The Atlanta City Council Finance and Executive Committee voted today, April 27, to convey its two-thirds ownership of Turner Field to the Atlanta Fulton Recreation Authority (AFRA) for final sale to Georgia State University (GSU) for the creation of a mixed-use development.
Atlanta City Councilmember Carla Smith explained that the conveyance paper gives AFRA permission to sell the city’s two-thirds and Fulton County’s one-third of the Turner Field property.
Mayor Kasim Reed addressed the committee, urging them to give an up or down vote on the conveyance. Reed said the Georgia Board of Regents has approved the partnership with GSU and Carter development to create the potential $400 million mixed-use development.
“There will be residential, commercial and athletic fields, including a football and baseball stadium,” Reed said. “Seventy percent of that property will go on the city tax rolls.
Reed said he was positive that community needs and desires for the property would be met and would bring prosperity back to the Turner Field neighborhoods that had been promised – but never materialized – after the 1996 Summer Olympics.