GEORGIA SITE FIGHT: LANDOWNER TO SUE OVER DELAY

Landowner will sue Duluth over big-box moratorium [The Atlanta Journal-Constitution]
Man says city-imposed moratorium delayed his selling 27 acres to Wal-Mart

A landowner who wants to sell 27 acres to Wal-Mart says he plans to file a $25 million lawsuit against Duluth after the city imposed a six-month moratorium on big-box developments.

Former Gov. Roy Barnes represents the landowner, Jack Bandy, whose 27-acre parcel on Peachtree Industrial Boulevard in Gwinnett County is where Wal-Mart wants to build a 176,305-square-foot Supercenter.

Barnes said in a letter the city received Friday that the city acted improperly by imposing the moratorium.

State law requires people or companies who sue cities to file such letters, called “anti-litem notices,” before actually filing suit in court.

The Duluth city attorney, Lee Thompson, said the city has 30 days to respond.

“We just got it on Friday,” he said, “and obviously we need to evaluate it and would have no public comment on it at this point.”

Bandy was poised to sell his land to Wal-Mart once city planners cleared them to build the store.

Amid the heated debate over the Wal-Mart Supercenter, the Duluth City Council imposed a six-month moratorium on big-box developments on July 30.

City council member Doug Mundrick proposed the moratorium, saying then that Duluth needed time to “catch its breath,” but the letter criticizes Duluth’s action.

“This ordinance was not passed for the general health and welfare of the citizens of Duluth,” the letter says, “but with the specific intent to delay, hinder and frustrate Bandy and Wal-Mart...”

It claims that Duluth has unconstitutionally singled out Wal-Mart by taking actions that “lessen competition and ... impede commerce” while giving “preference ... to ... competitors of Wal-Mart.”

The city declined to issue a building permit to Wal-Mart on Aug. 17.

The letter says Bandy and Wal-Mart signed a contract on Nov. 20, 2006 with the city’s assurance “that the property was properly zoned for a Wal-Mart and that Bandy had a vested right to construct a Wal-Mart store.”

The letter also says that Duluth “breached promises” to Bandy dating to its annexation of the property.

“The specific promise to Bandy upon the annexation of the property (which was then zoned industrial) was that a city zoning category of commercial (which was accomplished upon annexation) would allow the construction of big box stores,” the letter says.