The Marietta City Council approved a rezoning this week that allows MUST Ministries’ Marietta campus on Cobb Parkway to be converted to a school.
The 30,000-square-foot facility will become the new home of Gracepoint School, a private, Christian school for children with dyslexia in grades one through eight.
Credit: GRACEPOINT School
Credit: GRACEPOINT School
“This location is fantastic for us,” Molly Holm, a co-founder of the school, said at the meeting. “We have looked for a long time for a building. And so for us, this was a godsend to be able to find this property.”
The 4.45 acres Gracepoint is purchasing includes the MUST property and a separately owned parcel behind the building that is used as a vehicle storage lot.
The building currently houses MUST’s administrative offices, food pantry and a 4,600-square-foot thrift store. MUST is in the process of building a new campus nearby, and would move out of the current building no later than June 1, 2023. Gracepoint is currently operating out of Piedmont Church on Piedmont Road in Marietta. It will move into the MUST building summer 2023, ahead of the 2023-2024 school year.
Gracepoint will put 25 classrooms and a gym in the building. The school has 132 students, but the building would provide room to grow up to 180 students.
Credit: GRACEPOINT School
Credit: GRACEPOINT School
Council members approved the rezoning over the objection of two nearby businesses who expressed traffic concerns — the property is accessed via Pete Scogin Parkway, a privately maintained road that runs parallel to Cobb Parkway.
Fred Bentley Jr., a lawyer for Gracepoint, told council members the property’s current traffic count is about 290 cars a day, citing a traffic study performed by Croy Engineering. Gracepoint would see at most 230 cars per day.
The lot, Bentley added, has ample room to stack cars for pickup and drop-off.
Holm said the property was well-situated near Interstates 75 and 575, since students come from as far as Rome, Georgia. And Joy Wood, Gracepoint’s head of school, said the school’s current facility is about half the size of the MUST building, and overcrowded.
Bentley said the school serves a “critical need” in the community. Wood explained the school aims to remediate students’ dyslexia in four years so they can return to a traditional school environment.
Holm said she founded the school in part because the closest remedial school for her dyslexic son was the Schenck School in Sandy Springs.
City staff, citing the Croy study, did not believe the school would significantly increase traffic at the intersection of White Circle and Cobb Parkway.
Businesses accessed via Pete Scogin Parkway include an Extra Space Storage facility, the Stingray Allstars cheerleading team, Interstate NationaLease truck rental, and others.
Amanda Kirk of Stasco Mechanical, a nearby plumbing contractor, said she believed the school would worsen traffic and cautioned the increased traffic could be unsafe.
“I have nothing against this school. I’m sure it is wonderful, and I almost feel bad about opposing it,” Kirk said. “I don’t oppose the school at all. My concern is the traffic, and it’s not the carpool; it’s getting to their drive and getting out.”
Kirk’s father, Pete Scogin, built the private road that bears his name.
Tractor-trailers frequently come and go, using the intersection of Cobb Parkway, White Road and Pete Scogin, Kirk said. Due to their length, trucks coming from Interstate NationaLease often block access to Pete Scogin while waiting at the light to turn onto Cobb Parkway.
“So, I just envision somebody sitting there with a tractor-trailer blocking the entrance, and you got cars trying to take a right in, and you got cars trying to take a left across (Cobb Parkway/ U.S.) 41, then they are going to be stuck,” Kirk said. “If that happens, and those turn lanes fill up, then you’re going to have people backing up onto 41, which is a very busy road.”
The cheerleading team also creates plenty of traffic in the afternoons, Kirk said. City staff noted in their review that there could be a real problem if the school drop-off and pickup coincides with that of the cheerleaders.
Donna Hunter spoke on behalf of Drive Shaft Services, her husband’s auto repair shop.
“I’m not sure where they’re getting their information from, but I know the five years that I have worked with my husband there, it’s a train wreck in the morning,” Hunter said of the traffic study. “That many more cars is going to hinder our business. We do have families to feed and we don’t want freight companies to refuse coming in to deliver our freight, customers refusing to come in because of the traffic, and going and taking their business elsewhere.”
Councilwoman Cheryl Richardson asked Public Works Director Mark Rice about improving the intersection that accesses Pete Scogin. Rice said the city would have to go through the state department of transportation.
When it came time to vote, Richardson sighed and said, “I’m going to be that person today.” The rezoning was approved 6-1, with Richardson opposed.
Credit: Marietta Daily Journal
Credit: Marietta Daily Journal
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