Behind the story
Bill Banks, a former AJC staff writer, has been a freelance journalist since 1985. He’s been following Avondale Estates government for five years; attending council meetings and speaking with residents. He’s written extensively about the push for growth in Decatur and Avondale Estates.
View the map of the annexation plan at:
A public meeting Wednesday night in Avondale Estates had barely begun when Mayor Ed Rieker turned to an overflow crowd at city hall and admitted his wrongdoing.
“I made a mistake,” he said. “I try to do my best, and I’m sorry. I take full responsibility for what happened.”
The mea culpas were the result of outcry over an annexation plan that was submitted for state government consideration without public knowledge.
In January, Rieker asked State Representative Karla Drenner (D-Avondale Estates) to submit an Avondale annexation bill to the Georgia Legislature. Although there hadn’t been any public meetings on the subject, Reicker said that at the time he just wanted Avondale’s interests to be represented.
Avondale has done only two major residential annexations in recent decades: Majestic Acres in 1988 and Avonwood in 1997. But the topic resurfaced in 2013 when unincorporated portions of DeKalb, particularly Tucker, Briarcliff and Lakeside, began planning for cityhood.
The new map proposed that Avondale annex the 110 acres owned by the DeKalb Farmers Market, 60 acres owned by 54 commercial property owners known as Rio Circle, and the 250-home Forrest Hills neighborhood southwest of the city.
Several city officials said that plan had been discussed informally for about five years, but had never been put into a formal proposal.
DeKalb cities and groups interested in forming new cities met on Feb. 3 to present annexation maps to the DeKalb Municipal Association. Several areas on the Avondale Estates wishlist were also coveted by Decatur and Briarcliff.
Drenner submitted the Avondale annexation bill on March 7. It passed the House, according to Rieker, but was pulled before it came to a vote in the Senate. Around that time, all cityhood proposals were subject to a moratorium enacted by the Legislature, so the Avondale bill was pulled.
Word of the bill surfaced this summer and several residents questioned how it had gotten all the way to state lawmakers without the city holding public meetings in the months leading up to the bill’s submission.
At Wednesday’s meeting two Avondale commissioners, Randy Beebe and John Quinn, said they previously knew very little about annexation or the bill in question.
“I don’t recall the subject of annexation coming up in [a work session or regular meeting] until September,” Quinn said. “[To] my understanding we haven’t talked about it on the record.”
Rieker called Wednesday’s work session after residents confronted him and the commission during that meeting on Sept. 22 when longtime city activist Lisa Shortell all but accused Rieker of keeping residents in the dark.
“We should’ve been talking about this a year ago,” she said. “There’s no excuse. The citizens aren’t informed.”
During an interview with the AJC after that September meeting Rieker said he felt the escalating pressure of DeKalb’s various cityhood movements.
“There wasn’t any intention to hide anything,” Rieker said. “The fact is, we chose expediency over thoughtfulness, and that was wrong.”
Drenner, who last week expressed shock that Avondale’s citizenry knew so little about the annexation bill, spoke briefly during the meeting.
“I’m sorry you got caught off guard,” she told the crowd of roughly 150, some who were sitting on the city hall floor or lingering in the outer lobby. “I won’t ever again submit [an Avondale annexation] bill unless it has full support of the city.”
Rieker said the next step is to begin planning a new annexation map at the next work session on Oct. 15 and the next regular meeting on Oct. 20.
Nov. 15 is the deadline for DeKalb’s proposed new cities to provide boundaries to the House Governmental Affairs Committee. Rieker said Wednesday he hopes to have a new Avondale annexation plan in place before then.
About the Author
