The Sandy Springs Planning Commission voted 6-0 on Wednesday night to recommend that the city council deny Mount Vernon School’s request to light its athletic field.
Hundreds of residents from neighborhoods surrounding the school property at 510 Mount Vernon Highway filled the Studio Theatre. An overflow crowd watched the meeting on a screen in the theater’s lobby. The residents expressed their approval verbally after hearing the unanimous recommendation from the commissioners.
Planning staff had recommended approval, with conditions that limited times and days for the lighting, limited sound levels, used lights intended to minimize light spillage and required vegetation to screen the field from the neighboring homes.
Kristi Lindstrom, head of school for the Mount Vernon School, presented the case for lights as creating more opportunities for students to engage in healthy, team-oriented activities instead of spending time staring at screens. She said taking students off the road to travel to other schools for athletic practice would reduce congestion.
The additional time available for practice would enable the school to expand programs like girls’ lacrosse, Lindstrom said.
Kimberly Oliver, president of the Mount Vernon Woods subdivision, was the first person to speak in opposition to the request for lights. She presented a history of the agreements that started in 2003 between the neighborhoods, the school, and first Fulton County, and later Sandy Springs when it was incorporated.
Steve Leeds, president of the Aria West Homeowners Association, said the neighborhoods made extensive efforts to negotiate with Mount Vernon School.
“Nothing they proposed effectively mitigates the adverse impact the lights and evening noise will have on our communities. It is not consistent with the residential character of the community and the right of residents to have peaceful enjoyment of their properties,” Leeds said.
After the hearing, Planning Commissioner Dave Nickles made the motion to recommend the denial of the application that would amend the school’s conditional use permit and allow lighting on the school’s recreational fields.
Nickles said the school had previously accepted a condition that lights could not be installed but came with the request seven years later. Nickles said he felt the application goes back on everything the school promised and turns its back on the wishes of the surrounding neighbors.
When the city’s first mayor, Eva Galambos, appointed Nickles to the planning commission, she told him that the commission’s most important job was to protect the neighbors and neighborhoods, he recalled.
“And the best way to do that is to hold these folks to the conditions they agreed to and not allow lights,” Nickles said.
After the denial recommendation, Oliver told Rough Draft Atlanta that she was beyond grateful and thankful for the result.
“I’m so excited for our neighborhoods, not just my neighborhood, but the other neighborhoods. This is one step toward peaceful nights and being able to enjoy our backyards again,” Oliver said.
The school’s request will go before the Sandy Springs City Council on Tuesday, Jan. 21, at 6 p.m.
