Johns Creek Parents Weigh In on Redistricting Proposal

Johns Creek residents in the Jones Bridge/Barnwell/Old Alabama corridor say they are "cautiously optimistic" following Tuesday's posting of Round 3's redistricting map for North Fulton schools.

Residents in the attendance zone for Barnwell Elementary, Autrey Mill Middle and Johns Creek High were concerned after some of the maps released in March during Round 2 of a community input process would have moved their children to Haynes Bridge Middle and Centennial High.

Fulton County Schools will gather public input with the last of three redistricting meetings tonight, Wednesday, at 7 at Alpharetta High School.

“We are elated,” said Gregg Blotner, president of the Breckenridge neighborhood homeowners association. However, he said representatives from Breckenridge and surrounding neighborhoods still plan to show up for tonight’s meeting, wearing orange T-shirts stating their neighborhoods and current schools in a show of solidarity. “We still plan on being heard,” said Blotner, voicing a concern that the Round 3 map is not final and could still change.

Concerns around the Round 2 maps that would have shifted children from Autrey Mill Middle and Johns Creek High to Haynes Bridge Middle and Centennial High centered around traffic, proximity and the fact that students in this area had already been rezoned four times in the past eight years.

“By the school board’s own rules we shouldn’t be rezoned more than once in three years,” Blotner said.

Traffic was also a concern as in the current zone children only have to be transported a few miles from their neighborhoods to Autrey Mill Middle in a west-east route that goes against the bulk of traffic flow. Under the proposed maps, children in these neighborhoods would have to travel down the congested Old Alabama Road going west with rush-hour traffic, passing two private schools and the future site of a medical complex.

Susanne Wilson, who lives in the Glastonberry subdivision on Barnwell Road, was concerned about the traffic backup that would result from having to turn left in a short turn lane onto Old Alabama should the proposed Round 2 maps take effect.

“It’s a super-huge safety issue,” she said, adding that from a social and academic perspective, she was also concerned how a change in schools would affect her daughter, who participates in an accelerated academic program at Autrey Mill as well as a lacrosse feeder team for Johns Creek High.

“These plans don’t factor in children on feeder teams, parent time and volunteer efforts — it’s one of the things that’s frustrating,” Wilson said.

While the new map posted on Tuesday will not move Wilson’s children, she said in an e-mail that she’s still concerned about children on Johns Creek High feeder teams who would be impacted by the new proposal, pointing to students in the St. Ives neighborhood on Medlock Bridge Road who would move from Johns Creek High to Northview. “Many parents in the community have worked to make [Johns Creek High School] an overall exceptional school,” she said, explaining that the school will lose some of those parents in a move to Northview. 

The plan to give overcrowded area high schools some relief with the addition of a new high school at Bethany Bend has been met with contention everywhere in North Fulton. Some parents and residents in Roswell, Alpharetta and Milton, as well, do not agree with the system's redistricting proposals, which were presented at the last public redistricting meeting in March. The new proposals to be reviewed at tonight's meeting are now available online.

System leaders have said the major redistricting is expected to affect all attendance zones north of the Chattahoochee River and impact roughly 3,000 students of every level including high school, middle school and elementary school.

Tonight's meeting will ask community members to review and provide the school system with input based upon the following criteria: geographic proximity, capacity, projected enrollment, traffic, previous rezoning, special programs at schools and school feeder alignment. The alternative attendance zone maps will be revised one last time following tonight's meeting before being presented to the school board for a vote in June.

Johns Creek parents still plan to show up in orange T-shirts, coordinated by parent Marcia Grimsley, who lives in Breckenridge. “I won’t believe it until it’s passed,” she said of the new maps. “We will still show up in our neon orange shirts. We will make our presence known. We care about this.”

“If we don’t speak up for ourselves and give input that is factual and professional, no one else will speak up for us,” said Keith Olander, homeowners association president for Glastonberry. Following the new map presented Tuesday, he said representatives from his neighborhood will still be at tonight’s meeting. “The map is encouraging but no map is final until approved by the school board. We are going to continue to participate.”

Blotner says he hopes the new map is a reflection of the efforts of his and neighboring subdivisions to unite and write letters to the board voicing their concerns. But, “it’s not over until the final bell rings — that’s how we are going to play it.”

Whatever changes the system approves will go into effect when the yet-to-be named new school opens on the corner of Bethany Bend and Cogburn roads in Milton during August of 2012.

The two-hour meeting, which is expected to be well-attended, begins at 7 p.m. in the Alpharetta High School gymnasium, 3595 Webb Bridge Road.