EarthGolf

Forsyth County, Georgia’s planning commission voted 3-2 to deny the rezoning on Tuesday night.

A developer lost the first round late Tuesday in a battle with Lake Lanier residents who fought a plan to turn Forsyth County’s oldest golf course into a massive, 772-unit retirement community.

Wellstone Communities LLC of Cumming has an option to buy the 37-year-old Lanier Golf Club, provided it is rezoned by Forsyth County for a mix of residential and commercial uses.

…

John Lowery, president and chief executive officer of Wellstone, took the vote in stride.

“It’s just the first round,” he told staff. “We’re going to win this thing.”

The opposition side also had brought an engineer/environmentalist to sway the planning commission.

Glynn Groszmann, an engineer hired by the opposition, told the planning commission that the Wellstone’s plan will disturb a sizable amount of streams and could not be permitted under state regulations and the federal Clean Water Act.

In my opinion, that argument is not germane to the rezoning case. It is not up to either the planning commission or the County’s board of commissioners to determine the merits of a project’s rezoning based on a rezoning plan that doesn’t necessarily reflect what will actually be built. Often times, rezoning plans haven’t even been reviewed by an engineer to determine the feasibility of building what is proposed. While the use of an engineer claiming that the plan would not be permitted is a good political tactic, it has no basis in fact. The plan doesn’t constitute an attempt to obtain a land disturbance permit, nor necessarily satisfy any (let alone all) regulations that will apply to the site.

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