Villa Rica Council adopts grease-bin rules, approves liquor-store and development variances and awards waterline contract in final 2025 meeting

Villa Rica’s City Council closed its final regular 2025 meeting with a flurry of votes on commercial permits, an infrastructure contract and new business rules.

The council unanimously adopted a new ordinance to register and regulate outdoor recycled-grease bins used by restaurants, citing public-health and stormwater protection concerns after staff documented spills and unsanitary conditions. The ordinance requires businesses to register grease bins with the city, display a decal and provide contact information; staff set the registration window to coincide with the business-license renewal cycle (staff said the first deadline would be tied to March’s renewal period).

In community-development decisions, council approved an alcohol-license agent change for Walmart Stores East LP, located at 600 Carrollton/Billerica Highway, by a 4–1 vote after staff reported the applicant had met background-check and legal-notice requirements.

The council also granted two variance requests tied to commercial development: - A variance for 113 Commons Way (case VA-05-25), one of four presumptive liquor-store sites, to allow existing stucco and a stone water table to remain and to permit a lighter-weight fiber-cement (Nichiha) option for a newly constructed entrance instead of full four-sided brick. Council attached four conditions requiring that new façade portions be either Nichiha or full brick, that parking be restriped, that fire-life-safety and zoning requirements be met, and that final façade improvements receive community-development approval. The motion passed 4–1. - A variance for 117 Connors Road (case VA-06-25) to reduce a required 20-foot street buffer to as little as 5 feet in a constrained corner and to allow a minor reduction of a 10-foot landscape strip to 8 feet on the west side. Applicants (property owners) argued the smaller buffer would enable a building and parking layout needed to attract national tenants and offered to enhance landscaping density elsewhere and submit a detailed landscape plan. Council approved the variance with conditions — including submission of a landscape plan and limiting any permitted commercial use to what the final parking can support — by a 4–1 vote.

On infrastructure, the council approved awarding the Highway 61/Oldstone waterline relocation construction contract to Smith Pipeline in the low bid of $414,041 and added $50,000 for engineering/oversight (total request $464,041). Staff said the relocation is necessary to route city water around a private expansion project and is part of an ongoing downtown-to-North-Avenue waterline upgrade. The motion carried unanimously.

Other formal actions included approving a Norfolk Southern land-lease renewal placed back on the consent agenda after a packet error, approving the consent agenda and minutes, and authorizing two post-executive-session items: purchase of a tax parcel (V050150048) and a mediation settlement in Mount v. City of Villa Rica. Several votes were recorded as unanimous; several development votes were recorded 4–1.

The council also adopted a resolution supporting the Safe Streets for All goals of zero traffic deaths by 2035 and zero serious injuries by 2050 and directed staff to return with a safety action plan at an upcoming meeting.

The meeting adjourned after executive session actions were recorded in open session.