ATLANTA — Atlanta community members are concerned about a potential development coming to their Mechanicsville neighborhood.
On Wednesday, the Atlanta City Council Finance Executive Committee voted to approve a land swap with Atlanta Public Schools. According to the agenda item, the property will be used to help advance the City's strategy to address homelessness by providing housing options for people experiencing homelessness in Atlanta.
In the meeting, the Mayor's policy advisor for housing said they're in the early design stages, and the priority right now is to first get control of the property and address the encampments.
Councilmember Jason Winston then clarified this vote is just for the land swap.
“Anything about land use will go through another committee, and that will be for another conversation,” Winston said. “Simply, this right now is about the transaction that's happening between APS and the City of Atlanta."
However, residents in Mechanicsville, where the property sits, are concerned about its future.
“There’s a lot of traffic in and out of there, there’s a lot of drug deals that’s coming in and out of there, there’s people that need help,” said David Holder, the president of the Mechanicsville Civic Association.
He said he’s lived in the area for about 20 years.
“Before, it was a nice area,” he said of the plot of land off Cooper Street. “I’ve been back here a couple times and had lunch by myself, and now you don’t even want to go back here. It’s like a warzone.”
Sharon Collins spoke at the meeting on Wednesday and has lived in Mechanicsville her whole life.
She said the piece of property is "disheartening."
“Oh wow, it has gone from a thriving school that used to be here, Cooper Street School, to now it’s a dump,” Collins said. “If you look around, there’s trash everywhere, there’s homelessness going on over there.”
Both Collins and Holder said the community feels forgotten.
“Absolutely,” Holder said. “I think it’s become a dumping ground for the City of Atlanta. I think they look, and they say we’ll just dump this over here, and they walk away.”
They also agreed they’re not opposed to new development coming to Mechanicsville.
“I don’t want anyone to think the community doesn’t want low income, we do,” Holder said. “But we want to have some buy-in on what it’s going to be.”
Holder and Collins said they hope the City will hear the community’s concerns and take them into consideration.