Reject the Ansley Park Rezoning. Don't Bulldoze Our Neighbors' Homes.

Mayor Michael Caldwell and the Woodstock City Council, the Woodstock Planning Commission, and the Cherokee County Board of Commissioners

A bold, minimalist banner in a 1960s civil rights poster style. In the foreground, the silhouettes of a family stand in front of a manufactured home community while a large raised hand on the left reads, "Hands Off Our Homes. Our Community. Our Future." On the right, a bulldozer pushes toward the neighborhood with rows of new houses behind it, alongside a sign reading, "Communities Before Developers." Bright red, blue, yellow, green, and black geometric shapes and sunburst rays create a striking pop art design symbolizing resistance to the displacement of residents by redevelopment.

They built our houses. Now a developer wants to bulldoze theirs.

The families of Ansley Park on Dupree Road are our neighbors. They work in our restaurants, on our construction crews, in the businesses we use every day, and their kids go to school with ours. Some of these households have already lost a breadwinner this year and are holding on by a thread.

Now a developer, Weekley Homes, wants to level the entire neighborhood and put 220 houses on top of it. The families have already been told to vacate, and they are scrambling to find housing in a market with almost nothing they can afford. Some of them own their homes but not the land beneath them, and a manufactured home is rarely movable in any affordable way. When the land goes, everything they put into that home goes with it.

Here is what most people don't know: the project on the table cannot happen without the Woodstock City Council saying yes. Weekley needs the city to annex the land and rezone it, and the council has every right to refuse. A no vote stops this plan. And if the council considers a yes anyway, public pressure is how we make protections for these families the price of approval: relocation money from the developer, real time to move, no demolition until families are housed.

None of that happens in an empty room. Councils approve rezonings quietly when nobody is watching. Our job is to make sure they can't.

Sign this petition and your name goes on the official record. Then, if you can, show up on August 6 and August 24 when the decision gets made. We will hand you a two minute script if you want to speak, or you can simply fill a seat. Both count.

Sign now. Then send this to five neighbors.

Woodstock gets to decide what kind of town it is. That decision gets made in the next seven weeks, and it starts with your name below.

To: Mayor Michael Caldwell and the Woodstock City Council, the Woodstock Planning Commission, and the Cherokee County Board of Commissioners
From: [Your Name]

We, the undersigned residents of Woodstock, Cherokee County, and the surrounding communities, urge you to DENY the proposed annexation and rezoning of approximately 31 acres at 200 Dupree Road and 681 Stone Bridge Parkway, the site of the Ansley Park mobile home community.

Nobody disputes that a landowner can sell or that a developer can buy. But Weekley Homes is not asking to use this land as it is zoned today. They are asking the City of Woodstock for two government favors: annex the land into the city, then rezone it from R-40 to R-4 to build 220 houses at 7 units per acre. A rezoning is not a property right. It is a public decision, made by our elected officials, and the public is entitled to ask what Woodstock gets and who gets hurt.

The families of Ansley Park get hurt. Some own their homes while renting the land beneath them, and despite the name, a manufactured home is rarely movable in any affordable way. Relocating one costs thousands of dollars, and many older homes cannot survive the move or will not be accepted elsewhere, so losing the land means losing everything they put into the home. Others rent, and are losing some of the last housing in this area at a price working families can pay. All of them have been told to vacate, and they are scrambling in a market with almost nothing left at their price. These are our neighbors, our coworkers, and our kids' classmates, and some of these households have already lost a breadwinner this year. A council that respects property rights should weigh what these families stand to lose, not just the plans of one developer.

This rezoning is also wrong for Woodstock as a whole:

1. It destroys housing that can never be replaced. Ansley Park is naturally occurring affordable housing. The 220 new houses will be priced far beyond the reach of the families being displaced.

2. It is a massive density increase in the wrong place. Jumping from R-40 to R-4 means 220 new homes worth of traffic funneling onto Dupree Road and Stone Bridge Parkway at the 575 interchange, plus added strain on schools, water, and stormwater infrastructure.

3. It asks the city to bless a deal where one side takes all the losses. Even Cherokee County commissioners, reviewing this same site, said the developer should help these residents relocate. The city should not hand out an annexation and rezoning while the families who pay the price for it get nothing.

The City Council has full discretion here. This project cannot happen without your yes vote, and you are free to say no.

We call on you to:

- DENY the annexation and rezoning application, or
- At absolute minimum, refuse any approval that does not include binding, enforceable conditions: relocation assistance funded by the developer who profits from the rezoning, a minimum 12 month timeline before any resident must vacate, and no demolition permits issued until every household has secured housing.

If a developer wants a favor from the City of Woodstock, the price of that favor cannot be these families holding the bill. Woodstock should not build its future by bulldozing the people who already live here.