Fresh Loaf

Just another night in Buckhead

City Councilman Kwanza Hall surprised his colleagues with a proposal yesterday to examine whether allowing Atlanta bars to close later would be a boon for the city’s nightlife and budget. From the AJC’s ubiquitous Eric Stirgus:

Hall introduced legislation Monday requesting the city study the revenue opportunities of expanding the hours to sell liquor from 2:30 a.m. to 4 a.m. City Council President Lisa Borders sent the legislation to the council’s Finance/Executive committee for further discussion. Hall wants a summary report by Jan. 30.

Hall said the sales tax money from extending the hours could fund public safety improvements. He said the city could enact the longer hours in areas of Atlanta where it’s more practical.

“I think we need to look at revenue,” said Hall, whose district includes portions of Castleberry Hill, Midtown and the Old Fourth Ward, where nightlife is more prevalent than other parts of the city. “Who knows how many millions of dollars we’ve lost?”

Some councilmembers weren’t pleased with Hall’s proposal. Councilman Howard Shook, who represents Buckhead neighborhoods that pushed for the earlier bar hours, said Hall’s idea would be “dead on arrival.” City Council President Lisa Borders called the idea “absolutely irresponsible.” Buckhead Coalition President Sam Massell said the additional revenue wasn’t worth the potential headache.

But Hall’s been tweeting about the proposal nonstop and wants residents’ opinions, which is why we’ve created this high-tech “blog.” Comments will be printed and hand-delivered to the appropriate council committee by bowtie-wearing monkeys holding balloons. The event will be filmed. And if council lets bars stay open later, we’ll release the monkeys back into the wild. It’s up to you, people.

UPDATE: Hall elaborates on his proposal in the comments below.

(Courtesy Wikimedia Commons)

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Jim Maddox, caught between naps

The Atlanta City Council voted today to raise property taxes by 3 mills, an outcome we’d been predicting for weeks. But the actual vote count — 8 to 7 — was closer than anyone expected it to be. Not because Council members believed the tax hike was a bad idea. Hell, with only one or two possible exceptions, even those who voted against it were privately praying it would pass.

No, the vote was so close because several of our Council members possess, as Teddy Roosevelt once said, “the backbone of a chocolate eclair.”

Exhibit A is Jim “40 Winks” Maddox, the self-proclaimed “Dean of the Council” because he’s warmed a chair in City Hall for more than three long decades. Today, Maddox shocked his colleagues by voting against the tax hike and the $541 million budget. This is a guy who, two months ago, said publicaly that he didn’t think Mayor Franklin’s proposed 3-mill increase was big enough!

“I’m prepared to approve a tax increase to end the furloughs for all employees,” he announced at a budget hearing at the end of April.

But that was before he picked up three challengers for his beloved Council seat. So, today, without giving anyone a heads up, the lily-livered Maddox cravenly hung his colleagues out to dry.

Here’s guessing the next Council retreat is going to be awwwkward.

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Poncey-Highland community members and Atlanta City Councilman Kwanza Hall next week will begin a four-month planning effort to determine how the intown neighborhood should grow.

Councilman Kwanza Hall

According to a press release from Hall’s office:

Among the topics to be considered during the four-month process are land use issues; traffic calming; greenspaces and streetscapes; historic preservation; and sustainability.

The second community meeting for the master plan, a public workshop, is scheduled for Saturday, June 27, from 9 a.m.-12 p.m. at Druid Hills Baptist Church. The workshop will include child-friendly urban design activities led by the Atlanta chapter of the American Institute of Architects. At the end of the morning, children will share their vision for the future of Poncey-Highland with the adult participants in the workshop.

The meeting will be held on Wednesday, June 17, in the Carter Center’s Cyprus Room from 7:00-8:30 p.m. For more information call Hall’s office at (404) 330-6038 or send him an email.

(Photo by Joeff Davis)

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Mayor Shirley Franklin took an Atlanta City Councilmember to task last night for his noble efforts to reach residents through Twitter.

At last night’s Young Democrats of Atlanta fundraiser at Sweetwater Brewery, Franklin — the night’s honoree — addressed the crowd and took questions.

Attendees noticed the flames of Hades rise, however, as Franklin directed her hatred for new technology at Councilman Kwanza Hall, who was also at the event.

Hall, who represents a sizable chunk of intown Atlanta, is well-known for his Twitter habits.

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For most of the Beltline’s history, concerns about displacement have largely focused around slowly gentrifying neighborhoods in Southeast and Southwest Atlanta. The land and homes are less expensive and ripe for the picking by a developer agog at the thought of a project near the 22-mile loop of parks, trails and transit.

But at Monday morning’s Atlanta City Council meeting, councilmembers heard from concerned residents who feared a plan to save a key part of the $2.8 billion project would potentially uproot them from their homes.

At yesterday’s special-called meeting, council unanimously OK’ed a deal reached by the Georgia Department of Transportation, Amtrak and Beltline officials that saved residents near the Piedmont Park the headache of high-speed trains lumbering nearby on tracks called the “Decatur Belt.” The move also saves the entire Beltline project — late last year, the city poured money into the area when it purchased the property from a Gwinnett County developer for at least $66 million.

But the vote came without some last-minute amendments thanks to Marietta Street residents who said Amtrak, GDOT and Beltline officials’ plan to save the Decatur Belt merely shifted the burden of high-speed rail on to them — and placed their homes at risk. According to rough plans presented to GDOT’s board last week, the alternate plans for high-speed rail serving Atlanta involve expanding the tracks and potentially seizing property. The buildings and lofts in which the residents could very well be some of those.

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The Midtown Ponce Security Alliance hosts a special meeting tonight at the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer to address the city’s crime problem. Atlanta City Councilmembers Kwanza Hall and Anne Fauver and Major Khirus Williams of the Atlanta Police Department’s Zone 5 will attend. The public is welcome.

Full release and additional details are after the jump.

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Atlanta’s much ballyhooed Center for Civil and Human Rights will take an important step toward becoming a reality – a site dedication ceremony – this coming Monday.

Didn’t know a site had been selected? You’re not alone.

Neither City Hall, which helped start the ball rolling for the museum; nor the Atlanta Development Authority, which will issue bonds to help pay for it; nor the Center for Civil and Human Rights Partnership, the city-sponsored group charged with raising private funding, has ever announced that a site had been formally selected.

“I guess you could say that’s what’s happening on Monday,” says A.J. Robinson, president of Central Atlanta Progress, who headed up a panel of business leaders that helped determine the cost and mission of the proposed center in late 2006.

To call the site selection a below-the-radar decision is like saying Paris Hilton doesn’t mind having her picture taken. City Councilman Kwanza Hall, who represents the area, says he didn’t know about the dedication event until just this past Monday. Other council folk we asked hadn’t heard a thing.

So when was this decision made – and, more to the point, who made it?

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