Decatur, GA — The Decatur City Commission meets today at 6 p.m. for a work session and at 7:30 p.m. for the regular meeting at City Hall, 509 N. McDonough Street.

The meeting will be held in person and has virtual options as well.

To join the meeting virtually, follow these instructions:

To register in advance, click here. After registering, participants will receive a confirmation email that will have the link to join the meeting.

The meeting will additionally be live streamed on the city’s website. To access the live broadcast, click here.

To view the agenda, click here.

On the agenda for the work session is a discussion about the strategic plan draft report.

During the regular meeting, the City Commission will consider implementing another mask ordinance. The board will additionally consider approval of task orders for professional design services that are in line with a proposed plan for stormwater capital improvements.

This is the first step in implementation of the capital improvements identified in the stormwater master plan that the City Commission adopted in December 2020, Assistant City Manager David Junger wrote in a memo. High priority projects are scheduled to happen over a 20-year timeframe, separated into four consecutive five-year implementation horizons. The first horizon includes 11 projects.

The projects areas are Derrydown Way, Park Drive and Candler Street, North Decatur Road and Ferndale Avenue, Brower and McClean Streets, Champlain and Seneca Streets, Sycamore Drive and Fairview Street, Mimosa Drive and Mimosa Place, Lamont Drive, Wilton Drive and Plainview Street, Lockwood Terrace, Sycamore Place/East Ponce de Leon.

The individual consultant task orders will be presented to the City Commission for approval.

Updates to the stormwater utility fee were recommended in the master plan to fund these projects.

“Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the City Commissioners adopted a 2-step fee process, with approval of 4 fee tiers and a base fee of $215 per 1 equivalent residential unit (ERU) in FY 20-21 and a projected increase in the base fee of $285 per 1 ERU for FY 21-22,” Junger said in the memo.

The current stormwater utility fund balance that can be used for capital improvements is just under $1.6 million. The city is anticipating the budget for the first five-year phase to be $9 million, assuming the stormwater utility fee is approved and the city receives a 90% collection rate, Junger said.

The City Commission will also consider a project budget of $650,000 for invasive plant control and woodland restoration at Legacy Park. The city would collaborate Trees Atlanta to implement a five-year program to do this work. The plan includes 130 volunteer events, with most taking place in the final two years of the project, and various opportunities for environmental education for the community, Deputy City Manager Hugh Saxon wrote in a memo.

Most of the work will be done in the park’s 22-acre conservation easement and can be funded by a grant from DeKalb County. A total of $76,558 from the city’s capital improvements fund would be needed to pay for restoration activities outside of the conservation easement, Saxon said. City staff is recommending the city allocate $43,300 from the capital improvements fund for the current fiscal year.

Additionally, on the agenda for the regular meeting is consideration of recommendations from the Planning Commission, an agreement with Georgia Safe Sidewalks and a change order to the citywide fiber optic network project.

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