Snellville to get stimulus funds

On Tuesday, Gwinnett County Commissioners decided not to put all of the remaining stimulus funds into a Lilburn sports park, instead deciding to divide the allocation among 3 cities: Berkeley Lake, Lilburn, and...SNELLVILLE!

Snellville officials had requested $6.6 million of the recovery zone economic development bonds to use to create “downtown experience.” According to a letter, the city hopes to buy 10.6 acres of recently foreclosed on by the Bank of North Georgia for a future public-private partnership.

[Officials Split Money Between Three Cities - Gwinnett Daily Post, September 21, 2010]

 Wisteria Square/Photo by Darla Dixon

The foreclosed property the article refers to is most likely the property on Wisteria I think of as the "bridge to nowhere" that I blogged about recently.

Here's what Mayor Jerry Oberholtzer had to say about this:  "After only a few days on the job, Snellville's new Economic Development Manager, Eric Van Otteren, has already helped secure possible funding for future initiatives in our downtown. This bonding capacity allows the city to purchase land for parks or other uses in our city center. No decision has been made on IF we'll take advantage of this opportunity or what projects we might use it on."