County Commission Has Three Public Hearings

The Jasper County Commission held three public hearings at its regular meeting Monday evening, and voted to approve two of the changes, and took no action on the third as there was no need, according to County Attorney David Ozburn.

Elijah Jones owns the property at 53 Pennington Road, and he wanted it rezoned from commercial to residential. The property has previously been a restaurant, a bar, and had other uses. Mr. Jones says he wants to renovate the property for residential use. There was no opposition to Mr. Jones’ application, and it was approved.

Barry Wyatt wanted to rezone 3.97 acres at 600 Edwards Road from agricultural to manufacturing for the placement of mini storage units. That rezoning also passed.

The third application was for a special exception to build a conventional subdivision rather than a conservation subdivision. The county attorney spoke on the application. He said the county made the conservation subdivision the norm in 2008. However, in 2012 the commissioners adopted a codification of the county ordinances, and at that time the conservation subdivision language was changed. He said there is much ambiguity in the ordinance, with references made to conservation ordinances. He said the way the ordinance currently reads, the applicant, Nick Platek, does not need a special exception to move forward with his plan.

Commissioners questioned Mr. Platek, who said he built 22 percent green space into the subdivision, if he would consider doing the conservation subdivision about of 40 percent. One way, said Commissioner Gerald Stunkel, would be to require each property owner to leave a percentage of his or her property undeveloped.

After much discussion, the commissioners took no action, allowing Mr. Platek to move forward. They did vote to have the Planning & Zoning Commission and the County Attorney look at the ordinance and make recommendations for changes.

In discussing the Local Maintenance and Improvement Grant (LMIG) monies, commissioners learned the money they had planned to use to finish re-surfacing Post Road will not be enough for the project. Estimates show that the total project cost will be about $1,274,011 rather than the $875,824 the county has allotted between the state’s portion and the county’s match. Commissioners discussed the fact that it costs approximately $294,953 to pave a mile of road, and lamented the fact that they couldn’t do more. They finally voted to move forward with the Post Road project to be presented to the state, and said they would determine later if the road would be completed in 2020, meaning an additional $400,000 would be needed. If not, it would be completed in 2021.

County Manager Mike Benton says they are working on the audit, and there will be a positive fund balance, meaning there are monies to be added to the general fund. He says it’s preliminary, but could be in the $500,000 range. Commissioners discussed using that money and finishing Post Road. They will decide next year, when they put it out to bid and get real numbers, and know or are closer to knowing what the audit shows.

In other action at Monday’s meeting, commissioners:

*Agreed to open a bank account to handle the funds from the $750,000 Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) that the county received for the new health department. The account will be opened at the Bank of Monticello, as the funds for the CDBG grant for the senior center were processed at Ameris Bank.

*Tabled taking action on a vacancy on the nine-member recreation board. There is one opening, and five people expressed interest in serving, but none were present at Monday’s meeting.

*Agreed to allow the American Legion to use the Jasper County Recreation Department for a turkey shoot on Saturday, Nov. 23.

*Agreed to contract with Northeast Georgia Regional Commission for the update to the pre-disaster mitigation plan.

*Heard the first quarter financial report, and reviewed the human resources report.

At the end of the regular meeting, the commissioners went into closed session to discuss potential or pending litigation.