WWW.CHAMPIONNEWSPAPER.COM • FRIDAY, DECEMbER 2, 2011 • VOL. 14, NO. 36 •FREE
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• A PUBLICATION OF ACE III COMMUNICATIONS •
Charities offer thanks for sponsorsand volunteers
Metro Atlanta residents welcomed Sunday alcohol sales at local retailer The beer Growler inAvondale Estates on Nov. 20. Photo y Daniel beauregard
Serving East Atlanta, Avondale Estates, Chamblee, Clarkston, Decatur, Doraville, Dunwoody, Lithonia, Pine Lake,
Several cities welcome Sunday sales, others get ready
by Daniel Beauregarddaniel@dekalbchamp.com
T
hirsty metro Atlantaresidents stood in aline stretching out thedoor of the Beer Growler inAvondale Estates on Sun-day, Nov. 20, waiting for thechance to buy beer.Avondale was one of therst cities in the metro area toenact Sunday retail sales of alcohol after residents passeda referendum on Nov. 8 allow-ing it.
Paul Thompson
, a history professor at North GreenvilleUniversity in South Carolina,said in a recent report onlinethat he thought Georgia’s banon Sunday sales could go back as far as colonial times.“My guess is this is therst time in Georgia’s historythat this has ever been al-lowed,” said Thompson, whois working on a book on thetemperance movement.Co-owner of the Beer Growler
Paul Saunders
saidit was busier than they couldhave ever expected on Sunday.Saunders said from the timethe store opened at 12:30 p.m.,there was a steady stream of around 50 people in line untilthey closed that evening.“We actually ran out of beer,” Saunders said. “Origi-nally we had scheduled two people to work and by the endof the day we had our entirestaff there.”The Beer Growler sells“growlers” or quarts of draft beer that are sealed in a jugand sold for retail—customersare able to take a distinct draft beer home with them rather than spending time at a bar.“We sold 1,200 growlersyesterday,” Saunders said. “Ithink some people wanted to be part of history. We had acountdown and Mayor [
EdReiker
] was here and he wasthe rst person to buy one.”As Decatur resident
Kris-tin Frazier
stood in line hold-ing two empty growlers, shesaid being able to purchasealcohol on Sundays wouldhelp cities nancially and becheaper for residents.“It was a really silly law;you can go to a restaurant and buy alcohol there on Sunday,”Frazier said. She also pointedout that it might be safer too because now, residentswouldn’t have to go to a bar if they wanted a drink on Sun-day.Avondale City Manager
Clai Brown
said the city wasquick to go through the stepsallowing Sunday sales becauseit wanted to be progressiveand friendly to business own-ers in the area.Most cities had to makeslight changes to their ordi-nances for sales to take effectand most in DeKalb are pro- jecting to begin Sunday salesover the next few weeks.“I’m happy for the busi-ness owners because youknow how the economy is to-day and anything that can helpthem put additional revenue intheir pocket [helps],” Brownsaid.Sales went into effect inthe city of Decatur on Nov.27, Doraville and Dunwoodyon Dec. 1, and will becomeeffective in Clarkston andStone Mountain on Dec. 6 andChamblee Dec. 25.
See Story on Page 15AMore than 1,500 people from across metro Atlanta took part inthe Center for Pan Asian Services, Inc. 7th annual TEA (Together Empowering Asian Americans) Walk in Octoer. Organizers said it isthe largest walk of its kind in the South.Children work on an outdoor mural while visiting the DunwoodyNature Center for a class eld trip.
Page 2A Te Campon Fee Pess, Fday, Decembe 2, 2011
Ponce de Leon Court on historic list
OFFICIALENERGYPARTNER OFMAKING A DOLLAROUT OF 15 CENTS.
With our EarthCents Home Energy Improvement Program, learn how a fewsmall changes can make a big difference on your electricity bill. Plus, youcould earn individual rebates from $50 to $400, with total incentives of up to $700. A few small changes to your home and habits can leave you someextra spare change in your pockets. To find out about available rebatesplus more ways to save money and energy, visit
georgiapower.com.
We recognize that there have been timeswhen we’ve all had to pinch pennies.
A tract of 26 homes near theDecatur Square developed nearly90 years ago was listed earlier thismonth in the National Register of Historic Places.The Ponce de Leon Court Histor-ic District is a single street that wasdeveloped in the 1920s by
John L.Womack
. He and his wife
Marga-ret
purchased the rst tract in 1921,where they built their house at theend of the street. This house wasconverted into apartments in 1958.More tracts were purchased in1922 and 1924, and subdivision plats for the street date from 1924-26. John Womack was a small- business owner, builder, developer,salesman and amateur horticultural-ist.Most lots have single-family,one-story homes dating from the1920s, but there are also a fewduplexes and three small apart-ment buildings in the district. Thestreet maintains a unied character through similar setbacks, sub-tropical vegetation, sidewalks with planter strips on both sides andhouses that are generally the samescale. A few surviving palm treesand bamboo also distinguish thisstreet from others in the area.House types include bungalowsand side-gabled cottages. Stylisticinuences are primarily Craftsmanand Colonial Revival. The districtalso includes three buildings at the beginning of the street facing EastPonce de Leon Avenue, including a1922 two-story brick apartment building with classical features typi-cal of many built in the Atlanta areaat that time.The National Register of HistoricPlaces is the ofcial list of historic buildings, structures, sites, objectsand districts worthy of preservation.The National Register providesformal recognition of a property’sarchitectural, historical or archaeo-logical signicance. It also identi-es historic properties for planning purposes and ensures that these properties will be considered in the planning of state or federally as-sisted projects.
Photo by John Hewitt
Page 3A Te Campon Fee Pess, Fday, Decembe 2, 2011
Local News
Planners: Quarry, plaza key to Lithonia rebirth
by Andrew Cauthenandrew@dekalbchamp.comFor decades, it was Litho-nia’s raison d’etre and the 83-acre quarry area could onceagain be an economic enginefor the south DeKalb city.“Since the quarry was theeconomic heart of Lithoniaand the reason why the citywas here, we propose bring-ing it back to be the driver of economic growth again,” said
Allison Bane
, one of a groupof Georgia Tech studentsworking with Blueprints for Successful Communities, a program of the Georgia Con-servancy that helps communi-ties promote growth.The concept for the revi-talized quarry is a mixed-usedevelopment with guidedtours showcasing the historyand nature of the site, and anetwork of walking and bicy-cling paths connecting pro- posed parks. The ideas includeresidential developmentsoverlooking the quarry, com-munity gardens, dog parks andan inn.“I think everybody isstunned,” said
Mary AnnCowan
, a fth generation Li-thonian, who has lived therefor 74 years. “To us Litho-nians, it’s just a big rock.”Most of the residents at themeeting said they had never been to the now-closed quarry,which is just a short walk from the city’s downtownarea.The re-purposed quarrywas one the ideas put forth bythe Blueprints group during acommunity meeting on Nov.21.One of the goals of thestudents was to “nd somethings that are already here,especially those things that areunique to Lithonia that wouldturn it into a destination,” said
Katherine Moore,
programmanager of the Blueprints for Successful Communities pro-gram.And the quarry ts that bill, she said.“It’s a really signicantasset…as a redevelopmenttool,” Moore said.Since July, the GeorgiaTech team, under the directionof Georgia Tech professor of architecture and urban design
Ellen Dunham-Jones
, has been walking around townwith notepads and cameras,studying the town. Their work is a part of Blueprints,which has a $50,000 price tagthat was paid by funds froma community development block grant, the Arabia Moun-tain Heritage Alliance and thecity of Lithonia.“We can now see the fruitsof the efforts of the students,”said
Deborah Jackson
, Litho-nia’s mayor-elect.In addition to the quarryredevelopment, the Blueprintsgroup presented a concept for an improved downtown Litho-nia area.“It has a lot of really good bones to it,” said GeorgiaTech student
Phil Schaefng
.“There are some great old buildings there.”But the area also has some problems, most notably theLithonia Plaza in the center of the city. Once it was a pedestrian-friendly street gridwith several buildings, includ-ing a re station, churchesand the train depot. Now the plaza, considered an eyesoreto many residents, is hometo a Wayeld Foods grocerystore and several retail stores.A large part of the plaza isowned by the city of Lithoniaand contains vacant, rundown buildings.To reinvigorate downtownLithonia, the Blueprints groupsuggested tearing down partof the plaza, establishing afarmers market fed by a com-munity farm in the plaza, andmoving the Lithonia CityHall to the center. The groupsuggested extending StoneMountain Street to MainStreet to make the area more pedestrian-friendly.“Lithonia has the potentialto be a very vibrant, very ac-tive downtown,” Schaefngsaid.While all these conceptshave no associated develop-ment funds now, Lithoniaresidents will soon get sometangible examples of whatsome of the improvementswould be like. The GeorgiaTech students will make MainStreet more bicycle-friendly by painting temporary bikesigns on the road to directcyclists and remind drivers toshare the road.Temporary historical mark-ers, story-telling benches andoutdoor cafes will also be setup by the students in the nextcouple of weeks, said GeorgiaTech student
Jacob Davis
.“We’ve been looking atwhat we can do right now,”Davis said.Moore said that when thenal community master planis developed and released toLithonia residents by Febru-ary, the process will not beover.“The real hard work beginsthen,” Moore said. “Then it’stime for them to become realand for the community to putits sweat and time and energyand effort into [implanting the plans].”
The Georgia Conservancy, a group studying revitalization in Lithonia, says developing the land around the city’s rock quarry could spur economic growth in the area. Morethan a century ago, Lithonia was founded as workers moved into the area to work in the quarry. Photos by Andrew Cauthen
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