The Grovetown City Council voted to approve the city’s agreement with an engineering firm to help revise its ordinances, in its November meeting Monday evening. The meeting was the first after municipal elections saw the reseating of Mayor Gary Jones and Councilman Eric Blair, as well as the election of Richard Bowman to the council.
The city is seeking to rewrite its development ordinances, combining them into a coherent, unified document, explained Planning and Community Development director Ronnie Kurtz. The planning department chose Kimley-Horn and Associates, a consultancy based in Columbia, S.C., to execute writing the unified development ordinance (UDO).
“The Kimley-Horn proposal calls for the rewriting and configuring of the city’s zoning, subdivision, sign and stormwater codes to update standards and establish consistency throughout the process,” said Kurtz.
Kurtz went on to say that the $110,000 contract would be executed over two fiscal years, allowing time for public participation, including a visioning workshop ahead of drafting, and a public review session after a full draft is complete.
Kurtz said the first of these workshops for the public should be expected early next year, and that the project should be completed by the middle of 2025.
The city’s financial highlights looked promising for the month of October, with all of Grovetown’s funds above the ideal remaining percentage of about 67% and revenues exceeding expenditures, said financial director Bradley Smith.
The city is moving forward with some of its SPLOST projects, he noted. Though one of the SPLOST funds is no longer receiving revenue, the 2023-2028 funds are still collecting money, and the city expects a large transaction from T-SPLOST.
“We hope to see the parking lot project in the next 25 to 30 days,” Smith said to the council. “We have had some delays… primarily we’ve had some design concerns that we’ve had to go back and forth with the contractor on, so we are hoping to finish that one soon.”
Skyler Q. Andrews is a staff reporter for The Augusta Press. Reach him at skyler@theaugustapress.com.
