If you want to speak up at a Henry County Board of Commissioners meeting, there are now a few more hoops to jump through.

A new ordinance governing public comment was approved at the board’s March 16 regular meeting, and it has several new wrinkles. None of them are intended to make public comment easier.

The amount of time granted to each speaker is now three minutes. It was previously five.

Only topics on that specific meeting and the previous meeting are allowed. All other county business is off limits.

In the past, those who wished to speak signed up immediately before the meeting in question. Now they will have to sign up no later than noon the day before the meeting.

The new ordinance passed with a 4-1 vote. Johnny Wilson voted in opposition.

In other business, an honorary road topper was approved in honor of the late Spencer O’Neal, former pastor of Global Impact Christian Ministries, but the portion of Red Oak Road where the church campus is located will not be changed. The motion by Vivian Thomas passed 3-2 with Dee Clemmons and Bruce Holmes voting in opposition. Included in the motion was the renaming of a street at the county’s future aquatic center after Spencer, as well as the possibility of renaming the road at the church’s future home should it relocate.

The commissioners approved the Georgia Micro Enterprise Network (GMEN) as the third-party project administrator and approved technical/online portal contracts to manage the county’s $7 million Emergency Rental Assistance Program (ERAP). Earlier this month the county qualified for relief funding to assist eligible renters in the county with payment to their leases and those who are in debt or those who are facing eviction.

The relief funding can also assist renters with utility payment for electric, gas, trash removal, internet, water and sewer. A representative said that GMEN will provide rental and utility emergency assistance for up to 2,625 Henry County residents and that the program is expected to launch by the second week of April.

Two requests regarding proposed development of a McDonough site were denied. A developer sought to rezone 13.8 acres at 438 Moseley Road from RA (residential-agricultural) to R-3 (single-family residential) for a subdivision, and also to amend the designation of the site on the county’s future land use map from rural residential to low-density residential. Both of those requests, voted on separately, failed 5-0.

A request to rezone 1.23 acres at East Lake Parkway to C-2 (general commercial) for future use was approved with conditions 5-0, as was the rezoning from RA to RS (residential suburban) for 28 acres at 61 Lewis Drive, just west of Jodeco Road and east of Flippen Road. The request is to allow 61 single-family homes and 26 townhomes on the site. According to staff, the county’s future land use map designates the property for medium-density residential use, which means up to six residential units per acre are permissible.

Henry County will get nearly $350,000 in grant assistance for its transit department under a program the county has participated in for more than 30 years. The board voted to officially accept the Georgia Department of Transportation’s FY2022 grant for up to $192,067 in transit operating assistance, as well as up to $157,809 in federal and state assistance reimbursements for the purchase of two 16-passenger vehicles and one van with wheelchair lifts. In an unrelated agenda item, the board approved a $43,852 expenditure for the purchase and installation of 12 scoreboards at various county parks. 

The board accepted a $1,767,048 bid from Pittman Construction Company for construction of the South Ola Road extension, a county SPLOST project. Also approved was a project framework agreement requested by the Georgia Department of Transportation for the future widening of Bill Gardner Parkway. According to officials, the agreement details preliminary engineering commitments which include $1 million in federal participation and $250,000 from the county. Funding is in the county DOT budget. Additional specific activity agreements for right of way, utility relocation and construction phases will be sent to the county at the appropriate time.

Major Joey Smith of the Henry County Police Department was appointed to the county’s Department of Family and Children Services board to fill the unexpired term of recently retired Locust Grove police chief Jesse Patton. That term expires September 20 of this year.

The board approved a $314,520 annual contract for janitorial services at various county buildings, as well as an agreement regarding the receipt of more than $5,000 in grant funds to apply toward the hiring of two summer interns for the transportation planning department and the planning and zoning department.