Add another city property to Mayor Kasim Reed’s must-sell list: The Inman Park Trolley Barn.
The Atlanta City Council is mulling a proposal out of the mayor’s office to sell and redevelop the 126-year-old Edgewood Avenue site as a way to boost property tax revenue.
The city bought the once-dilapidated trolley barn in the mid-1970s, tapping a nonprofit to restore and maintain the historic building. In recent decades, it’s largely been used as an event space.
Under the proposal, the city would transfer the trolley barn to Invest Atlanta, its economic development agency, which would oversee a redevelopment bid process that city leaders say will preserve the barn. District 2 Councilman Kwanza Hall introduced the ordinance on behalf of the mayor’s office.
The Atlanta City Council’s finance committee approved the ordinance on Thursday. It now heads to the full council for a final vote next week.
The trolley barn, which the city currently leases to nonprofit Atlanta and Edgewood Street Railway Company, was built in the late 1880s as a maintenance facility for Atlanta’s electric street railway line, according to city documents.
For years, the nonprofit has rented out the space for weddings and corporate events, with the proceeds reinvested into its maintenance. But because the city owns the site, it doesn’t generate property tax revenue.
Steve Hays, president of the nonprofit’s board, said his organization is raising money to buy the property. According to the nonprofit’s long-standing agreement with the city, he said, it has the right of first refusal on the sale.
“We plan on being the organization that purchases it,” he said. “We’re raising money so that we can be that organization.”
Melissa Mullinax, Reed’s senior adviser, said the mayor wants the property to be sold through Invest Atlanta as that allows the city to set the parameters for how it will be redeveloped.
Hall’s ordinance mirrors how the nonprofit currently uses the space. A potential future buyer would be required to preserve the trolley barn, for instance, as well as allow the space to be used for public events.
City leaders believe keeping the trolley barn will help “increase awareness and interest” in the Atlanta Streetcar currently rolling through downtown Atlanta.
If the property was sold through a sealed bid process, the highest bid wins and the city has no control over its future, Mullinax said.
Hays noted Inman Park has historic zoning that would prevent the barn from being demolished or dramatically altered.
It’s the latest property Reed has moved to sell in the past year as he eyes new ways to raise property tax revenue.
Reed plans to ask voters in March to approve an infrastructure bond referendum worth up to $250 million. He’s refused to raise property taxes on homeowners, thus the mayor is seeking to pay for the bond’s annual debt service through other means.
Last year the mayor unveiled plans to sell Underground Atlanta and the Civic Center, to name a few. In December, Reed announced the city is under contract with a South Carolina developer to revamp Underground. Invest Atlanta is still reviewing bids for the Civic Center.
District 9 Councilwoman Felicia Moore abstained from the trolley barn vote on Thursday. She noted a difference in the speed at which Atlanta leaders move to sell properties, while holding up the sale of an abandoned elementary school that the school system want to shed.
Last month, Reed's office denied a request by Atlanta Public Schools leaders for a deed to the former George Adair Elementary School in Adair Park. The council finance committee approved an ordinance on Thursday that allows the city to enter into formal negotiations with APS over the property.
“At the city we don’t necessarily have a problem with this administration unloading property we don’t want,” Moore said. “I think we need to be just as respectful to other governmental entities trying to do the same thing.”
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