October 21 City Council Meeting

Video available at https://www.youtube.com/live/wMCe5oerz34

It opens with yet another public comment about lighting and noise for evening high school football practice and football games. So much time and effort has been spent on this, can we devote as many resources to other children's activities? So many kids in Sandy Springs are already or would like to be playing soccer or running track, performing in plays, playing music, going to math competitions or science fairs. Surely we can find children's activities other than contact football that the community wants to watch and celebrate that don't entail so much disturbance to neighbors. Or, what would it say about us if we can't?

At 11:00, there's a discussion and approval of $905,000 for Georgia Power to put power lines underground, as a component of Hammond Drive project. Maybe it's fine. But it does strike me that the city council is very quick to spend our money on road infrastructure for driving, but not for other (safer) modes of transportation. Nearly a million dollars just for electrical work for a short segment of road is a lot. I'm curious if they even have a firm metric in mind of how much congestion will be decreased, or in other words how much faster an average drive along Hammond will be at rush hour, a few years after this multi-million dollar project is completed? I predict it'll still be awful. Maybe total traffic volume on Hammond will be higher, possibly increasing crashes and definitely increasing emissions in the area, contributing to childhood asthma etc.

At 14:00 there's approval for some supplemental agreement with GDOT for Path400. I didn't follow the details but good that this project is proceeding. Key here is that funding is mostly coming from outside of Sandy Springs. There's a 20% city local match.

19:00, discussion of GDOT transportation alternatives and mitigation air quality competitive funding program, and the local funding match. This is only an application to participate in a federal program managed through the state. In past years this program was managed by ARC instead of GDOT, unclear why it changed. There are two different types of grants. First, Transportation Alternatives. Second, Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement. 20% local match required for pedestrian and bike programs. Increasing road capacity is not eligible, but unclear if transit is. Emphasis on decreasing emissions and increasing safety. City staff propose a project near Holcomb bridge. Seems fine by itself, although it does perpetuate a bias of parks and recreational infrastructure that neglects the southern half of the city.

-Vladimir

City Council Meeting Oct 7, 2025 - Speed Cameras and Sidewalks

 In this meeting, , there was an update to the earlier discussion about speed cameras. At 47 minutes, the speaker says that speed cameras have not been installed on Roswell Road because of the state law requirement for signage to be visible at all lanes of traffic. On a multilane road a driver on the center lane could theoretically be blocked by another vehicle from seeing the sign informing them of a camera. This is absurd. We have the technology to hang signs so as to make them visible from all lanes. Every intersection on Roswell Road has them. This is the most dangerous non-highway road in Sandy Springs. Speed cameras should be installed there.

Here is the record of citations so far

At 51:06 this chart of crashes is presented.

When something can be predicted to happen in public over and over, that's not an accident. The effectiveness of these cameras is itself proof that crashes are a policy choice the government can choose to avoid. The speaker, from Sandy Springs Police Department, clarifies that this chart is only for accidents on the road, and "not counting private property cause schools I'm sure they have a lot of them" which is correct for purposes of evaluating the cameras, but should warrant a separate conversation from the city council. They should not tolerate crashes at schools in Sandy Springs any more than violence using other deadly objects.

The SSPD seems very diligent about avoiding false positives. In addition to the 10mph buffer, only issuing tickets for people going 11 over, they also add a time buffer. The example given is for a driver getting gas. If that hypothetical driver gets to a gas station before the school zone light and then pulls out after the school zone light, even if they break the speed limit and go 36 in the 25 mph school zone of the otherwise 35 mph road, they won't get a ticket for the first few minutes of the period on the chance they didn't realize the school zone was in effect.

At 1:00:26, council member DeJulio recounts how when Sandy Springs was incorporated, leadership discussed and decided against installing speed cameras in general, not just at schools. Since then speed cameras have largely gone away. That was a mistake, and it reveals the value of concerted action for safe infrastructure whenever possible. If speed cameras were an option then and had been implemented it would be harder to remove them, than to block new ones.

Multiple council members speak favorably for not enforcing speed limits around schools during the day, with mere $75 fines for drivers going 46 mph or over. Why do they want to protect dangerous criminals in school zones?

At 1:10:00 council member Paulson makes the valid point that the goal should be getting drivers to stop speeding, at least around schools, so none of them would get the fine. He asks the presenter about how to do that and they chat about continuing education etc. But speed limits are extremely easy to understand, even in the limited context of basic traffic laws. For one thing, these fines themselves are education, they tell drivers to learn to drive. Another component is traffic calming and building safer roads. The Sandy Springs city council seems generally opposed to traffic calming for our major roads. E.g., fewer lanes, narrower lanes, barriers on the side of the road between drivers and other road users. Coincidentally, the next topic on the agenda is neighborhood traffic calming. 

Council member Paulson has the right aspiration. I hope he gets some information from a traffic engineer experienced with traffic calming and actually pouring concrete to successfully get a city to, or at least close to, Vision Zero. In particular around schools, it would be great to build protected bike lanes to give kids a fun and healthy alternative transportation option with concrete barriers to remind drivers to take their responsibility seriously.

These fines, even if all of them somehow went to Sandy Springs residents (a majority of people in the city during business hours are not residents), amount to $1 or $2 per resident depending on if outstanding fines ever get paid. This is nothing in the grand scheme of city policy. It's absurd that scaling back these fines is getting so much attention and taking so much time at city hall, instead of focusing on reducing speeding.

Sandy Springs traffic calming policy is focused on neighborhood streets rather than more dangerous high speed roads like Roswell, and does not even take the safety of neighborhood streets seriously.

Ar 1:16:51 this table of completed projects is displayed.

This is great as far as it goes but it demonstrates how little traffic calming Sandy Springs is doing. These are minor roads and even these minor projects are not enough to make most drivers obey the speed limit, put away their phones, etc. We cannot have wide smooth lanes everywhere and then act surprised when drivers use them as traffic engineers know they will.

Council member Bauman is correct that there's a lot of speeding across the city, we need a lot more infrastructure improvement for safety, and we need new financing for that.

At 1:33:00 they talk about setting the 85th percentile limit at 10 mph over instead of the current 8 mph. This continues to be nonsense. Instead of twiddling with this, neighborhood traffic calming needs better metrics.

At 1:52:19 council member DeJulio says "well I just think it's awful easy to request money, other people's money, to solve your problems" to summarize his hostility to the city paying for traffic calming, at the end of a broader conversation. This reflects a focus at city hall on subsidizing driving that is reflected in the deaths and serious injuries across the streets of Sandy Springs. The more rational way to frame fees, if DeJulio merely wants to keep the cost off of the City, is to force drivers to pay for the cost of reducing how much they crash. Council member Bauman has the better side of this conversation, it is basically the central purpose of the city government to make these streets safe.

2:32:00 starts discussion about eminent domain for property at 4684 Roswell, at Mystic Pl intersection. For the Roswell Road Transit Streetscape project. This is an extremely dangerous area where a driver killed a pedestrian earlier this year, hopefully that long delayed project starts moving.

Edit: Notes on a previous city council discussion about neighborhood traffic calming, http://safersandysprings.blogspot.com/2025/06/notes-on-june-3-2025-sandy-springs-city.html

Notes on previous discussion about school zone speed cameras: https://safersandysprings.blogspot.com/2025/09/speed-cameras-near-riverwood-and-north.html

Vote Against Fulton County Ballot Measures to defund Fulton County Schools

Per https://atlantaciviccircle.org/2025/09/24/atlanta-fulton-county-senior-homestead-exemption-election/

 

In Fulton County, the following two questions will be on the ballot:

• Do you approve an act to provide a new homestead exemption from Fulton County school district ad valorem taxes for educational purposes in the amount of 25 percent of the assessed value of the homestead for certain residents of that school district who are 65 years of age or older?

• Do you approve an act to provide a new homestead exemption from Fulton County school district ad valorem taxes for educational purposes in the amount of 50 percent of the assessed value of the homestead for certain residents of that school district who are 70 years of age or older?

 

This is being marketed as an anti-displacement measure for seniors, but it is actually a measure to defund our schools. We do need the government to take action to let seniors continue to live in our community as they age. We need more housing. We need housing that's accessible, with no need to walk on stairs to enter the building or to go between floors. We need housing that's in a safe area for somebody no longer physically able to drive, with short and safe multiuse paths for walking or mobility devices to get to stores, doctors, transit, etc. The same politicians pushing these tax exemption are opposed to housing policies that would work for seniors. Some seniors are displaced purely due to financial need, and they are disproportionately renters rather than home owners. This policy does nothing for them.

The link above quotes a tax expert clarifying how this will operate across homeowners,

“If a 75-year-old living in a $10 million home is getting a $5 million exemption, that doesn’t seem fair,” he said, referring to Fulton’s proposed 50% reduction in assessed home values for homeowners over 70.  

There's simply no reason to structure the exemption this way if the actual concern was displacement. These measures are defunding our schools for the disproportionate benefit of property owners who have benefited the most from land appreciation. Land that could be better used if seniors in a $10 million dollar home downsized to something easier to manage.

Fulton County Schools needs better housing policy in general to enable more families to live in the area and boost enrollment. Otherwise there will be more school closures, like Spalding. These exemptions are not the housing policy we need. Likewise Fulton County Schools have many unmet needs, and these measures to defund our schools will make things worse. Please vote no.

-Vladimir