Monday marks the start of this year’s session for Georgia’s 157th General Assembly in Atlanta, so we’re going to highlight the Dickens administration’s priorities for state lawmakers.
According to documents we obtained last week, Atlanta plans to continue its push against Buckhead cityhood and any statewide interference or takeover of the city’s airport. Atlanta also wants to decriminalize homelessness, according to the agenda laid out by Mayor Andre Dickens and Kenyatta Mitchell, his intergovernmental affairs director.
Speaking of housing, the city wants state lawmakers to invest into the city’s new Affordable Housing Trust Fund. There’s currently $3 million in the account, and the city’s goal is to raise it to $100 million. Additionally, the city wants a state law that allows municipalities to provide impact fee reductions for affordable housing.
Atlanta also wants the state legislature to revise a zoning procedure law requiring public hearings on permits that traditionally only required a review by staff. According to the city, both the development community and City Hall are hindered by this because Atlanta has to hold a hearing on every application. Atlanta wants Georgia to increase the amount of general obligation bonds that can be issued without a referendum, as well.
Lastly, Atlanta wants Georgia to give Atlanta’s transportation commissioner the power to create designated transit lanes for public transportation. City Hall also wants Georgia to empower the city to install cameras on the buses or light rail vehicles to assist in the enforcement of transit-only lanes.
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Heads up, politicians: the 2022 campaign disclosure reports for elected officials and those who unsuccessfully ran for office were due Dec. 31. The grace period ends Monday, Jan. 9. Don’t say we didn’t tell you.
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Atlanta’s City Council committees are back in session this week, and we’re ready to see how the sausage gets made. In other words, we’re looking forward to seeing the exchanges among council — especially if things get intense.
One set of items we’re interested in is a proposal package from Councilman Jason Dozier that includes three forms of legislation intended to help uphold the walkability of the city’s Beltline project. We’ll have a separate article on those proposals Tuesday on our website, AJC.com.
In other news, we’re also interested in this proposal to create the mayor’s Office of Policy. According to City Council’s communications crew, the legislation is design to ensure the efficient and effective development and implementation of the mayor’s policy agenda and initiatives. It sounds like a big deal, given that it involves having the chief financial officer work to create a budget for the office. We’re in touch with City Hall to ensure that we can fill y’all in on the full details of this proposal, too.
Send us tips and feedback at Wilborn.Nobles@ajc.com.
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