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Lowndes County commissioners deny rezoning request for Bud Horace Avenue property
Summary
Lowndes County commissioners voted to deny REZ2024-09, a request to expand commercial highway zoning at 1735 Madison Highway, citing floodplain, wetlands and unpermitted operations concerns.
Lowndes County commissioners on an unspecified meeting date denied REZ2024-09, a rezoning request for a three‑acre parcel at 1735 Madison Highway, commonly referred to in the filing as the Bud Horace Avenue property.
The request sought to change portions of the site from conservation to commercial highway to accommodate continued semi‑truck repair operations. County planning staff told commissioners the property is roughly 95% inside mapped flood zones on maps from 2008 and 2021, contains wetlands and lies partially within the Valdosta Regional Airport overlay, which carries supplemental development standards.
Planning staff J.D. Dillard described the site as approximately 3 acres—about 0.75 acres currently zoned commercial highway and 2.25 acres zoned conservation—and said the application history began with a 2024 code enforcement complaint over semi‑truck parking. Dillard said staff paused earlier review while requesting Army Corps and FEMA wetlands/floodplain documentation and later proposed a staff condition that would retain roughly 0.58 acres as developable if a 55‑foot buffer from the wetlands were required.
Property owner Roger Budd III spoke in support of the rezoning. Budd said his tenant, Eduardo Lantigua, performs semi‑truck repair on the parcel and that he and the tenant want to build a structure for the business. “All we wanted to do and all we still wanna do is let Eduardo Lantigua, our paying tenant, continue to operate his business in Lowndes County like he's been doing,” Budd said. Budd told the commission he believes the Army Corps of Engineers’ maps contain an elevation error and said he and his surveyor have sought a map modification.
County staff member Mr. McLeod told the commission the Army Corps had not received a formal application related to the property. “They have not received an application on this piece of property,” McLeod said.
Commissioners cited the mapped floodplain, wetlands, long timeline of unresolved permitting and the site’s visible accumulation of vehicles and unpermitted structures when explaining their concerns. The Lowndes County Planning Commission had recommended denial of the rezoning by a 6–1 vote, citing environmental and development feasibility issues.
A motion to deny was made, seconded and carried; the transcript does not record a roll‑call tally. No further action or appeals were specified during the meeting record.
The county packet presented to commissioners listed several options staff had prepared should the board have chosen approval, including (1) basing boundary changes on an Army Corps‑approved delineation, (2) a 55‑foot buffer from wetlands, (3) requiring paving to an approved entrance and withholding certificate of occupancy until code compliance, (4) flood‑protection perimeter work per Georgia EPD floodplain guidance, and (5) a list of uses to be prohibited on the parcel given its environmental sensitivity.
