City of Vinings bill filed in Georgia House

Mar. 30—The Vinings Exploratory Committee announced Tuesday state Rep. John Carson, R-northeast Cobb, has filed a bill that, if approved, would send a referendum on Vinings cityhood to area residents. They issued the following news release:

A group of concerned Vinings residents is proposing holding a voter referendum for cityhood on the November 2022 ballot.

"We are seeing continued growth from commercial developers that will dramatically impact our area with traffic and density," said Tom Ham, spokesman for the citizens group. Ham is the current president of the Vinings Historic Preservation Society and a homeowner in Vinings.

"Vinings has a unique history and a very specific sense of community. Becoming a city would formally confirm that identity" said Cullen Hammond, a leader in a Vinings homeowner association. "The entire area would benefit from the stability and focus of a new city."

Residents of Vinings have fought many recent zoning battles to preserve the low-density neighborhood feel of Vinings, and the group believes that, going forward, the best people to determine the destiny of Vinings are the local residents themselves. "Large-scale, high-density, uncontrolled development threatens our neighborhoods with increased traffic and lower property values. It's time to take control of this process," said Hammond.

Prior to a referendum, a professional feasibility study will first be conducted to determine whether a City of Vinings could successfully operate based on what is known as the "city-lite" model. The goal will be to make the city revenue-neutral, meaning no tax increase due to cityhood.

"We are not interested in creating a huge municipal organization or lavish city buildings. We want to keep it as streamlined and as low-cost as possible" said Ham.

The group believes that, as a city, Vinings will begin to receive its fair share of SPLOST money and projects. "We believe Vinings is a net contributor to County SPLOST funds, and we only get small projects here and there. It would benefit us greatly to be in control of what would become our share of the SPLOST dollars, so that we could use the funds directly to benefit our community," said Vinings homeowner, Taryn Bowman.

State law requires a city in Georgia to support a minimum of three services. The Vinings group has chosen to manage Planning and Zoning, Code Enforcement, and Parks and Recreation. Rep. John Carson of Cobb is sponsoring the bill.

Carson believes that "based on the support I've seen from the community, the time has come to let the voters decide for themselves whether to create a new city in the area."

The group is committed to be accessible, transparent, and as specific as possible throughout the process and will make the results of the feasibility study public when it becomes available. The group is actively soliciting input from all Vinings residents. More information on this effort can be found on the group's website at viningscityhood.com.

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