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HOGANSVILLE — The Hogansville City Council voted Monday to cancel its current grant application with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources for a planned ATV park, ultimately stopping the project in its tracks.

“The project has had its application officially withdrawn from consideration with the [Georgia] Department of Natural resources following the vote of the City Council at Monday’s meeting,” said Hogansville City Manager Jonathan Lynn. “That project will not be moving forward at this time, but we look forward to a continued partnership with the Department of Natural Resources on future projects.”

Councilmember Michael Taylor noted at Monday’s meeting that residential concerns were the driving force behind the cancelation.

“[We said at] the work session we would not waste our time or waste the [Georgia] Department of Natural Resources’ time due to the citizens,” he said. “Most of them said no.”

According to city documents, the Hogansville City Council discussed their constitutes’ concerns about the ATV park at its work session on March 7. Hogansville was approved to move forward with the second round of grant applications at a meeting in late February.

The proposed 11 miles of wooded trails would have been located on the former Hogansville landfill. A concept plan was shown as part of the discussion, showing the approximate area of the trails and nearby properties.

The ATV trail would mimic Bone Valley Trail in Polk County Florida, the documents stated. 

The total proposed cost of the project is $874,000 with a SPLOST-funded city match of $181,000 and in-kind contributions of water and sewer hookups. The operation of the trail would have required three part-time positions.

Councilmembers Toni Striblin, Mandy Neese and Matthew Morgan also said they heard more ‘no’ responses than supporting ones.

“If everyone is against it, why waste more money and time?” Neese said.

In other business at the meeting, the council approved at final budget adjustment of FY2021 (July 1, 2020 – June 30, 2021). The city will be able to finalize the draft of the FY21 Audit to present back to council for approval. The final budget amount for FY21 following this adjustment is $3,980,268. The original budget amount that was adopted by the mayor and city council was $3,429,709. This is only related to general fund expenditures and revenues, according to city documents.