It only becomes official if Bulloch County commissioners approve a resolution proposed on their 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 4 agenda, but county officials head into that meeting prepared to object to the city of Statesboro’s pending annexation of a roughly 37-acre tract on Beasley Road.

Originally described as 41 acres and now as 36.55, this is the same undeveloped land owned by Bel Air Estates Inc. that Statesboro City Council first voted to annex Jan. 17 at the request of the property owners. The council then voided that annexation through a Feb. 21 vote to settle a legal challenge mounted by six Bulloch County residents, most residing on property neighboring the tract, two of whom are also Statesboro city residents.

Before agreeing to the settlement, put into effect when Superior Court Judge Ronnie Thompson signed a consent order Feb. 23, Statesboro officials acknowledged errors in the city’s process of notifying the county commissioners and county school system.

But beginning in February, city officials started using a revised practice, with City Council voting to acknowledge receipt of each annexation request while the Bulloch County Board of Commissioners and Board of Education are informed.

On March 21, Statesboro’s council acknowledged receipt of the new request from the Bel Air Estates Inc. owners.

As of Monday, the county commissioners had a draft resolution on their Tuesday agenda – ready for a vote – to object to the annexation on grounds provided under a paragraph of state law, OCGA (Official Code of Georgia, Annotated) 36-36-113.

Board of Commissioners Chairman Roy Thompson said County Attorney Jeff Akins will present the resolution at Tuesday’s meeting.

“It’s on there, and we still have to vote on it,” Thompson said. “So I guess it will be subject to the vote if the objection is filed or not.”

OCGA 36-36-113 allows county governments to object to any city’s annexation of land that will cause a “material increase in burden” on the county in any of three ways: 1. the proposed change in zoning or land use; 2. proposed increase in density (in this case the number of people living in an area); or 3. infrastructure demands.

County road ‘burden’

A central paragraph of the proposed resolution states:

“The Bulloch County Board of Commissioners hereby objects to the Annexation on the grounds that the proposed change in zoning and land use and the proposed increase in density will impose infrastructure demands on Bulloch County that will constitute a material increase in the burden on Bulloch County and have a significant financial impact on Bulloch County, including but not limited to intersection improvements, road repairs and resurfacing, and substantially increase traffic.”

Nearby properties are zoned R-20 for single-family residential use in the county’s zoning system. Statesboro’s default zoning for newly  annexed  property is  R-40 single-family  residential, which implies a minimum lot size of 40,000 square feet, or nine-tenths of an acre. But the city has no standards for R-40 lots.

Originally, when Bel Air Estates Inc. requested the annexation in January, its owners proposed a change to R-2 townhome residential to allow developer Lamar Smith of Smith Family Homes to build a townhouse subdivision with up to 212 home units on what is now shown as less than 40 acres.

That potential surge of new residents, the amount of traffic and changes in the quiet character of the neighborhood were reasons neighbors gave for objecting to the annexation and rezoning. With the new annexation request, the developer has proposed a change not to R-2 but to R-6 single-family residential zoning, which engineer Joey Maxwell of local firm Maxwell, Reddick & Associates said in February would be for a plan with 124 detached houses.

If a majority of the county commissioners approve the resolution, the city will have an opportunity to respond to the county’s objection. Then a mediation process could ensue in which the two local governments try to work out details of the annexation and zoning, said Bulloch County Planning and Development Director James Pope.

Meanwhile, the county government would seek to have a traffic study done showing the subdivision’s potential effects on county roads.

“Assuming the commissioners vote to oppose it …  as it works through that process we would have a study done and either show our case is true or not, but we think based just on that annexation it would have some impacts to the county infrastructure in the area,” Pope said.

Moratorium expiring

Meanwhile, the Board of Commissioners’ partial moratorium on individual rezoning requests for residential subdivisions in the southeastern portion of the county is set to expire Friday, April 7, and county officials plan to let it end.

So the commissioners’ Tuesday evening agenda also includes discussions and potential votes on a package of proposed changes to subdivision regulations, another package of changes to the county Zoning Ordinance itself and,  as “new business,” adoption of an all-new Stormwater Control Ordinance. In fact, these things take up the most space in a 428-page agenda packet, with the resolution to object to the city’s Beasley Road annexation being Page 428.

At this point, all of the elements of the revisions county staff members hoped to make during the moratorium period are being presented for the commissioners’ consideration, except the Future Development Map, Pope said.

“We have the zoning and the subdivision regulations to be heard tomorrow night,” he said Monday. “And then the last part of the moratorium piece was that Future Development Map, and Wednesday is the deadline to get on (the agenda for) the May planning and zoning meeting.”

So the appointed county Planning and Zoning Board should be presented the map for its recommendation May 11, Pope said. The elected commissioners would then be able to approve that final part of the new work by June.

Meanwhile, the moratorium will expire Friday, and property owners’ new, previously barred subdivision zoning change requests could be accepted as early as Monday, April 10.

“I feel sure there will probably be at least four, but maybe more,” Pope said.

The commissioners on Aug. 16 adopted what was originally at 180-day moratorium applying only to an area mapped as “Southeast Bulloch County,” south from Statesboro and Burkhalter Road to the Bryan County line.

It temporarily barred processing of requests to rezone AG-5 agricultural tracts to R-40, R-25 and R-15 single-family residential, R-3 multi-family residential, R-2 two-family residential, PUD-1 planned unit development or MHP, manufactured home park.

At the request of County Manager Tom Couch and County Attorney Akins, the commissioners in January extended the moratorium for 180 days past its original Feb. 10 expiration date.