More AGGC scorecards
Yesterday, I linked to a partial collection of answers from Charlie Maddox for the Athens Grow Green Coalition candidate scorecards. I've been fortunate enough to get a copy of Mayor Heidi Davison's answer and thought I'd post her answers to the same questions.
What do you think Athens-Clarke County’s growth issues will be in the next ten years?
Athens is a uniquely wonderful, eclectic, livable, and highly desirable community that enjoys the amenities of a large city while enjoying the charm of a small town. Often recognized nationally and internationally as a great place to live for young parents with children, retirees, art and recreation lovers, etc., these attributes will contribute to our continued upward growth patterns. Simply put - we sizzle with personality!
That winning personality is driving our population increases. Predictions tell us Athens’ residents will increase by more than 50% over the next ten years reaching 250,000 by the year 2030. Additionally, we must consider increased numbers of people commuting from neighboring counties with complementary high growth rates.
As an important center for work, shopping, medical and other services, entertainment, and recreation, these factors will place a strain on our current infrastructure. Planning for the demands of this future growth requires a proactive rather than reactive stance.
Growth within our small geographic footprint calls for non-traditional solutions in every area including housing, recreation, multi-use and commercial construction, transportation alternatives, economic development, and public safety. Compact development in close proximity to existing infrastructure that is pleasantly dense and close to town, protects greenspace, reduces the cost of service delivery, and fosters a sense of place should be our goal.
Policies to ensure environmental sustainability in order to meet the sheer volume of basic human needs of clean air, clean water, and the responsible disposal of waste are going to present this community with the challenge to think anew towards creative solutions.
More fleshed out than Maddox's response, but still playing it safe by speaking generalities (overall). What impressed me, however, about Davison's response was her desire to protect existing greenspace in spite of the impending growth, which I take to mean she sees feasible solutions to create denser pockets of population within our community. One of those solutions, I would assume, would be mixed-use developments.
Also, kudos for recognizing the challenges of waste disposal, particularly in light of the recent landfill problems.
What will you do to increase the supply of accessible, affordable housing?
Several opportunities present themselves in this area that should be discussed and possibly implemented. Those include the creation of a Housing Trust Fund to be used for gap financing, reduce parking requirements for residential development, more aggressive demolition of blighted housing to be replaced by new homes, turning surplus property over to housing providers, working with developers to consider expedited permitting and creating voluntary inclusionary housing policies to meet the needs for mixed-income, lifecycle, and workforce housing, and explore the concept of “Granny Flats”.
The government can and should continue to work with local housing providers such as Habitat for Humanity, Athens Housing Authority, Athens Land Trust, EADC, local developers, employers, and funding institutions in an effort to define housing goals and strategies for implementation. Work of this nature is underway to build new housing and rehabilitate existing older dwellings, but efforts could be better coordinated.
As gentrification seeps into our more modest in-town neighborhoods in the form of infill, we need to seek out ways to allow underperforming property to be revitalized without the negative effect of displacing long-time homeowners. Using some of the strategies alluded to in the first paragraph, it’s possible to inject into the mix moderately priced homes for those with low to middle incomes.
The two greatest expenses are housing and transportation. By creating moderate income housing close to transportation nodes, individuals who earn a modest living are more likely to have opportunities for participation in the local economy, investment in their family, neighborhood and the larger community.
Considerably more thorough than Maddox, who effectively gave a non-answer on that question. Davison dives into specifics, which is much appreciated, as is her recognition that it's important to develop some of this more affordable housing near existing transportation nodes.
What do you think Athens-Clarke County’s growth issues will be in the next ten years?
Athens is a uniquely wonderful, eclectic, livable, and highly desirable community that enjoys the amenities of a large city while enjoying the charm of a small town. Often recognized nationally and internationally as a great place to live for young parents with children, retirees, art and recreation lovers, etc., these attributes will contribute to our continued upward growth patterns. Simply put - we sizzle with personality!
That winning personality is driving our population increases. Predictions tell us Athens’ residents will increase by more than 50% over the next ten years reaching 250,000 by the year 2030. Additionally, we must consider increased numbers of people commuting from neighboring counties with complementary high growth rates.
As an important center for work, shopping, medical and other services, entertainment, and recreation, these factors will place a strain on our current infrastructure. Planning for the demands of this future growth requires a proactive rather than reactive stance.
Growth within our small geographic footprint calls for non-traditional solutions in every area including housing, recreation, multi-use and commercial construction, transportation alternatives, economic development, and public safety. Compact development in close proximity to existing infrastructure that is pleasantly dense and close to town, protects greenspace, reduces the cost of service delivery, and fosters a sense of place should be our goal.
Policies to ensure environmental sustainability in order to meet the sheer volume of basic human needs of clean air, clean water, and the responsible disposal of waste are going to present this community with the challenge to think anew towards creative solutions.
More fleshed out than Maddox's response, but still playing it safe by speaking generalities (overall). What impressed me, however, about Davison's response was her desire to protect existing greenspace in spite of the impending growth, which I take to mean she sees feasible solutions to create denser pockets of population within our community. One of those solutions, I would assume, would be mixed-use developments.
Also, kudos for recognizing the challenges of waste disposal, particularly in light of the recent landfill problems.
What will you do to increase the supply of accessible, affordable housing?
Several opportunities present themselves in this area that should be discussed and possibly implemented. Those include the creation of a Housing Trust Fund to be used for gap financing, reduce parking requirements for residential development, more aggressive demolition of blighted housing to be replaced by new homes, turning surplus property over to housing providers, working with developers to consider expedited permitting and creating voluntary inclusionary housing policies to meet the needs for mixed-income, lifecycle, and workforce housing, and explore the concept of “Granny Flats”.
The government can and should continue to work with local housing providers such as Habitat for Humanity, Athens Housing Authority, Athens Land Trust, EADC, local developers, employers, and funding institutions in an effort to define housing goals and strategies for implementation. Work of this nature is underway to build new housing and rehabilitate existing older dwellings, but efforts could be better coordinated.
As gentrification seeps into our more modest in-town neighborhoods in the form of infill, we need to seek out ways to allow underperforming property to be revitalized without the negative effect of displacing long-time homeowners. Using some of the strategies alluded to in the first paragraph, it’s possible to inject into the mix moderately priced homes for those with low to middle incomes.
The two greatest expenses are housing and transportation. By creating moderate income housing close to transportation nodes, individuals who earn a modest living are more likely to have opportunities for participation in the local economy, investment in their family, neighborhood and the larger community.
Considerably more thorough than Maddox, who effectively gave a non-answer on that question. Davison dives into specifics, which is much appreciated, as is her recognition that it's important to develop some of this more affordable housing near existing transportation nodes.
posted by Jmac at 7:17 AM
2 Comments:
I read the whole thing on Maddox web site. You have to laugh at the whole "I'm no special interest candidate" line since the Chamber owns his ass!
Nothing makes the Chamber guys hotter than to call them a "special interest group" but what would you call them?
I also got a kick out of the constant references to "the Maddox campaign" and the answers are even titled as being from "the Committee to Elect Charlie Maddox Mayor" rather than from Charlie Maddox. It makes me wonder if there is any "Charlie" in the Maddox campaign at all.
Thanks, TINRM, for noticing that they were on Maddox's (new, visually improved, but still vacant of depth) website. So, I guess I've heard this guy speak four or five times, and its hard for me to imagine him beginning any sentence with "conversely," as he does in response to one Grow Green question.
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