Commissioners voted 3-1 to deny the rezoning, with Commissioner Mark Thomas voting for the project.
The rezone application was sought by Deferred Tax LLC and Maxie Price for three separate parcels of land. One parcel is currently zoned B-2, but the others are zoned for office space and residential use. The rezone would have brought all the parcels under B-2, a zoning that allows a wider variety of businesses.
However, Watkinsville landscape architect Ken Beall, who represented the landowner at Tuesday s commission meeting, said the parcel planned for a supermarket was not large enough for the proposed Publix. Part of the land from that parcel was donated to Oconee County for the construction of the Oconee Connector, he said.
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Image Used By Land Planner Beall At Planning Commission (Lee Becker)
If the Oconee County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday night were to approve the requested rezone for a shopping center at the intersection of Mars Hill Road and the Oconee Connector, it would be the third largest in the county in terms of building square footage.
It also would be the culmination of efforts going back to 1988 to create a shopping at that location.
Commissioners have approved smaller shopping centers on two of the three properties in the intersection in the past, but the property owners never developed the land.
The developer reported the center will be valued at more than $50 million.
The development has attracted some opposition, especially to the size of the project and a proposed traffic light on the connector between Georgia Highway 316 and Mars Hill Road.
A petition by a group called Mars Hill Responsible Development has garnered at least 1,000 signatures from Oconee residents, but many others outside the county also have signed, according to Jennifer Walker, who helped with the petition.
Walker said she plans to present the petition at the commission s 6 p.m. meeting Tuesday.
“We were hoping there would be some consideration of what the planning office staff report had recommended, but the developer has been pretty persistent on some points that we are not able to see eye to eye (on),” she said.
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Matt Elder (Left) With Guy Herring (Aaron Nowak/Lee Becker)
The Oconee County Planning Commission voted a second time on Monday night to recommend that the Board of Commissioners not rezone 47 acres at the corner of Mars Hill Road and the Oconee Connector for a major shopping center.
The vote on Monday had six Commission members recommending denial and three voting against that recommendation.
The vote on Jan. 19, when the rezone first came before the Commission, had been unanimous, with all eight voting members in favor of denial.
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Steven Strickland and Chuck Hunt changed their votes, and the newly appointed Commission member, Matt Elder, replaced a denial vote by Brian Fosen with his vote against denial. Fosen stepped down following the January meeting.
UpdatedMon, Apr 19, 2021 at 2:31 am ET
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Jamie Boswell (GDOT)
Boswell Properties, owned by State Transportation Board member Jamie Boswell, is at the center of the rezone involving his client Maxie Price that is before the Oconee County Planning Commission on Monday night.
Boswell not only is listing the 47 acres owned by Price, but he has been informed of a decision by Georgia Department of Transportation senior officials to overrule regional engineers who had rejected Price s request for access to the Oconee Connector from his property.
Boswell also is listing at least 13 other properties that will be affected by decisions made by the Department of Transportation as it moves forward with plans to transform SR 316 into a limited access highway.