From the Dunwoody Crier
By John Schaffner
Dunwoody Councilman Robert Wittenstein said he “likely would be supportive” if residents in the northern portion of Brookhaven decided they would rather be annexed into Dunwoody than create a new city or remain in unincorporated DeKalb County.
During an interview with The Crier, Wittenstein said, “I am pretty comfortable with that. I think we have a great thing going here. If I lived down there, I would want to be in Dunwoody too.”
Wittenstein attended the June 29 third town hall meeting for residents in the unincorporated area of DeKalb—generally called Brookhaven—to discuss future options of creating a new city of Brookhaven, possibly seeking annexation into one of the adjoining existing cities or maintaining the status quo.
More than 150 residents attended the meeting in the Lupton Auditorium at Oglethorpe University, which was organized and moderated by State Rep. Elena Parent (D-Brookhaven). The previous two meetings were arranged by State Rep. Mike Jacobs (R-Brookhaven), who has sponsored a city of Brookhaven bill in the Georgia Legislature for possible consideration next session.
State Rep. Tom Taylor (R-Dunwoody) and Sen. Fran Millar (R-Dunwoody), also have participated in all three meetings, but especially the first two in Chamblee and at Oglethorpe, which drew more than 250 residents each.
Jacobs has said that the genesis of the broader discussion was talk of the possibility of the area of Brookhaven north of Windsor Parkway and west of Ashford-Dunwoody Road asking about being annexed into Dunwoody and other areas east of Ashford-Dunwoody Road possibly being annexed into Chamblee.
“Dunwoody can offer then a much higher level of service than they are getting today,” Wittenstein explained. “It means some extra police patrols and road paving, so there is some cost. But my feeling is that the revenues that we would pick up would balance the books, and there would not be a burden on the existing city.”
Wittenstein said, if the residents in Brookhaven were to become part of Dunwoody, “they cannot only get better services, they can lower their tax bill. In the period of time we have been in existence, Dunwoody has held our tax rates flat and DeKalb has gone up every year,” he added.
“As long as we can do it without it become a burden, I believe there is no reason not to” annex that area into Dunwoody,” he stated, but providing that is what those residents want.
Concerning the discussions of creating a new city of Brookhaven, the founding city councilman said the people in Brookhaven are worried about two things—“feasibility and desirability. Having done what we did in Dunwoody, I can guarantee it is feasible to create a city of Brookhaven.” He said the planned study by the Vincent Institute at the University of Georgia will show that.
“When they know that, the issue will be all about desirability,” he added. In Dunwoody we had just the opposite situation. We didn’t know if it was feasible, but we were unanimous about it being desirable. We all knew if we could, we wanted to.”
Wittenstein said he believes Brookhaven has the tax base to become a city if it wants. “They have to do some soul searching about what they want to do.”
