The city of Greensboro is getting bigger and bigger. The City Council Monday night approved annexation and rezoning requests for parcels of land totaling 94.4 acres along Meadow Crest Road.
The 28-acre site where the new Greene County Elementary School is under construction is part of that annexation. Work to lay new water and sewer lines to the site has been going on for months, but Greensboro requires customers of its water and sewer system to live in the city. Monday night’s action gives the school official access to the system rather than digging wells and laying sewer lines.
But the state of Georgia says all city property must be adjacent to another piece of city property, and the school’s annexation would leave it as a city “island” surrounded by county property. So, the Weyerhaeuser Company, which owns the 66 acres between the school and the city limits, agreed to also be annexed as part of the deal.
Greensboro’s water and wastewater system is the main reason that developers have been seeking annexation into the city.
Last month, a 52-acre lot off Oconee Avenue, next to the Cottages at Oconee Village, was annexed into the city. Seventy houses targeting the workforce market will be constructed there.
In December, 121 acres off Martin Luther King Jr. Drive were annexed for development to include 140 single homes and 42 townhomes.
Next month, 379 acres across Highway 44 from the old Athens Tech building will likely be annexed by the city council. Owners of some 364 acres of that land requested annexation and L-1 zoning for light industry. Owners of the other 15 acres, which would become county “islands” surrounded by the city, agree to also be annexed. The city’s Planning and Zoning Board was scheduled to consider the request this week.
During the public comment part of Monday night’s council meeting, Katrina Breeding, who owns property near the land that could be annexed next month, questioned whether the city’s infrastructure will be able to handle all of this growth.
“At some time, this body is going to have to be responsible for decisions that may concern the infrastructure,” she said. “I was listening to Mr. Cunningham.”
Earlier in the meeting, Marcus Cunningham, supervisor of the city’s wastewater treatment facilities, had given a status report to the city council. He talked about how the city is in compliance with water quality regulations and procedures but reminded council members about the age of the system.
“One of our vertical turbine pumps at the wastewater plant is going to need to be repaired very soon,” Cunningham said. “That pump has never been repaired or anything outside of routine maintenance since it was installed in the late ’90s. Treating wastewater can be pretty hard on a pump, and it’s been operating for well over two decades.”
He said a replacement pump at one of the city’s eight sewer lift stations could cost $30,000.
However, Cunningham also pointed out that the only way to verify that the lift stations are working is when they are inspected bi-weekly.
At his request, the City Council approved $4,898 to purchase and install monitoring devices for real-time continuous reporting on the status of the lift stations as well as a new station to be built at the site of the new school. The city water system is also antiquated.
“Can the infrastructure support this (development) when we’ve got problems?” Breeding added during her comments, suggesting council members have to do a better job of researching. “Remember what your infrastructure can and cannot stand because the state of Georgia is not going to let you go forever with a poor infrastructure.”
Following the meeting, Mayor Corey Williams told the Lake Oconee News the city has “things in place” but would not elaborate.
“We’ve had many developers come and say, ‘we’re going to do this’ and we’ll just wait and see if it happens,” Williams said. “I would assure you that before this council makes any decision to annex any property into the city that we have carefully went over if our infrastructure can handle it or not.”