Atlanta businesspeople who’ve worked to improve downtown are formally pushing back against a $4 million proposal to erect temporary housing for homeless relief.
Led by Susana Chavez, Park Place Operations executive vice president and a member of the Central Atlanta Progress board, the opponents say they’ll attend today’s Atlanta City Council meeting to air concerns about Mayor Andre Dickens’ proposed “Rapid Housing” initiative in downtown’s southernmost blocks.
Earlier this month, Dickens’ office issued an executive order to begin development of a new program that aims to help Atlanta’s homeless at 184 Forsyth Street. Plans call for using shipping containers—many of them donated by the Georgia Emergency Management Agency, or GEMA—as a relatively cheap and quick means of delivering housing as part of the city’s first phase of Rapid Housing efforts.
Chavez submitted a letter to Dickens on Friday that said, in part, the proposed village of shipping-container housing “will be detrimental to the individuals and the area which we have worked so hard to improve,” according to the group’s PR representatives.
The Forsyth Street property in question, at right, with downtown’s main business district ahead. Google Maps
Chavez noted she’s a “strong supporter” of the mayor, but she and other detractors feel the Forsyth Street location is unsuitable for temporary housing, with seven nightclubs and no food stores within a four-block radius,
“We believe that creating temporary housing [at 184 Forsyth Street] will negatively impact what has been accomplished, including new investment in this area,” Chavez continued.
According to an agenda, the city council is expected to consider ratifying Dickens’ executive order for the homeless housing initiative at today’s 1 p.m. meeting. That order directed the city’s chief financial officer to allocate up to $4 million to obtain GEMA shipping containers…
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