1 - Ivan Allen, Jr. Digital Collection - Georgia Institute of Technology

\~~.~\~\1tJ\O"V~\ ".1.\ ,•}tilLettersDear Me. GUlhman:If you want to playpolitical footblll, go to Cityl!.all, and espeCially drop inat the City Council andZo n ina Board meetings,These boards havevictimized the CollierRoad·Howell Mill Roadneighbors for three yearswith their pendulU mtype emotional voting. Theproperty was at one time1 ~.l.O-.J rlom residential tocommereilil. then li ter thisdeCISion was reversed and ilw II .1&ln magica ll y~"hi,denlial It the techniCl1lin of the c·The develo lIy COuncil .con t· P1:r, however, hasInUIlly · doomrnCfcill tll(es T~.a I .COmpletel . .. is ISthe enlir/ In lllle wilh howltandltd ProPOUI hu beenmldhlnd l t~ or better yet,Flcts I ·d nn Igures, nOI toCity Council Denies R e-Zoning PlanEDITOR'S NOTE:The voice of even a conscientiouseditor is $eidom, if ever the voice of God. But the voiceof the whole people in a given case is seldom, if ever,anything but the voice of truth, and fairness.Therefore, J asked a number of residents of Howell MillRoad and Colllier Road to express their opinions onthe re-zonina petition of would be developers as told inthe editorial below.Parts of several/etters are printed inthis issue of The Nonh Side News. Others will appearfor a period of several weeks, as space permits.The plan of three Northsiders, Kim King, AlexMcLennan Jr., and Mrs. lois Springer to build a welldesianed shoppinS center at Ihe intersection of HowellMill Road and Collier Roads whose shops and servicefirms would offer practically every human need _ hasbeen described as an uSly battle.The one word description is not accurate. Thevictory of the opposition to the development ca nnot becalled a battle any more than the victory of GelllhisKhan over thousands of unarmed, unclothed and unfedsemi-savases can be accurately descibed 1$ a battle. Thedenial of the petitinn has more the look of a swordthrust of deception than of a battle with cause aright.Councilman GUlhman, at first an opposer of thezoning chanae, which would have given the develope~the riaht to build,later said, in substance, if notpresicely, thai afler investigation he stror,gly urged afavorable vote for the re·zonin, petition_But at the meeting Councilman Guthman votedqainSI the petition, thus causing a tie VOle, which wasbroken by the anti-petition vote of Wyche Fowler.-. .The denial of the petition was when COuncil met andMe. Guthman YOted to deny Ihe rezoning petitio n in therace of 300 residents who pleaded that they wanled thezone change so that the shopping center would nOIonly improve the appearance of deteriorating grounds,but wou ld provide a needed service to the comm unity.And while 300 heads of households pleaded for theshopping center development only six CitiZens, officersand leaden of the Wild WOOd community , pleaded adenia l of the petition.\YUdwood ObjectorsI n a sense, the oP p olltion of th esix Wildwood residen ts might well be compared to thecitizens of Roswell registering a complaint apinstdaylight saving lime in Decatur or som e o ther remoteplace. This comparison is apt because the 300 heads ofhomes who petitioned for t he development live " nextdoor" to the Irea in question while the half a dozenobjectors of the Wildwood community live relat ivelyremote from the sile of the proposed shopping center.A lOgical question at this point would seem to be:did the six objectors from WildWood speak for theirhundreds of neighbors. If so, why did they not presenta petition?A Good QuestionIf a shopping center does not occupy the groundwhat will the Occupancy be?That is the question.T he answer well could bedevelopment with integrateddevelopment, of course, wouldvalue of 300 or more homes.a low cost housingtenants. And tha tdeflate overniaht theThis newspaper has fought against and for manyefforts, zone changes in the North Side, Zone changes,of course, have been "steam-rolJered" in some cases,But it appears to us that the Howell Mill _ CollierRoads intersection area would be favo red by acommercial development. It is now an eye-sore, fit onlyfor a shopping center.As practically every Northsider kno ws the area of theproposed shopping ce nter is not an attractive scene,and compares not at all wit h a typical intersection ofNonh Side Roads. The several acres, with only a fewold buildings, have a srubby look. And if the handsomecenter is nOI built deterioration of the u nke m p iscene will worsen.For the most part Howell Mill Road ru ns its up-hill ,down dale course through one of Ihe most picturesq ueareas of the great North Side. The rood, on .....ruch once stooda grist mill for pioneer Atlantans, deserves a better fatethan continued deterioration of one of its moslconspicuous i n te r section.~.Hundreds o f people haveinvestments of midd le cost homes wit hin about a milefrom the intersection. And these 300 people, a surveyshows, need the convenience of a modern shoppingr center. Mati G. PerkinsCouncilman Guthman On Re-Zoning Caseloaic and Ihe and some have adjOining Deve lopment Commillec say we have JUSI started our points that w(te u~d .?n,';mm" " .,,· nClghbors, I h ave I property, unanimously voted in favor a ll out effort 10 b e survey in thiS ImmnoU ,.., en eRcom pet e y onW·I I son, Ch airman . of re-zoning for commercial recog fll . ~e d ~s 10 d'.d IV! ua I s Vill ..·nily I did _ not h IOu I the) e~"d. Th, City 0' th, ZO'i', .o"d. I"" ,>C. with ,i,h" 0" who g,d '.'_ "gots not on what IS wrote Richard GUlhman, ··Of Ihe people, by the Muy G. Pecks would not ,ole ntt.JeoJri,h, 0' 'h, "",hbo'hood Ch,i'm," 0' th, PI""" ""oplo "d '0' th, p'opl," '''0' 0' • "'"' Th 1