DeKalb superintendent calculates

DeKalb County Superintendent Michael Thurmond on Monday revealed the school district’s calculations of the costs of an annexation movement that would take one of the county’s wealthiest unincorporated areas into the city of Atlanta.

The proposed annexation of the attendance zones of Fernbank and Briar Vista elementary schools, which include the Druid Hills neighborhood near Emory University, would “disenfranchise” and displace 3,000 of the district’s roughly 100,000 students, while also raising the property tax burden for some elderly homeowners in the annexed area, the district said.

The new report, posted prominently on the home page of the district website, also says students who are not part of the annexation would lose access to facilities such as the Fernbank Science Center and its planetarium. Also, the district would lose valuable properties, including Adams Stadium and surrounding buildings on land worth an estimated $50 million.