‘This is a political stunt’: Developer thrown out of Cobb County hearing

Before the Cobb Board of Commissioners once again rejected a proposal from a developer suing Cobb Commissioner Joann Birrell, he was escorted from the room for continually disrupting this week’s zoning hearing.

Christopher Hunt of Green Community Development, who had previously proposed an ecofriendly development for east Cobb, brought a similar plan for a subdivision in south Cobb.

As it became clear Commissioner Monique Sheffield had serious concerns about the topography of the land, which is in her district, he began interrupting the proceeding from the audience.

“Excuse me...sir, if this happens again we’ll ask that you be escorted out,” Chairwoman Lisa Cupid said. Happen again it did. “This is a political stunt, this why Mableton de-annexed, and these people are going to drive Cobb down and ruin it,” Hunt said later in the hearing before being escorted out of the room by a Cobb police officer.

Birrell was noticeably absent from the dais during the hearing on Hunt’s case — she stepped down before it began, citing pending litigation.

Hunt filed a lawsuit in Cobb Superior Court in November against Birrell and the county seeking $100 million in damages based off the commission’s denial of his previous request.

This time around, Hunt proposed 11 homes on 6.5 acres at the corner of Bates and Hicks roads in Mableton.

Hunt called out zoning policies for being unfriendly to builders of sustainable homes, and he said variances are needed “to overcome the counterproductive, antiquated processes and rules that actually make it to where it’s prohibitive and punitive to try to be sustainable.”