The five-year-old Spruill Greenmarket needs to be relocated due to construction at its previous location. The City was asked to help identify a location for the market one morning a week, May through November. People suggested possible locations, but many were parking lots that could not be closed off to traffic easily or had other hazards. Also, the parking lots don't have access to bathrooms, shade, water, electricity, etc.
St. Patrick's Episcopal Church, 4755 North Peachtree Road, Dunwoody, GA 30338 stepped forward and offered Greenmarket its location on N. Peachtree Road across the street from Brook Run to use its property. On the proposed day of the market (Wednesday), St. Patrick's hosts a food bank in the afternoon, to which farmers and customers could conveniently donate food; therefore the market would be beneficial to both facilities.
Everything sounds good for the location though this matter raises a number of technical zoning details that the Council will have to weigh when deciding the matter. This initial zoning vote will also be the first time the residents have a chance to catch a glimpse into each Council members long term zoning philosophy.
The matter being placed in front of the Council affects all places of worship and may have unintended consequences throughout the city, because of this there is a Public Hearing scheduled for Monday nights City Council meeting at Dunwoody United Methodist Church at 7 pm.
Since the matter does not advertise the fact that all places of worship are eligible for the Farmers Market, but only St. Patrick's Church is immediately slated for the facility, I want to make sure the immediate neighbors are aware of the situation and would like to hear specifically from those residents living close to St. Patrick's.
I have already received quite a bit of feedback from the community on this matter but if you feel strongly one way or the other, I encourage you to either contact me directly, comment to this blog or attend Monday night's council meeting. Thanks.
John Heneghan
Dunwoody City Council
Member at Large
John.Heneghan@Dunwoodyga.gov
John, the more things we prohibit and the more laws we pass, the closer Dunwoody comes to being just one more homogenized, pasteurized, character-less, over-regulated governmental entity.
ReplyDeleteFarmers' markets are great things. We should welcome them – as the area did BEFORE Dunwoody became incorporated as a tax-generation source. We should also let artists and musicians and ice-creams carts join them on every street corner during the summer. Let's breathe some life into this city!
jogger,
ReplyDeleteHow about you drive over to Buford Hwy tomorrow morning and bring back a portable pushcart and sell some tamales and frozen ice treats in front of the Farm House.
Yum! Great idea, DunwoodyParent. (If it wasn't such thinly-veiled hate-speech.)
ReplyDeleteActually, DunwoodyParent, one of my favorite summer childhood memories is waiting, quarters in hand, waiting for the ice cream cart to come through the neighborhood each day. It certainly was a great treat for us all on a hot summer day.
ReplyDeletejogger,
ReplyDeletewhy do you hate tamales and frozen ice? worried about getting the Mexican swine flu?
Also, can Dunwoody stop these unlicensed ice-cream peddlers (who all seem to own a beat-up 1985 Chevy cargo van with no exhaust pipe, old tattered graphics, Bondo, and a small child riding in the back with the unsecured freezer) from disturbing my peaceful time at the pool this summer? I'd be more worried about the food in one of these vans than the food from the back of a pick-up truck from a farm in Carroll County.
Mom, You'll need an entire roll of quarters to feed tow kids from one of these rogue peddlers of ice-cream treats.