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At a meeting tomorrow, Sandy Springs city staff is expected to recommend replacing the existing building on Blue Stone Road with a new $6 million cultural center to house the Anne Frank in the World exhibit.
Sandy Springs City Council will hold two special meetings starting at 4 p.m. on Tuesday, Aug. 9. The first will be a millage rate public hearing, followed by a work session with the update on the Anne Frank exhibit and Georgia Holocaust Memorial.
The council voted 5-1 in November 2021 to put the exhibit and the Georgia Holocaust Memorial at its property at 6110 Blue Stone Road, the former home of Heritage Sandy Springs. A $2.5 million appropriation was made in the city’s fiscal year 2020 budget for a cultural center.
The new building would house the exhibit, memorial, other Holocaust exhibits, the Georgia Commission on the Holocaust’s offices, Visit Sandy Springs offices and a small office for the Sandy Springs Police Department. It’s projected to be 13,230 square feet.
Sandy Spring’s portion of the $6 million cost was estimated at $1 million.
According to the presentation, the commission would pay for the design and construction of the space it occupied in the building through its lease. The proposed lease would be 20 years, with two five-year extensions.
The proposal said the commission would provide a $3 million letter of credit to the city.
Sandy Springs Councilmember Jody Reichel shared in an email to her constituents that this would place a financial burden on the city. Better locations are available in the Atlanta area, she said.
“The taxpayer expense for this endeavor will be in the many millions of dollars based on construction costs and the proposed sub-market rental rates. As proposed, the lease would tie up this high-value property for decades,” she said in her email.
Reichel said more discussion about the future use of the Heritage Sandy Springs property is necessary. The property should be maintained for an opportunity to develop a thriving downtown, she said.
She asked city residents to offer comments at the meeting. The work session agenda does not list public comment. However, the millage rate public hearing does.
Requests to comment by Zoom must be registered by noon on Tuesday using the public comment request form found here.
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