Dougherty County commissioners get overview of Comprehensive Plan

ALBANY — The director of the Albany-Dougherty Planning Services department offered Dougherty County commissioners an overview of the joint city/county Comprehensive Plan during the county board’s work meeting Monday morning.

Planning Director Paul Forgey and Planning Manager Mary Teter outlined specific issues with the Comprehensive Plan, which takes into account the 20 years from 2016 to 2035. The Georgia Planning Act requires each county government to submit a plan to the Department of Community Affairs every 10 years for DCA approval.

“We’ll submit our draft proposal to the DCA for approval, then bring it back to the city and county for final approval,” Teter told the County Commission. “We anticipate final adoption by June.”

Issues discussed in Teter’s and Forgey’s presentation included ways both governments should address educational opportunities, community health, safety, economic development, infrastructure development, natural and cultural resources, service delivery, regional cooperation, housing and transportation issues in the community.

Teter said 2014 statistics show that the city of Albany’s population has declined to 76,946 from its 2010 census count of 77,217, while the county’s overall population has decreased from 94,514 in 2010 to 93,898 in 2014.

“This is a comprehensive document, more than 300 pages long,” Forgey told the board. “We have an executive summary for you to consider, but we will make a copy of the entire plan available to any commissioner that wants one.”

The Planning manager said priorities for improvement mentioned in the plan include utilization of the Flint River, downtown development, infrastructure, economic development, job and business retention, agritourism, blight eradication, transit needs and creation of a college district.

The board was also presented a proposal whereby the county can recoup money for obsolete cellphones and an intergovernmental agreement through which it will rent space in the Riverfront Resource Center on Pine Avenue to the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia for the next three years. Annual rental costs for each year would be $17,115.36 in Fiscal Year 2017, $17,971.20 in FY 2018 and $18,869.76 in FY 2019.

Following the work meeting, the board held a special called meeting during which it passed a resolution endorsing a call to action to reduce the number of individuals with mental illnesses in the county jail. Commission Chairman Chris Cohilas, an attorney who previously served as chief assistant district attorney for the county, endorsed the resolution, which was unanimously approved by the board.

“This so-called ‘Stepping Up Initiative’ will allow us to compete for additional resources that will allow us to help keep nonviolent offenders with mental illnesses out of our jail,” Cohilas said.