Blackshear City Council discussed and/or voted on the following during their monthly work session on Tuesday, September 1 and regular meeting held on Tuesday, September 8.
Zoning and Land Use Ordinance: The city council passed Ordinance 2026-06, which establishes a comprehensive zoning and development code for the City of Blackshear. The vote was not unanimous, however.
Zoning and Planning Board members appointed: The following individuals were appointed to serve as the initial members of the Planning Advisory Commission of Blackshear: Roy Gilleon, Sharon Komanecky, Marc Lee, Chris Jarrell and Rebecca Thigpen.
At their regular monthly meeting, the Blackshear City Council held the second and final reading of Ordinance 2026-33, which outlined these appointments and passed unanimously.
Alcohol license issued: The city council unanimously approved the application for a retail beer and wine alcohol license by Risha 86 Corporation. As the new owners of ZFoodmart at 25 Hendry Street, this is effectively a transfer of the existing license to the new owners.
Pierce County service delivery strategy amended: The city council unanimously voted to modify the existing service delivery strategy, which clarifies what services are provided by which governmental bodies to their citizens.
Largely a formality related to the split between city and county regarding coding and zone enforcement, the official document reads “the City of Blackshear has assumed responsibility for providing land use services within the corporate limits of the city of Blackshear and the existing service delivery strategy must be amended to accurately reflect the current service delivery arrangement.”
Department Reports Blackshear Police Dept. Report: BPD reported 17 vehicular accidents in the month of August, but only one with injuries. Nine warnings and 94 citations were recorded. Top cause of accidents was reported as “following too close”.
There were only six arrests in August, four adults and two juveniles, which is still a 50% increase from August 2025.
Blackshear Volunteer Fire Dept. Report: BFD responded to 49 different events in August. BFD workers and volunteers completed a total of 202 cumulative hours of activities and training.
Public Works Dept: Last month, the department conducted 25 water and sewer locates, five sewer service repairs and four sewer main repairs. There were also three meter replacements, two meter box replacements, one meter lid replacement and three valve replacements. There were two water service repairs and three water main repairs. There were 70 leak checks, locating 60. There were also 20 read checks, 25 close outs, 35 service cut offs, 20 services cut back on and 14 new consumers connected in August. There were no incidents of consumer tampering during the reporting period.
Public works also performed routine grass maintenance, replaced damaged street signs, conducted routine cleaning of storm drains, repaired potholes and performed routine limb trimming and did routine grass maintenance at the cemetery.
Main Street Program: The Main Street/Better Hometown program spent $4,000 dollars on operational expenses during August. Main Street Manager Bethany Strickland attended training for the month at the GA Downtown Association Conference.
Though no events were held during the month of August, the monthly report listed 20 volunteer hours were used for board and committee meetings hosted by the Main Street program.
There were two business openings in August, Occasions Event and Formal Wear and Thrifty Bear Consignment.
Total expenses for the new self-watering planters along Main Street, replacing fallen trees and other public improvement and beautification projects was $10,000.
Senior Center: Senior center volunteer Karen Herndon delivered an update about recent and upcoming events. Herndon spoke about September being National Senior Center Month, Sept. 11 also being Grandparents Day, the upcoming Sept. 12 patriotic parade and two different bingo events, one Sept. 14 and another Sept. 29.
Next meeting: The council will hold its next work session, meeting at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, October 6 and its next regular meeting at 6 p.m. on Tuesday, October 13.
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