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About Jackson herald. (Jefferson, Jackson County, Ga.) 1881-current | View Entire Issue (July 26, 2023)
4 8 7 9 1 4 1 4 0 2 O O 20 PAGES 2 SECTIONS PLUS INSERTS The Commerce News JEFFERSON, JACKSON COUNTY GEORGIA 30549 $1.00 COPY First day of school School bells to ring again Commerce andJefferson schools resume July 28; county schools on Aug. 3 Students will return to the hallways at schools across Jackson County this week and next week. School bells will ring again in the Commerce City School System and Jefferson City School System this Friday, July 28, the first day of the 2023-24 school year. Jackson County School System students have a few more days to savor the summer. The first day for the Jackson County School System’s 2023-24 year is Thursday, Aug. 3. Storms A'-Af, ; ,/v. * ’ Ufa fe-E., . A A large pine tree fell onto the Jefferson Clubhouse during last week’s storms, damaging the roof before rolling off. The clubhouse is closed until the amount of damage can be determined. Thursday storm results in downed trees, power outages Storms ripped through the area on Thursday after noon (July 20) resulting in damage and power outages across the county. Jackson EMC reported 8,744 outages in Jackson County on Thursday night. Crews worked throughout the night and Friday to re store power to area resi dents. The EMC also called in additional contract con struction and right-of-way crews, along with linemen from Satilla EMC, to assist. Trees fell across the coun ty, causing damage to both public and private facilities. The City of Jeffer son again got hit hard by the storm with numerous downed trees, including one on the Jefferson City Club house. Another strong storm caused extensive tree dam age in Jefferson a couple weeks ago. MAILING LABEL Jefferson Jefferson to use software for water leak alerts The City of Jefferson alerts to homeowners if which homeowners could won’t be adopting water their usage suddenly spikes, buy insurance to cover the leak insurance for residents indicating a possible leak. cost of a large water bill due to purchase. Instead, the city The Jefferson City Coun- to a leak in their lines. But will purchase a new soft- cil had previously discussed ware system that will send the insurance program in .See Jefferson, page 2A Commerce Commerce council, planners talk zoning ordinance overhaul By Alex Buffington alex@mainstreetnews. com Commerce is getting close to completing its zoning ordinance overhaul after months of work and discussion. The Commerce City Council and the town’s planning and zoning commission held a 3-hour and 35-minute meeting on Monday, July 24, to work through the details of the proposal. City staff plan to revise the ordinance over the next month and the city could hold its public hear ing on the changes at the council’s September work session. The new document could be adopted at the council’s September voting meeting. Much of the discussion on Monday centered around house sizes, lot sizes and setbacks for new developments. The council previously discussed requiring set backs of 35 feet for the front of residential proper ties and 15 feet for the sides and back. That 35-foot setback could help alleviate some street parking issues that other neighborhoods across town have experienced. The 35 feet should allow more vehi cles to park in residential driveways outside of the garage. Planners Melinda Cochran-Davis and Erin Moore noted that 35-foot front setback assumes all houses will have a front-facing garage, but they’d like to see more housing variety with side-entry garages. The two groups ultimately decided they’d consider giving exceptions for front setbacks de pending on the orientation of the driveway/garage to help accommodate variety. The groups also discussed changing trends in housing and lot sizes. While the previous trend was to have large houses with large lots, that’s not what current trends show. Mayor Clark Hill cited state and national data that shows millennials ar en’t looking for large lots like Baby Boomers did. “They want to come home to a smaller yard, a smaller footprint in a neighborhood with more green space,” Hill said. Hill and several other people on the two com mittees noted they aren’t as concerned about the size of lots anymore as they are about the quality of what’s being built (building materials, limiting clear-cutting, having more usable green space, etc.). As for house sizes, the council previously See Commerce, page 2A South Jackson No application yet for proposed rock quarry Vulcan Materials Company hasn’t yet formally filed for a rezoning or special use with Jackson Coun ty officials for a planned rock quarry in South Jack- son. The firm has been acquiring property-purchase commitments from landowners between Hwy. 441 and Chandler Bridge Rd. for around 800-1,000 acres for the project. While no formal action has yet been taken, the ac tivist group Citizens for Sustainable Jackson are op posing the project. In an email to its members, CSJ noted that the area of the proposed quarry is a vital groundwater recharge location in the county. “This area accounts for about 50% of the total ground water recharge area in Jackson County,” said CSJ. See Quarry, page 2A piggly wiggly HOME OF THE SLUSHEES n
