A controversial rezoning application by a Fulton County charter school has been deferred at the request of Amana Academy.

The public charter school wanted to renovate an existing office/warehouse building into a new home for its charter school. But the location is within Pod 14A of the Windward Master Plan development. That section of the master plan has been designated as a business center, which lists permitted uses as “Office-Institution, research and development, office-professional, light industrial and hotel conference center zoning categories.”

Because school is not a permitted use, Amana Academy filed an application for amendment to the Windward Master Plan. The Alpharetta Planning Commission heard that application in July, but deferred its recommendation until itsAugust meeting. Even with more information, the Planning Commission was split with a 3-3 vote on any recommendation. That sent the application to City Council with no recommendation.

City Council was scheduled to hold a public hearing on Monday Aug. 22, but it has been deferred with no new date set.

On Thursday, Aug. 18, the applicant asked for a deferral of their case, according to Alpharetta Assistant City Administrator James Drinkard, citing the following reasons:

• To allow the Applicant to revise its traffic study previously provided to the City. As you may be aware certain counts were performed during the summer break when traffic is not indicative of the majority of the school year. In addition the added time will allow for the Amana Academy to provide more accurate carpooling and busing information;
• To allow Amana to consider other potential locations as requested by the Alpharetta Planning Commission during our hearing of Aug. 4, 2011; and
• To allow the Applicant to continue its dialogue with Windward homeowners to determine if any compromise may be available with respect to the application.

This was the applicant’s first request for deferral.

"Consistent with how we have handled such requests in other cases, the city has granted the deferral. As such, the Amana Academy case will not be heard this Monday, Aug. 22," Drinkard said.

Deferrals are common occurrences with rezoning cases.

At this time, no date has been scheduled for the hearing of this case.