Alpharetta Residents Become Downtown Planners Tonight

Alpharetta residents can begin designing their city center tonight, deciding what should go where on the 22-acres of land City Council has assembled to redevelop downtown.

At 6 p.m. the second of four public information meetings will be held in . Unlike the first meeting, which was more about explaining how the redevelopment could be financed without raising taxes, according to city staff, tonight's meeting is all about learning what local residents want to see in the development, and where each element should go.

Several requirements must be included within the 22 acres:

• 5 acres of contiguous park land;
• A new City Hall of approximately 47,000 square feet
• At least 3 acres of land for Alpharetta's new library branch–more if a parking garage isn't built next to it.

The city bought 5 acres of land with bond money designated for parks, so that much of the site must be a park. Part of the reason to redevelop the site is to build a new City Hall that allows more city departments to be located in the same building. The Community Development and Finance departments would move into the new building.

Additionally, the Atlanta-Fulton County Library system accepted Alpharetta's offer of 3 acres of downtown land for a new 25,000-square-foot library branch, so that must be included.

The city plans to shift the last section of Haynes Bridge Road east, changing its intersection with Academy away from the First Baptist Church and allowing creating more usable land in the process.

The plan will continue to change in successive meetings on July 14 a $29 million bond referendum on the Nov. 8 ballot. As two other bonds will be retired in 2013, the reduction in payments needed for them frees up more than enough revenue to pay for this new bond, according to Tom Harris, the city's Finance director. That should mean no more taxes and possibly lower tax rates, he said.

The city established a Web site for the downtown project. It includes an online survey of residents for another way to get comments on the project.