City Council OKs rezoning for 65-home subdivision

The construction of 65 residences off Woodlawn Drive moved a step closer to beginning after the Dublin City Council approved a rezoning Thursday.

During a meeting, council approved the rezoning of the property from a neighborhood business zone (B3) to high density residential development zone (R5) and will be directly across from Woodlawn Apartments. 

“The R5 zone will allow for more homes in a smaller acreage than what is normally allowed in a R1 zone,” said Dublin City Manager Josh Powell. 

Will Curry, president of Curry Companies, called Thursday’s vote the first big step to an even bigger process for what will be 65-single family homes on 22-acres of land. 

“Now we can get plans, pricing, costing, developers and builders,” he said. “This was a very important step.”

Currently there is no start date. Curry said there will be a lot of required infrastructure work.

“They will be a little bit tighter together, but it’s very consistent with other developments throughout the city of Dublin and other neighboring communities,” Curry said. 

Curry explained more details to the council during a public hearing. Almost a year ago, Curry said they engaged with partners from Hilton Head, South Carolina, to help them design, draft and work on the concept they have initially called the Madison Place Subdivision.

“This is not just the back of a napkin drawing,” Curry said before handing out a drawing of the subdivision. “Wood & Partners (landscape architecture land planning) was also engaged on Moore Station Village. This development is intended for attainable and affordable housing and that is what we are attempting to do.”

Curry showed where there would be “a very nice” entry feature into the subdivision.

“There will be a water feature people can see as they are driving in that will also have a walking trails around it,” Curry said. “The intent would have a nice, upscale community. It would give a sense of neighborhood to the people who are living there. There will be a lot of amenities and tie in with this development to the surrounding neighborhood and community.” 

There will be some covenants for the subdivision. 

“Those are not finalized,” Curry said. “We want to make sure this is a long-standing project that is held to a very high standard, especially with all of the funds the city has placed in the surrounding area.”

When asked about the square footage of the homes, Curry said the initial framework they are looking at is 1,300 square feet as a minimum and they did not currently have a maximum.

“That will depend on the lot configuration,” he said. “Two stories would be permitted with a minimum of around 1,100 square feet on the first floor with  two car garages required. That is the framework we are going through, but it has not been set in stone through the covenants, which will be similar to a HOA.”

After the ordinance passed, Dublin Mayor Joshua Kight told Curry that the city looks forward to continue to working with the developers.

“It is fantastic to have 65 new single-family homes in our town, especially at an affordable level and in a nice neighborhood,” Kight said. “Appreciate all of the work you have done to keep pushing this towards a reality.”

Later in the meeting, Councilwoman Sara Kolbie addressed the issue of trash seen in various parts of town.

“Everything is not greened up quite yet for spring. But instead of flowers we are seeing a lot of trash,” Kolbie said. “Please, everybody do your part to keep your area of our community cleaned. It is not welcoming to visitors and certainly degrading to our current investors within the community and homeowners for the amount of trash.” 

She thanked the city employees who were seen picking up debris Thursday morning.

“Thank you to our hardworking employees who work in our street department,” Kolbie said.

Thursday’s meeting was held early in order to allow the council to hold a strategic planning workshop that was held that day at Palmetto Farms in Montrose.

“We do this every year,” Kight said. “We get together as a team and talk about major issues facing the city, and we look back at what we’ve accomplished the prior year and our goals for this upcoming year. We’ll spend the rest of the day in meetings going over those items and will work to prepare for a great 2026 for the city of Dublin.” 

In other meeting news, the council:

– Approved the purchase of an Envirosight VC500 controller for the Rovver X system from Environmental Products Group out of Atlanta in the amount of $16,695.

“The camera is remotely controlled to access, view and inspect sewer lines and storm water lines throughout the city,” Powell said. “The controller for that device, the software is out of date and needs to be replaced.”

– Approved Warnock Brothers to repair the bathrooms at the Riverview Golf Course at hole No. 5 and hole No. 12. The cost will be $41,408.

“The bathrooms, which are both on the course, have been deteriorating over the years,” Powell said. “We have gotten approval from FEMA, because of some damage from Hurricane Helene, to make some repairs to those facilities. … We should have some pretty nice restroom facilities on the golf course.” 

  Kight added that more than 75 percent of the cost will come from the FEMA grant.

– Heard a first reading to amend an ordinance regarding fire safety for mobile food service units. When the city adopted the current food truck ordinance, there were specific provisions about fire code requirements.

“There are some conflicts between that and the general fire codes,” Powell said. “To simplify that, we wanted to make sure we are consistent between our ordinances.”

The second reading and public hearing will be held at 5:30 p.m. on March 5. 

– Tabled an agreement with Georgia Power for new street lights installation on Lawrence Street. Powell said the Downtown Dublin Authority requested these lights on behalf of Miller Soul Food.

“Currently there are no lamp posts on that road,” he said. “This will provide some additional light to this corridor.”

The council brought up looking at adding street lights on both sides of Lawrence Street, which led to them tabling the resolution until the March 5 meeting. 

“For Miller Soul Food’s sake, we need to let them know we are in agreement to do this, we just need to discuss this a little bit more,” said Councilwoman Tess Godfrey. 

– Declared two lawnmowers as declaration of surplus.