City of South DeKalb (Atlanta, Sandy Springs: sales, lawyers, homes)

[bu2]

This does ignore the annexation plans of Clarkston, Stone Mountain and Lithonia. They have long range plans to annex some of those areas.

[Gulch]

Originally Posted by bu2

This does ignore the annexation plans of Clarkston, Stone Mountain and Lithonia. They have long range plans to annex some of those areas.

Then those cities may want to speed up their plans.

[Saintmarks]

Originally Posted by sedimenjerry

That's what I was thinking. There's nothing in common with those areas except they're in Dekalb. It's just a bunch of suburbs running together.

Agreed. Way too unwieldy. At least break it up into two different cites. Let the areas ITP and south of I-20 become the city of Panthersville (gotta love that name) and let everything OTP and north of 20 become Redan. Use some of the historic names already in existence. A city of South DeKalb is not a name for a city. Cities should have their own identity, not just the portion of a county that nobody else wanted.

IF this thing were come into play, look for loads of people to beg to come into the existing cities. Stone Mountain, Clarkston and Lithonia finally might grow like they should have decades ago.

[sedimenjerry]

Originally Posted by Saintmarks

Agreed. Way too unwieldy. At least break it up into two different cites. Let the areas ITP and south of I-20 become the city of Panthersville (gotta love that name) and let everything OTP and north of 20 become Redan. Use some of the historic names already in existence. A city of South DeKalb is not a name for a city. Cities should have their own identity, not just the portion of a county that nobody else wanted.

That's what I'm saying. There's a Redan High school. Redan shows up on Google maps with its own boundaries. Pantersville is also listed. Sandy Springs was long known as a community before becoming a city. This south Dekalb is more like Milton and Johns Creek. Just areas of suburbs that decided to incorporate. At least Milton and Johns Creek make a little more sense with their size. South Dekalb is just a smaller Dekalb county.

[jsvh]

Originally Posted by Saintmarks

Agreed. Way too unwieldy. At least break it up into two different cites. Let the areas ITP and south of I-20 become the city of Panthersville (gotta love that name) and let everything OTP and north of 20 become Redan. Use some of the historic names already in existence. A city of South DeKalb is not a name for a city. Cities should have their own identity, not just the portion of a county that nobody else wanted.

IF this thing were come into play, look for loads of people to beg to come into the existing cities. Stone Mountain, Clarkston and Lithonia finally might grow like they should have decades ago.

Agreed

[arjay57]

I'm fine with South DeKalb forming their own city if that's what the people want.

[Saintmarks]

Originally Posted by arjay57

I'm fine with South DeKalb forming their own city if that's what the people want.

I am too if that is really what the people want. But I would say the same situation that played out in Fulton will be the same here.... Cities formed where there was some identity as a city, existing cities expanded their borders. All of North Fulton municipalized (if that is a word), Chattahoochee Hills came into being in extreme south Fulton, the remaining southern Fulton cities (Palmetto, Fairburn, Union City, East Point.... even Atlanta) had people choose to be annexed into them prior to a proposed city of South Fulton. So far, the city of South Fulton is the only proposed city in the metro that has been voted down by residents. I don't see any reason why South DeKalb will be different.

BUT..... THe desire to create smaller, more responsive city governments is on the rise. Proof to my long standing beef that counties do not need to be in the municipal services business, something weird that Georgia counties do that counties in most other states do not get into. If an area grows large enough to no longer be considered rural and needs municipal services, it should be in a... wait for it.... municipality! Some people against new cities and/or annexations use this as an argument. The argument should be that counties have no business running municipal services. Their scope should be limited to that of courts and let cities do the job of cities. The county getting into the municipal services business without being a city is the problem, not that there are cities sprouting up.

Fulton and DeKalb have grown too unwieldy and the citizens are responding. So far Gwinnett and Cobb are doing OK with their county governments, but I predict the day when this same disdain for counties acting like cities will cross the border into these counties. This form of government has its downside, it eventually will come to the surface and those counties will become fully citified.... (if I can make up another word).

[jsvh]

GA can fix this by stopping counties from acting like cities. Many choose to live in unincorporated areas because they want less government and taxes. But in GA you don't get that choice. You just get a bigger more disconnect county government that is trying to act like a big city. Counties should not have to provide all the services they do. If the people want more government and services let them annex or form into a new city.

[sedimenjerry]

It is weird how Georgia does things (shouldn't be surprising). Only Texas has more counties than Georgia, despite having 20 states larger in land area, something like 23 in total area. Looking at a map with counties you can tell a huge difference in the size of counties between Bama and SC, and GA. Counties here have always been on the smaller, more local size. It's also why our cities are so small. Atlanta has half a million people. Houston, with a slightly larger metro, has over 2 million. Plano has nearly half the population of Atlanta despite being a suburb of Dallas. El Paso is a larger city! For schools, Buford is one of the few small cities that has its own district. In Texas, nearly every small town has its own system, an ISD.

Personally, I like Gwinnett County. We're in a Lawrenceville zip code but not in city limits. If we were, we would have to have a fence put up just for our dog (even though it's always inside). Animal control wouldn't even let us adopt our dog if we were in city limits. Too much hassle.

[jero23]

It'll fail like South Fulton. When people realize that there are other urbanized areas like Los Angeles, Washington DC, and Miami have areas that are in their immediate area that have municipal services provided by their urban counties.

Google Los Angeles County, Fairfax County, VA Arlington County, VA, Prince Georges, MD, Montgomery County, MD, and even my home county back in Alabama, Jefferson County provides municipal services to the unincorporated developed areas around Birmingham.