Mike Beaudreau and Doug Stacks offer widely different views of growth and development —- a crucial distinction since they're battling for the Gwinnett County Commission District 3 seat.

District 3 has the largest percentage of undeveloped land in the county, according to Gwinnett's planning department. The district contains Snellville, Grayson, Dacula and parts of Loganville, Lawrenceville and Stone Mountain.

Beaudreau, elected to the District 3 seat in 2004 and seeking a second term, says he's not so much against growth as for "managed growth."

If he's anti-anything, he says, it's accepting contributions from the development community. The 33-year-old national accounts manager for Ricoh Corp. pledged not to accept money from developers when he first ran and says he's proud of his record since.

What he means by managed growth, Beaudreau said, is sticking to the county's comprehensive plan —- which has already been through public review and approval.

"Are we going to go forward and use the land-use plan?" Beaudreau said. "Or go back to the good ol' boy days, with who knows who, who went to school with who and who slapped who on the back?"

Stacks takes a different view. Without growth, he says, the county will "grow stagnant."

"We need a good positive growth," said Stacks, 46, director of planning and economic development for the city of Lilburn. "If we don't have commitment to economic development, the taxpayer burden is going to be shifted to the residents. That's something, as a 35-year resident of the county, I feel is going to be a critical issue."

In November, the two men were on opposite sides of a heated rezoning request from a developer who wanted to construct a 94,200-square-foot shopping mall on a popular strawberry field outside Loganville.

Crown Point Properties' application was unanimously denied, Beaudreau says, because the community rose up against it.

"It was another example of rampant overdevelopment," Beaudreau said. "We've already got enough strip malls and gas stations. ... It was a case where, once again, enough is enough."

Stacks, who represented the developer, won't say much about the case because it's in litigation. He did say his involvement was not behind his desire to run for a seat on the County Commission.

"That's not my first rezoning denial and it won't be my last," Stacks said. "It's part of doing business. When you go into a rezoning, you think you have good ideas and other people think they're a bad idea. . . . [Rezoning] is a way to change your vision for a particular part of property."

He'd been interested in the idea of politics for a while, Stacks said, and wanted to get involved with addressing economic development issues at the county level "before it's too late."

On traffic, transportation

Beaudreau: He's encouraged by the fact that people are doing more carpooling "because that's a private solution to a private problem," he said, "not government coming in and saying we need to insert ourselves in the process."

Believes he's been mischaracterized as being against mass transit. "I just want them to be cost-effective. Look, if we can get people off the roads and downtown or Midtown in a cost-effective way, I'm all for it."

Stacks: He thinks it's "definitely worth looking into" mass transit options, but he thinks from a local standpoint, it makes most sense to start with intersection and minor road improvements.

Regionally, he's for "getting rid of some of the bottlenecks that happens when we cross county lines."

Meet the candidates

Both District 3 candidates will be at a forum tonight at the Gwinnett County Justice and Administration Center, 75 Langley Drive in Lawrenceville. Hosted by Conservative Republican Women, the event starts at 7 p.m. and will feature all eight candidates for County Commission seats:

Chairman Charles Bannister and the two vying for his spot, commissioner Lorraine Green and Glenn Pirkle; and the three candidates running for Green's seat, Shirley Lasseter, Bruce LeVell and Carol Hassell.