner Carl Jordan didn’t think the study sketched a broad enough vision. It says nothing about limiting commercial signage, he said, or transit, or the placement of utility wires, which might sometimes go underground. And to Jordan, the placement of sidewalks shown in the study “doesn’t hack it” because they’re often shown too close to the street. Also, he said, Athens should consider pedestrian refuge islands (like the one on Chase Street near Prince Avenue), small “pocket” parks (like the new corner park near the ACC Library on Baxter Street), and think of how to protect “viewsheds” such as the view of the North Oconee River from downtown.

Most commissioners and county staffers at the meeting didn’t want to get that specific with the study, but they did talk about adding a statement of purpose, to include accommodating non-motorized transportation in street designs. The study doesn’t necessarily imply that any streets will be reconstructed. But when streets do come up for widening or refurbishment, the 31-page photo-filled study will provide a checklist for planning, commissioners said. The recent reconstruction of the western end of Baxter Street with attractive amenities seems to have spurred commercial redevelopment there, and has often been mentioned by commissioners as a successful project.

Commissioners also discussed revisiting (once again) the rate structure for park recreational fees, which were raised last year to cover about 20 percent of the county’s estimated costs. Some commissioners felt that the earlier change left some fees so high that young people would be discouraged from participating in sports or arts classes (although “scholarships” have been made more available for low-income children).

Staffers suggested that children tend to take the activities more seriously if they have to pay at least something to participate; and ACC Manager Alan Reddish disputed Commissioner Jordan’s “anecdotal” information that basketball participation dropped after fees went up. But, said Jordan, “we’re the ones who get elected. We’re the ones who have to listen” to complaints of high fees. Still, Jordan acknowledged that keeping track of costs is important, because bureaucracies tend to expand themselves, he said, and costs can get out of control. The proposal will likely spend more time in committee before being brought back to the full Commission again.

John Huie

jphuie@athens.net

Pay to Park

On a Street Near You?

originally published October 24, 2007

The Athens-Clarke County Transportation and Public Works Department is working on a plan to greatly expand Five Points’ on-street permit parking program, and the proposal could be implemented as soon as January. The current proposal “will be tweaked in the next couple of months,” transportation director David Clark told neighborhood attendees of a public meeting Oct. 15, but it is substantially complete, and as now drawn would expand the permit parking requirement from serving about 75 parcels to serving around 650 parcels. That kind of jump in size is “a different program altogether” in the words of District 7 Commissioner Kathy Hoard, who represents (with District 4 Commissioner Alice Kinman) part of the area under consideration.

Hoard says the proposal, and requisite studies by Clark’s staff, came about because of independent inquiries made by her and by Kinman, based on “several requests” in recent months. As parking prices on the UGA campus had gone up, Hoard’s constituents told her, “more of the neighborhoods were being used as a commuter parking lot.” That was one reason that five streets in the area of University Drive and Morton Avenue got permit parking between 1999 and 2002, and that Henderson Avenue (just north of Baxter Street) got the program in the late 1980s. The new proposal would essentially fill in the Midtown-Bloomfield neighborhood in between those two areas, cross to the west side of Milledge, and expand the current University Drive-area permit parking zone.

Under the current draft of the proposal, the hang-tag permits would not be assigned to specific spaces (or, for that matter, to specific streets), but they probably would be specific to a certain car. They would cost $10 a year (and have to be renewed annually), and proof of residence would be required to get them. Enforcement would be only from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, and would be entirely complaint-driven. Clark and traffic engineer Steve Decker emphasized at the public meeting that police will not patrol the area looking for parking violators, though after 72 hours a violating car could be towed.

As drafted, the program might allow two or three tags per household (temporary tags for visitors could be obtained), and residents may or may not be able to buy extra tags beyond those. (Clark and Decker are taking comments on issues like these through Oct. 24.) Allowing three tags per household seemed to some homeowners at the meeting to conflict with the area’s largely single-family zoning. Particularly in the Midtown-Bloomfield area, though, many houses and duplexes are grandfathered to allow multi-family living arrangements, Hoard points out.

Still, the issue of high use of neighborhood streets for parking by UGA students - whether neighborhood residents, commuters to campus, or Greek house visitors - struck a nerve with some homeowners at the meeting who seemed to want to find a way to crack down hard on what they see as many student-related problems. “The transients,” as some residents referred to students, block fire and garbage truck access, clog streets, and inconvenience residents, they said. (Parts of the neighborhood are already getting more yellow curbing to solve the fire truck problem.)

A “separate but related problem,” resident Jason Rogers - a father with two-year-old children - said at the meeting, has to do with large fraternity and sorority meetings on weekday evenings and events on weekends. “There’s still a problem during the day,” Rogers said, “but the bigger problem for me is at night when my daughters are trying to sleep, and I’m trying to sleep.” He said high traffic at 2 a.m. for three nights a week (plus “whooping and hollering and throwing up in my yard”) was unexpected for him: “They’re making my home their playground at all hours of the night.”

But Clark and Decker said a “one-size-fits-all” program would be impossible to construct, and said that a daytime program would cut down on the largest numbers of non-resident cars parking on the streets. Commissioner Hoard is in agreement with their plan to try the expanded program as a pilot and revisit the topic a year later. “I don’t mind trying a pilot program in the district I represent. I don’t think this is for all neighborhoods,” Hoard says. Other neighborhood issues, she says, can be addressed through other means like the Community Protection Division, adding, “I don’t think we should use a parking program to solve all of the ills of our neighborhoods.”

Ben Emanuel

ben@flagpole.com