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BEN EMANUEL
Seagraves dates the picture to some time
around 1950 based on his rough knowledge of
his grandfather’s tenure as a councilman, given
its appearance in the photograph hanging on
his office wall, (.lark Well* began his first term
as mayor in 1948; an educated guess based on
buildings present in the picture dates it to no
more than a few years after that.)
There is much more to be learned from this
fascinating and newly-rediscovered mid-century
aerial view of downtown Athens. Seagraves has
already cleaned the dust off the old picture,
and it's hanging in the lobby of the government
building at 120 Dougherty St. for all to see. Stop
by and have a look next time you're downtown.
Ben Emanuel ben@flagpole com
Navy School Plans
See What They’re Thinking
On Wednesday, Nov. 29, the public will get
a chance to see drafts of potential scenarios for
reuse of the Navy Supply Corps School property
when it closes in 2011. The Navy School Local
Redevelopment Authority (LRA) and consultants
RKG Associates are holding an open house and
a public meeting in the Planning Department
auditorium at 120 Dougherty St. downtown. The
drop-in open house to view various reuse plans
and ask questions will be 5-7 p.m., and there
will be a presentation on the reuse scenarios 7-9
p.m. The LRA plans to present a draft of a final
reuse plan in February 2007.
PARTNERS AT WORK
Partners for a Prosperous Athens want
you to know that it's not too late to take
part in the anti-poverty work they've
undertaken. They'll hold the final large
'recommendation* meeting—as always,
op«n to the public—at Clarke Central High
School on Monday, Dec 4 at 7 p.m. After
the meeting, the citizen committees' rec
ommendations will be submitted to the
Partners steering committee. The rest of
the timeline currently looks like this: In
January and February, the steering com
mittee plans to identify a set of 'initial'
recommendations. Town halt meetings in
March will gather feedback on those recom
mendations, which could be implemented
beginning in June, 2007. For more informa
tion, visit www.prosperousathens.org.
Simultaneous to the work of developing reuse
plans—but on a sepaiate track of the planning
process—the LRA has been accepting Notice of
Interest proposals from entities interested in
redeveloping the base in full or in part. The LRA
has received nine proposals—most from non
profit organizations and one each from the ACC
government and the University of Georgia—for
homeless assistance or "public benefit" uses of
the site. Federal base closure law mandates that
the LRA consider such uses as part of the reuse
planning process. Proposals from private devel
opers wil. come at a later date.
Six of the nine Notices of Interest have come
from Athens-based organizations who are all part
of the Northeast Georgia Homeless Coalition. The
group has been meeting all year, and includes
the Athens Area Homeless Shelter, the Interfaith
Hospitality Network, Advantage Behavioral
Health Systems (ABHS), AIDS Athens, and the
Athens-Oconee Court Appointed Special Advocate
(CASA) program. The set of proposals is designed
to be flexible: each proposal focuses on different
buildings on the site, and although the various
proposed programs would work well independent
of one another, they might work best as a group.
Included are a child care center focusing on
homeless children, a health care clinic for the
homeless that would also expand the existing
services of AIDS Athens, an emergency shelter
for adolescents in care of CASA, two "transitional
housing" shelters providing long-term support
for families and individuals beyond the need for
emergency shelter but still making their way our
of homelessness, and a "one-stop shop" or home
less services "superstore" that would provide a
range of services and would be coordinated by
ABHS.
That last option, the "one-stop shop" con
cept, would expand on the current services of
the Homeless Day Service Center on Peter Street,
consolidating various functions currently spread
across town. It would be located in an arc of
buildings on the edge of the site that could be
leased from another user—a private developer,
or maybe UGA—who might use most or all of
the Navy School property. Such a lease arrange
ment from a larger-scale user would work for all
the non-profit proposals, most of which would
aim to use existing buildings—for the most part
in the same way they're used now. as housing,
clinics, day care, and so forth—on the western
half of the site. In addition to the six Athens-
based non-profit proposals, there is one from the
Atlanta Union Mission (a Christian ministry af
filiated with The Potter's House) to create transi
tional housing for homeless men in recovery from
substance abuse.
There are two "public benefit" proposals not
from non-profit groups: one from the ACC Leisure
Services Department and one from UGA. Leisure
Services says it would like to consolidate office
functions, improve gymnastics facilities, and
greatly expand tennis facilities so as to be able
to host tennis tournaments that currently can't
be held in Athens. Their proposal involves some
demolition and some new construction on a por
tion of the site partly taken up by recreational
fields now.
UGA's proposal is to create a "multi-faceted/
multi-discipline health sciences center" that
would include its new College of Public Health, a
nursing school, a library, and clinical and other
academic facilities largely in conjunction with
the Medical College of Georgia and Athens Tech.
UGA says it would preserve the site's historic
structures and put up some new buildings as
well, and makes clear that it would need the en
tire Navy School site in order to effect this plan.
It will be up to the LRA to determine what
will work best on the nearly 60-arre site,
whether a total reuse by one institution like UGA
or a combination of various uses. The "one-stop
shop" for homeless services, for instance, is de
signed to work effectively on the edge of a larger
use dominating' the rest of the site. It remains
to be seen how Notices of Interest from private
developers will figure into the LRA's planning
process.
Ben Emanuel ben@1lagpole.com
Adopt Me..
/'ATHENS AREA HUMANE SOCIETY
399 Btaverdam Rd. ♦ 706-353-1287 » www.athenshumanesociety.com
Nelson s a long-limbed orange tabby with b*g orange eyes - friendy, laid-back, cuddly
young fellow who is also a wonderfully attentive listener. If you need a talker, there’s
Winston • adorable black kitten with little surprise patches
of white here and there. Playful and sweet. Hush. The
Great Tabby Adventurer, was found stuck in a tree.
He is read)' for kitten action, which wil indude
Hazel is such a cute, tiny, brown
bunny with a dark brown stripe.
He is a cairn, gentle ktde creature,
ok with tender handling.
Dudky s a VERY cool aduk kitty weh
huge beautiful kqu*d golden eyes. He
is recovering nicely from a dog attack
(he was bitten on his back) and he
finds the warm and safe indoor life
luxurious. A lover, not a
fighter, as he wihappiy
demonstrate.
Phillip Seagraves is the proud new caretaker of an aerial photograph of downtown Athens dating to sometime around 1950.
He recently found the picture in the attic at City Hall and had it hung up at 120 Dougherty St. tor all to see.
510 N. Thomas St. • Downtown Athens
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