Join Medlock Park's Nextdoor community

Medlock neighbors: there's a new community-building tool available, and we hope you will check it out. Nextdoor is free, and differs from other neighborhood online groups (Yahoo group, Facebook) in that

Only people who actually live in a neighborhood are eligible to join the Nextdoor network for their area and everybody has to use their real identities on the site, which Nextdoor says is essential for keeping the quality of conversations on the site high.

A Nextdoor community called Medlock Park has been established by the MANA neighborhood watch coordinator. Since safety announcements are of interest to neighbors who live near MANA, at their request, our Nextdoor boundary has been extended to include additional streets as follows:

By request, "Medlock Park" Nextdoor boundaries extend slightly beyond MANA boundaries.
For MANA boundaries, see our About page.

To join the Medlock Park Nextdoor community, sign up via https://medlockparkga.nextdoor.com/login/. Nextdoor uses publicly available information to confirm that the person signing up resides at the stated location. If you are a resident and are not able to sign up, contact manawatch@gmail.com for assistance.

Birds-eye View of Nextdoor:

Nextdoor's default
appearance.

What's the point? Nextdoor offers an opportunity for discussions that only include residents of MANA and nearby streets. You can email neighbors who are members, invite neighbors who are not, see the neighborhood resident directory, and start discussions on topics relevant to our community.

I just want to get neighborhood watch alerts: Not interested in neighborhood discussions? No problem! Go to your Settings {under your name, via drop-down menu on the top right margin}, then click on Email, and you will be able to customize what types of alerts arrive to your email or to your text-enabled phone. For example, if you only wish to receive emergency alerts, you can set the "Urgent Alerts (SMS)" item to "immediate updates" and set all other potential notifications to "no email". Otherwise, you can follow discussions via Nextdoor on your web browser, or by enabling email alerts to new discussion items.

Who is reading this stuff? Information you add to Nextdoor is only visible to other Medlock Nextdoor members. You have the option of including additional information in your profile (e.g., pets, hobbies, etc) but this is not required.

Per Nextdoor's policy, neighbors should not share content posted on the Medlock Nextdoor site with non-members.  "Nextdoor's Privacy Policy forbids people from sharing content posted on a Nextdoor website with people who do not yet live in the neighborhood. However, an agent can describe generally how Nextdoor is used in the neighborhood and display the Nextdoor Demo site to illustrate how the website works."

 !  Please refer to Nextdoor's Guidelines and Member Agreement regarding appropriate use of the site and its content.

Organization: See screenshot above. By default, Nextdoor allows users to post comments or start discussions under the following categories: Classified, Crime and Safety, Documents, Free Items, General, Lost & Found, and Recommendations. These posts are visible to all Medlock Nextdoor members. 

Private Groups: Members also may create additional interest groups that can be public [Medlock users can join with a click] or private [must await moderator permission]. The creator of the group is the default moderator and can add additional users (but as noted, for a public group, members can add themselves). Posts to a group appear in the "news feeds" for the above categories (General, Classified, Crime, etc.). In the case of a public group, the comment is visible to everyone, but for a private group, the comment is visible to subscribers only.

Too much! If a neighbor becomes too much for you, you can find them through the neighborhood directory and mute them; their posts will disappear from all discussions you view.

Documents: We can upload documents to share with our neighbors. 

Events: Users can create events and descriptions thereof. Again, such information is only visible to Medlock Nextdoor users.

You may notice the Nearby Neighborhoods link in the above image. This feature is currently disabled as Nextdoor.com works out the details to allow communication between different Nextdoor neighborhoods.

Can I invite my neighbor to join? Yes. Just follow the instructions at https://medlockparkga.nextdoor.com/invitation_email/?is=schp

Cityhood meeting recap

Creative Loafing has a summary of the May 6 meeting on cityhood information meeting:

Close to 300 DeKalb County residents filed into the Clairmont Hills Baptist Church last night to hear lawmakers and community activists discuss the county's growing cityhood movement. 

Many citizens have remained up in arms over the past few months as community groups have introduced a flurry of new city plans. Cartographers have liberally carved out borders that, on occasion, clash with other proposals for potential cities such as Lakeside, Briarcliff, Druid Hills, and LaVista Hills, and Stonecrest.  Read the rest @ Creative Loafing

MANA board attendees report the meeting was very well run by Mary Margaret Oliver, and shared the following "take home" messages:

• "For a city to be viable, they need to get 40% of their revenue from commercial.  The City of Decatur is now at 80/20 which is why they “need” more commercial revenue.  Jason Carter bottom-lined the problem:  There just isn’t enough to go around so everyone is fighting over the same turf."

• "any new city needs to take over three services from the county at a minimum.  Everyone wants land use/zoning.  In fact the speaker form Druid Hills said that that is their only issue with De Kalb County and if that could be resolved they would be happy with the status quo."

• "The main reasons for seeking cityhood were:  Land use, permitting, zoning and parks with schools being a hope for the future."

• "The City of Decatur is moving forward with annexing the 2 commercial areas but was vague about it... The representative spoke about how low the commercial % was in COD, how their borders need to be 'straightened out'" but the comments were "vague".

Update: Another report of the meeting is available at Atlanta Progressive News.

This weather is crazy

Flood watch and weather advisory! But this squirrel knows better.

This rain's driving even the squirrels inside!

Photo and caption by Deb Elkin

Reminder: Cityhood sponsors discuss current proposals [Monday, May 6]

via Mary Margaret Oliver (District 92, GA House of Representatives):

Members of the DeKalb House and Senate delegations, including those who have introduced legislation to create new cities or annex new areas to existing cities, will hold a Town Hall meeting on May 6, from 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm at Clairmont Hills Baptist Church, 1995 Clairmont Drive, Decatur 30033, the corner of Clairmont and North Druid Hills Road.  We want all DeKalb citizens to learn about the options available to them for local governance, and how you may participate in the efforts that will be on-going this summer. PLEASE JOIN US! 

House Rules of the Georgia General Assembly require that a new city may only be created over a two year term, not in one year.  Legislation, listed below by primary sponsor, was filed in the 2013 Session that ended March 28, 2013, to give an opportunity procedurally to create possible new DeKalb cities of Druid Hills, LaVista Hills, Lakeside, Stonecrest, City of DeKalb, and Tucker.  Also, annexation bills are pending for Chamblee and being discussed for Decatur, and legislative limitations on annexations options have also been filed.  We ask neighborhood associations or groups who are reviewing current legislation, or working for or against possible new cities to describe briefly their efforts.  

WE NEED YOUR INPUT!  HOW DO YOU WISH TO BE GOVERNED? 

The meeting will provide information on the costs of planning for new cities and the resulting possible tax implications.  We will discuss procedures for legislative enactment, give a summary of ongoing cityhood activities, and learn about other governance options. 

THANK YOU!  PLEASE JOIN US MAY 6 AND LEARN HOW YOU MAY PARTICIPATE IN PLANNING FOR A NEW DEKALB!  Thank you. 

The following are bills that have been introduced and may be reviewed on the General Assembly web site by Bill number:
HB 22---Primary Sponsor Mary Margaret Oliver.  HB 22 sets out additional procedures and enhanced financial requirements for creation of new cities.
HB 619—Primary Sponsor Mary Margaret Oliver.  HB 619 passed in 2013 and allows an area in unincorporated DeKalb that adjoins Chamblee to vote to be annexed into Chamblee
HB 665—Primary Sponsor Mary Margaret Oliver.  HB 665 is a placemholder bill to create new city of Briarcliff/Druid Hills.
HB 677—Primary Sponsor Billy Mitchell.  HB 677 would create a new city of Tucker.
HB 687---Primary Sponsor Pam Stephenson.  HB 687 limits the ability to annex new areas to existing cities by geography.
SB 270—Primary Sponsor Fran Millar.  SB 270 would create city of Lakeside
SB 275—Primary Sponsor Jason Carter.  SB 275 would create new city of LaVista Hills.
SB 278---Primary Sponsor Ron Ramsey.  SB 278 would create new city of Stonecrest. 

Tri-colored female dog, purple harness, recent surgery FOUND [Apr 28]

Posted to Medlock Neighbors Facebook page:

DeKalb Superintendent releases 90-day action plan

To view the 90-day plan and other recent DeKalb County School System announcements, visit http://www.dekalb.k12.ga.us/. The plan lists five goals; for each, there is a descriptive paragraph and action items. The goals are:

• Address AdvanceED/SACS action items and work to achieve unconditional accreditation status;
• Develop and implement a balanced budget for FY 2014;
• Prioritize student academic achievement and career readiness; strengthen parent, adult
guardian and mentor involvement;
• Develop and implement a plan that will improve operational efficiency throughout the
district;
• Continue to rebuild trust with internal and external district stakeholders

This Saturday: ICS movie

ICS Movie