It’s official: Columbus is getting bigger.
A judge on Friday approved the city’s annexation plan, which will bring 1,462 more residents, three square miles and five more miles of road into Columbus, according to Tim Youngblood of Bridge and Watson, the firm that assisted the city with the annexation.
Chancery Court Judge Kenneth Burns OK’d the proposed growth after attorneys presented the case for annexation early last week. Based on 2010 U.S. Census data, the city’s population is going to swell from 23,640 to 25,102.
Some ward boundaries within Columbus are going to be re-drawn. David Armstrong, chief operations officer with the city, said the process of doing so would begin after the lapse of a 10-day appeal period in the event that no one objects.
Municipal services to the new city areas will begin immediately, Armstrong said. The city will have to complete its redistricting process within a year of the ruling and extend water and sewer infrastructure into the areas in five years.
“We’ll go ahead and get redistricting done,” Armstrong said. “It’s not going to be very long and drawn out. It’s something they’ll have to present the council and the council will have to vote on it.”
The annexation brings four areas of the county into the city. The four areas include most of the east side of Lehmberg Road and a short distance north on Highway 12, the Riverwalk to the west of downtown, a piece of Woodland Heights Drive to the north and the area around Columbus Middle School.
The city will have to spend roughly $187,742 to provide municipal services to the new areas. The city’s overall annual net revenue will increase by $277,859, however, according to estimates from 2010, when city councilmen initially approved annexation.
Youngblood said those estimates have not been revisited since 2010 but those figures will not be significantly different now from four years ago.
“The city should be able to serve the areas annexed without it putting any kind of financial burden,” Youngblood said. “Sometimes areas necessitate municipal level services, and if the city can absorb it, the city absorbs it, even if it does cost money. That’s not the case with this.”
Ward shifts
The majority of the added population will come from the eastern side of Lehmberg Road, which primarily abuts Ward 3 and some of Ward 2. Ward populations must be equally proportioned within 10 percent of the ideal number for each ward. That is calculated by dividing the total population by six.
With the new population, the ideal population for each ward would be 4,184 compared to 3,940 right now, Youngblood said. Because the population that would be added is densely in one area, Wards 2 and 3 would have to shift east to pick up residents there and drop some in the western portions of their current boundaries to maintain population equality. As a result, neighboring wards would pick up residents forfeited by the easternmost wards. This could mean that each ward sees a population change, Youngblood said.
“In this case, I think you would have to alter every ward to some extent, because most of the population to be annexed is in one location,” Youngblood said.
Ward 3 Councilman Charlie Box said he didn’t see a scenario where his ward would change drastically in demographic and bringing in the areas would provide development opportunities for the city.
“One of the reasons I wanted to do it is because a lot of those areas over there, we’re already providing some fire protection and police,” Box said. “I don’t think it’s going to make that big of a difference. It’s a positive for the city and give us some developable land that we could do some stuff with.”
Redistricting, which no longer requires preclearance from the U.S. Department of Justice as of 2013, is done by total population and not voting age population.
However, 949 of the 1,462 residents added would be 18 years or older, which would increase the total voting age population in Columbus from 18,319 to 19,268, based on Census data.
Extension of services
As for extending water and sewer services to the areas — which could carry a $6.6 million price tag — Columbus Light and Water General Manager Todd Gale said financing would have to be implemented in its five-year capital improvements plan, the first of which begins with the upcoming fiscal year that begins next month.
“We’ll go back to that five-year plan the board approved and work that in,” Gale said. “We need to do a little bit more due diligence on our side as far as what fire protection is in those areas and if it’s required to beef it up.”
The $6.6 million estimate, however, is a worst case scenario, Gale added. The extension could cost significantly less.
“The engineer looked at it like nothing was there,” Gale said. “East Lowndes is serving some of that area, so some of it I would have to think already has fire protection, and we wouldn’t have to pay for that.”
Nathan Gregory covers city and county government for The Dispatch.
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 46 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 46 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
