Neighbors Who Have A Cause

A small strip of state-owned land may be the key issue as to which way ' Ponce-Highlands neighborhood will go.

By CAROLE ASHKfN*»... Richard Arlington, a retired p^— PONCEY HIGHLANDS Ruth Ann Foote walks with Poncey Highlands was a "nice, quiet, who lives on North Avenue, "we didn t even son Louis down Linwood very desirable neighborhood ui 1914 when bother locking our houses when we went E LEON AVE A venue in Ponce- Kaue Head s husband, who had paid $5,000 downtown, and you can still walk the streets Highlands. At left is a map ' for their home on North Avenue, carried any hour, night or day " of the neighborhood Below over her over the threshold, she says Don Bassett, a 38-year-oid Munford Inc. BLUE RIDGE left is the park whith is "We had paved sidewalks when I executive and his wife Dolly director of 0 state-owned land and may '4 moved in as a bride." the white-haired ma- Georgia Lawyer Referrals, who are both ac- be cleared for a highway. «tron recalls, with pride "But the street was- tive in a newly formed Poncey-Highlands ORT^ (Staff Photos - Jerome n't paved, and across the street was nothing Neighborhood Association, moved in from a SPRING McClendon. Map—Jere but woods, so it felt like we were almost out East Cobb County where they tired of hav- Warren) ^ in the country And it was such a convenient ing to chauffeur their children who are ac- . place to live Close to town, and within tive in sports, from one far-flung location to ^ walking distance of at least four another * churches "Here. I give them 15 cents for the bus The area, which did not even come to and they, go to soccer practice football . be known as Poncey-Highlands" until a practice or to ice skate at the Omni, and it's I half-century later, has undergone many no big deal," Mrs Bassett says, with a grin. j changes since then it's seen the arrival and "Of course. I have to check on them, but I £ departure of a Ford Motor Co assembly don t feel Uke I'm a taxi service any more!" w plant, and hundreds of houses which were ^ torn down to make way for a state tollway Poncey-Highlands < spelled to conform ~ (to which the residents, who have so far with the vernacular pronunciation of « blocked construction, are unalterably op- "Ponce"i consists of a roughly iriangular ~ posed I It s been a young neighborhood, an area just south of , "old people s neighborhood, a deteriorating bordered on the west by the Southern Rail- '» neighborhood and is now undergoing the way tracks, and on the east and south by £ first tentative thrusts of rejuvenation, al- Moreland and Highland Avenues Made up though it has never achieved the chic of of three older neighborhoods < Linwood nearby Inman Park, Druid Hills or Virginia Park. Ponce de Leon Heights and Copen,- ;; Highlands hillL it has until recently lacked an identity But in all those years the Heads, who offered some incredible bargains, for the Commission and Mayor Jackson have con* of its own - partly because there were few out "on our side," he points out " raised three children in the house on North issues or objectives to unite the residents, first time- Avenue, never thought of leaving And the Bud Foote. a professor at Georgia Tech, State transportation officials "continue and partly because its homes have been for example, paid $16,500 seven years ago to advocate a road through there,", but can't very things that endeared it to them 63 occupied mostly by older people who kept years ago are once again drawing young for a 13-room house on Linwood Avenue in begin construction without the approval of to themselves as Dolly Bassett put it excellent structural condition. "We consid- the A R C., he sayi. families like Lisa and Jim van den Heuvel But with the announcement of the State and their two children, who came here three ered other neighborhoods," says his wife, In any event, the controversy has given Department of Transportation s plans to ex- Ruth Ann. "but a house like this on the Poncey-Highlands both the issue and the years ago from Decatur tend a Stone Mountain Tollway through the "The streets are so pretty, tree-lined north side would have put as in debt for the objective it has needed to form a lunged center of the area in the late 1960s and the rest of our lives, and one in front Grinnell, Dolly Bassett. Ellle Vfilz and and quiet, but we're only a couple of condemnation of nearly 500 homes in this minutes from downtown. And I think the would have taken the next 10 years of our Richard Arlington were among the residents and surrounding communities for the right- lives to refinisb. This seemed like a nice who banded together Sept 14 to fprm a older people are marvelous They give the of-way. some of those who had occupied area a sense of stability," enthuses Mrs Van compromise neighborhood association, and to found a their houses since the early 1900's, when Ellie Volz. a 34-year-old Fairburn community newsletter, to be called "The Hi- den Heuvel. who is 30 "And by the way. most were built, moved out And younger we ve got the second lowest crime rate in schoolteacher, paid $29,500 for her six-room Lander." families, m search of well-tended, close-in house 14 months ago, but considered it "a The area has "some historic signifi- the whole city " housing, discovered" the community, which Twenty years ago, echoes 76-year-old deal and a half, because it was already cance according to Tom Kelly, who says renovated The seller even threw in a new that bullets and other Civil War relics have kitchen, with cabinets custom built to her been found in the vicinity of Cleburne and specifications. Copenhill Avenues, where Gen. Sherman And with the Influx of younger resi- camped on the eve of the Battle of . dents, who wanted to raise their children But as Lisa van den Heuvel points out, here, came a movement to stop the threat- "It's unknown. People confuse it with Vir- ened highway expansion, an issue which has ginia Highlands or Candler Park. It'* just also galvanized the residents of adjacent this little strip of land in the middle 6f no- communities Uke Virginia Highland, where that' been butchered up by the 1-485 NO Morningside-Lenox Park, Candler Park and land takeover What we're trying to do is let the people know we exist " TRESPASSING "That state-owned land." says architect Like most of those who live here, Mrs. David Gnnnell, a Poncey-Highlands home- van den Heuvel believes that Poneey-High- owner who also has an office in the com- lands is a neighborhood that's "already on OR munity. "is probably the key issue as to its way up," and Richard Jagers and Tom which way the neighborhood will go in the Pippin, who are renovating several old future A lot of young people are not wait- houses in the area for lease and re-sale, DUMPING ing for the question of the highway to be de- agree cided. and are boymg homes here m spite of "My wife thinks I'm crazy, refinishing that But we're determined to stop it. And I doorknobs and everything," says Jagers, think we can." climbing down from a ladder in front of a Quinn Hudson thinks so. too Hudson is house at 1046 North Ave., which they have the president of Atlanta Great Park Plan- turned into a four-unit rental property. "She ning, Inc. an association of homeowners says people won't take care, of it But I'm from 10 close-in communities including very particular about the people I rent and Poncey-Highland who have been pressuring sell to. I won't let them put holes in 'he the authorities to turn the state-owned land walls, or hang plants from 'he beams, after ' -X*. -r into a public park. The Atlanta Regional all the trouble I've gone t Mortgage Rates

Fowler Backing Average rate by quarter Changes To Save Mortgage Bonds 1974 Staff Gfa«*wc—Jara Warr»n

By Jo* Brown The problem is mainly the tremendous reve- City of Atlanta this year has been authorized to Con*HtvlK*> $t«M nue loss to the Treasury," says Fowler, "This, is a raise another $30 million With home financing already being squeezed by very, very costly program" • ' v Ways and Means Committee Chairman A1 Ull- soaring interest rates, a federally-authorized pro- man. D-Ore„ and the committee's ranking Republi- gram under which communities have been raising The Internal Revenue Service loses an esti- mated 122.5 million in tax revenues for each $1 can. Barber B Conable Jr of New York, have spon- money for cut-rate mortgages is in danger of being sored a bill to curb the practice As introduced, the scuttled by a cost-conscious Congress billion of bonds issued And the tax-collecting agency warns that if the practice is allowed to con- proposed legislation would prohibit state and local Since 1968 wtien federal legislators passed the governments from issuing the bonds except to fi- Revenue and Expenditure Control Act. states and tinue unchecked it could cost the Treasury as much as 122 1 billion by 1984 nance homes for veterans. cities have been able to float tax-exempt municipal Fowler, while recognizing the costliness of the bonds to raise mortgage funds for housing, in part The key to the program is the tax exemption program, is one of its staunchest friends in Congress to rescue blighted inner city neighborhoods. granted for the bonds- Because interest earned on and has been credited with helping to bring about However, growing opposition from the nation's municipal bonds is eiempt from federal income many of the committee changes which may make it savings and loan associations and concern about the taxes, bond buyers are willing to accept lower inter- financially acceptable to the bulk of the nation's deepening federal budget deficit has prompted Con- est rates on tax-exempt than on taxable bonds This lawmakers gress to take a second look at the financing prac- means localities can issue tax-exempt revenue Fowler says that if the legislation could be per- tice bonds at relatively low interest rates that cover fected it would be an ideal vehicle for financing The program is threatened because both its administrative and legal costs but are still lower small mortgages for low income families. opponents and supporters fear that it will drain the than conventional mortgage rates U.S. Treasury of millions of dollars, according to But some congressmen have charged the tax- 5th District U-S. Rep. Wyche Fowler of Atlanta, a Already about 12 states and 50 cities have is- exempt bonds are being abused, with mortages member of the House Ways and Means Committee, sued such bonds for bousing Georgia, through the going to upper-income families rather then the less which is wrestling with proposals to change the pro- Georgia Residential Finance Authority, has floated affluent. gram. two issues of $50 million each since 1976 and the See BONDS, Page tCt-C Bonds Continued From Page i-C "I have opposed these loans being applied willy-nilly and across the board," said Fowler. "And I have tried through the amending process to limit them to inner city neighborhoods and to rehabilitating neighborhoods where we are encouraging home ownership While Fowler feels that the UUman-Conable proposal is too severe, he is not optimistic that the amendments he sup- ports which would continue to. allow the bonds to be sold to raise mortgage moiiiyHi modest housing for low-income fami- lies will ultimately prevail Part of the problem, says Fowler, is that practically all of the states and cities with ongoing programs have different criteria for judging what price property and what^income level are acceptable from applicants In Georgia for instance, the GRFA doesn't handle mort- gages larger than $39,000 But a bond issue in Redondo Beach, Calif. will enable buyers to purchase $100,000 to $175,000 con- dominiums The legislation, frankly, is m a legislative mess nght now." said Fowler in an interview this week ' And because so many states and authorities across the country have these pro- grams at various stages of development, it's very difficult to draft a transitional mle which will draw the line as to who is covered by the legislation and who is not. And also what amounts to allow them to issue." "Atlanta's authority - given by the state this year — is for a $30 million issue - which is very, very modest by na- tional standards And I'm hoping that we can include the » Atlanta program m the legislation if it's ultimately passed," he i said