By Ashley Hungerford
Marietta Daily Journal Staff Writer
SMYRNA - The city of Smyrna is making progress on redevelopment projects like Jonquil Village, but not without many of the roadblocks being experienced across metro-Atlanta, including a slowdown in residential building, city officials say.
At a Wednesday breakfast sponsored by the Council for Quality Growth, Mayor Max Bacon; City Administrator Wayne Wright; Community Development Director Ken Suddreth; and Economic Development Manager Alan Durham gave a briefing on issues relating to growth and development in Smyrna.
Wright explained tax-allocation districts and why they are important to Smyrna's redevelopment.
"They are a way to generate high-quality development in a location the market will not do it," he said. "It serves as a catalyst to redevelopment."
With a TAD project, Wright said, the government finances the building of private infrastructure and is repaid in taxes the project generates. The right TAD project, he said, can transform "blighted shopping centers that have outlived their day."
The city says Jonquil Village, at the corner of Atlanta and Spring Roads, is one such project. The city, county and school board have agreed to a $26.2 million TAD subsidy for the 14-acre, mixed-use project. Approval from all three entities is required for all TAD projects.
The mixed-use project is to include a Publix grocery store, office space, an underground parking deck, and more than 300 condominiums. Tampa-based A. G. Armstrong Development is the developer.
Durham said the property is valued at $16 million. After redevelopment, it could be worth $190 million, city leaders say.
The condominium part of the project, though, may need extra help.
The real-estate slowdown, Durham said, is making banks hesitant to make loans for condominiums. Smyrna officials may allow the condominiums to be built in phases, or may allow the condos to be leased for a few years. The city currently has a moratorium on building apartments.
"Our council has realized we're in a slowdown," Bacon said. "We're trying to work with developers in the city."
In October, Suddreth said, residential-building permits brought the city $667,000. A year earlier, that figure was $6.5 million. Permits for commercial buildings brought in $950,000 in October. Those totaled $4 million in October 2006.
"Smyrna's not immune from the housing market," he said. A second TAD project being considered is Belmont Hills, a mixed-use plan for the corner of Atlanta and Windy Hill Roads.
Durham said the shopping center was known as the largest retail center in the Southeast when it opened in 1953. Now, he said, it's a "horrible underutilization of land."
The 50-acre site is zoned for general commercial use. Details on how many housing units would be built and how much of a TAD subsidy would be needed are still being worked out, leaders said.
But they're optimistic.
"Jonquil Village will have an impact up and down Spring Road," Wright said. "And Belmont Hills will transform the northern end of Smyrna … we're extremely bullish on Smyrna's future."
ahungerford@mdjonline.com
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Until elected officials in Smyrna wake up to the fact that this quadrant of Cobb County houses the majority of South America's "illegal" undocumented workers in overcrowded rental houses that continue to open spanish speaking (only) businesses, resturants & shops along Smyrnas major corridors,... they are going to have a difficult time selling their city as a viable area to plop down $600,00-$800,000 on a home. They want to somehow seem "compassionate" to immigrants, but refuse to understand the difference in 'legal, & 'illegal'. If these were mostly 'legal' neighborhoods in Smyrna, we probably would not notice such a lack of assimilation! I have tried to ask questions of elected officials up here, but if you are not in lock step w/ the mighty mayor, you are shunned, called a liar, & simply ignored. Why then , was Lowes stopped from building @ 'the 4 corners'? My understanding is Smyrna was asking too much of them as far as building requirements. So I am sure the abandoned Latino bar , the Mexican grocery & the El Salvadorian sandwich shop, other various lower class shops are more inviting to the type of revitilization Smyrna is dreaming of. Publix, maybe could have come in on that corner, then..(where it should be!) I am not sure what the appeal of a major grocery chain is, when you plop it dead center of an area that was really looking better as a quaint village & residential walking district! I personally wouldn't care to look out of my $500,000 townhome @ rats scavanging through grocery dumpsters. Belmont Hills would be better off @ least, torn down, than standing like dinasour bones on display. I have lived in this area 10 years, & I have not seen ONE attempt to brighten up South Cobb Drive. Not one glistening building, no new signs,... really just a road left behind, & deteriorating on a yearly basis.(inviting HUD homes & dreggs of society) South Cobb could have--- SHOULD have already seen the Lowe's built, followed by maybe some UPSCALE apartments, & loft buildings,... followed by some good, quality shopping, an uhhh... maybe a movie theatre??? Could you imagine??? Could you IMAGINE real leadership?? ... guess NOT!!
Sure there is a housing slow down, especially in this area. Why? Because of all the illegals driving down the price of labor. Did the developers consider if they deny work to citizens then people can't afford to buy those poorly built homes? And Smyrna has welcomed them and refuses to crack down on the problems they have caused other than economic disaster - school test scores, overcrowded financially strapped hospitals, drunken driving, drug influx and increased crime for a start. The construction industry fall out is karma for builders and developers, and it is spreading to financial sectors and retail. Mayor Bacon, you need to stand up and do the right thing - like Mayor Barletta of Hazelton. Start with the 287(g) program.
....so Smyrna gets a $26 million dollar TAD for a Publix & some glorified apts. I smell a RAT!!
This smacks of the so-called public-private partnerships which are nothing more than fascism: the joining of govt with industry. If investors in the market choose to not invest in these questionable endeavors, then what makes these bureaucrats think that they know better?? Any time govt gets involved in commercial enterprise, a fiasco ensues. Think Buffalo NY ferry project. Stop this before it starts.