A proposed zoning change to property adjacent to the south end of DeKalb-Peachtree Airport is nearly dead but could be revived after voters in the area decide whether to create a new city and extend another.
For now the 27-acre swath will remain as is after the DeKalb County Commission withdrew its proposal to allow light industrial in the former residential neighborhood whose homes were demolished because of safety concerns of flights from the busy airfield.
County officials had hoped to resolve the issue while the property was still in unincorporated DeKalb so they could take into consideration the competing desires of residents to the south and west of it.
“The county is uniquely positioned to bring everybody’s interest to the table, but if the residents’ priority is to keep it as an undeveloped area, we will accept that and see what happens with the elections,” said County Commissioner Jeff Rader, who called for the proposal to be withdrawn.
DeKalb is unlikely to revisit the issue until residents across the street from the land decide in July whether to form the city of Brookhaven and residents to the south vote this fall on whether to become part of Chamblee.
If those two votes pass, the bulk of opponents to the zoning change will be in newly incorporated Brookhaven while officials in Chamblee, which could control the land’s fate depending on the annexation vote, note that similar land already in their borders has been rezoned for industrial use.
The county took up the rezoning as part of a larger look at land use along Clairmont Road, a former residential street that is now a main north-south thoroughfare in DeKalb.
No specific project was planned for the land next to the airport, but officials said allowing light industrial use would help sell the property for “airport compatible” businesses — meeting an obligation placed on DeKalb because it used Federal Aviation Administration money to buy the land a decade ago.
Residents in the area, though, said the county promised when it bought the former neighborhood that the area would serve as both green space and a noise buffer from an airport that handles more than 400 flights daily.
“We were promised this would remain green space,” said Michael Lennon, who lives just across Clairmont from the land in question. “It was just called residential because you knew you couldn’t develop it that way.”
Chamblee, though, has called for development on similar land in that city that rings the airport to the north. Among the land rezoned is the huge chunk set aside for the bankrupt International Village project that called for retail and hotels in the area.
Chamblee will examine the land to the south if voters agree to an annexation in the fall election, though Mayor Eric Clarkson stopped short of saying if there are plans to rezone the land if it becomes part of the city.
“We would have to look at it anew,” Clarkson said.
That question may hinge on the land’s value. To turn the land into formal park or green space, FAA rules would require the county or city to buy the land at fair market price.
Fifteen acres of the land has already been appraised at $3.5 million. That includes a 5-acre parcel that the county’s Police Department has on hold for a potential north precinct station. That project, too, is on hold until the Brookhaven and Chamblee votes.
Residents near the airport, though, hope the delays mean all the governments take more time to look at the entire area when considering the rezoning that could still come.
“This is one of the most important pieces of property in the entire county,” said John Steinichen, a member of the community council oversight committee in the area. “I say, put it off for a while and get a longer vision for what we want.”
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