Permit Denied for Jehovah’s Witnesses

Plans to build a Dacula Kingdom Hall have been halted after the Gwinnett County Board of Commissioners voted 3-1 to deny a special use permit request from the Dacula Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

District 3 commissioner Mike Beaudreau motioned to deny the request after expressing concern the church's four days of services each week would negatively impact traffic.

“This community, as depicted in the planning department report, is very rural in nature,” Beaudreau said. “You’re talking about a fairly sizeable congregation with multiple services that will change a rural area forever.”

Beaudreau described the area as “horse country” and said he did not feel he could vote in favor of the special use permit.

“It’s just an incongruent land use,” he said.

Several area residents spoke in opposition to the permit. Linda Stringer, a nearby homeowner, said the church is not appropriate in a residential and farming community.

“We do not want the noise, the lights, the garbage, the rodents that kitchen garbage will bring, litter, automobile exhaust, increased pedestrian traffic in our yards and increased car and bus traffic that a building such as this will bring,” Stringer said. “Please protect our homes and our lifestyle and our future.”

On Feb. 15, the Gwinnett County Planning Commission recommended approval of the request to construct. The planning department had recommended denial due to the fact that a nearly identical 2007 special use permit application for a church on the site was denied. The planning department analysis also stated the location could result in an inappropriate amount of traffic in the sparsely developed residential and agricultural area.

Stan Pipkin, speaking on behalf of the Dacula Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses, said the main issue with granting the church’s request appeared to be related to the classification of Ace McMillan as a minor arterial road rather than the actual traffic impact.

Pipkin said it was only a “minor technicality” that required the church to apply for a special use permit. According to Pipkin, the congregation could have constructed the sanctuary fronting Luke Edwards Road without the permit, but must have one to build on a different portion of their property.

Pipkin said the use of the property for a church is consistent with the comprehensive plan and would not place an undue burden on area roadways.

“The Dacula Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses requests equal treatment as afforded other churches and all the protections granted under the 5th and 14th amendments of the United States Constitution and the Georgia Constitution and Chapter 21, Title 42, Section 2000 of the United States Code for Religious Land Uses,” he said.

Pipkin said the church building would provide a much-needed place of worship for Jehovah’s Witnesses residing in the Dacula area.

“Currently these Dacula residents travel to Buford, Grayson and Sugar Hill to worship,” Pipkin said. “These distances impose an undue and unnecessary burden on the older, infirm or otherwise disadvantaged members of the congregation.”

Pipkin added the Jehovah Witnesses had agreed to a number of additional conditions such as increased setbacks and buffers to make the church as unobtrusive as possible.

In the end, only District 4 commissioner John Heard voted in favor of the permit.

The other Dacula area planning zoning case, a special use permit to allow a hair salon to be operated out of a home at 931 Auburn Road, was approved.

The applicant, Cynthia Holdrich, has a home on a two-acre, wooded tract between Bailey Woods Road and Fence Road. The proposed single-chair salon would operate seven days a week and serve four to six customers each day by appointment. The request was approved unanimously with conditions including limiting the hours of operation from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., restricting the number of customers to one at a time and prohibiting any exterior signage.