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Will Gwinnett limit household occupancy?

By GEORGE CHIDI
Published on: 08/07/07
A Gwinnett County commissioner Tuesday called for limits to the number of people who can live in the same household.

Commissioner Bert Nasuti asked county staffers to investigate revising an existing ordinance that says up to eight people can live in one household. He said the current ordinance is hard to enforce.

His proposal comes just weeks after the Cobb County Board of Commissioners angered some immigrant advocates by revising its occupancy ordinance. The advocates said Cobb's ordinance unfairly targets the county's Latino community.

In Gwinnett, which also has a booming Hispanic population, Nasuti said he is more concerned about enforcing zoning laws than appearing to target Latino residents.

"My goal is to target people who violate the law," he said. "It won't matter if your name ends in a vowel."

The proposal is just one of many nationwide that cities and counties have debated in response to the heightened national debate on immigration in the past year.

Local governments in metro Atlanta and throughout the United States have taken matters into their own hands, passing all manner of ordinances aimed at curbing illegal immigration.

In Cherokee County, commissioners debated an ordinance that would have prohibited landlords from renting to illegal immigrants. The Northside county shelved the proposal until court challenges on similar ordinances in other states have been decided. Last year, Roswell limited the number of unrelated residents who can live in the same house.

Many counties and cities have called Cobb County recently to ask for a copy of its new housing ordinance, which commissioners say is easier to enforce than an old regulation.

Cobb's new ordinance uses square footage to limit the number of adults who can live in a home. It limits occupancy to at least 390 square feet of "total building square footage" for each adult and for each car parked overnight. The rule also limits the number of people living in a home to one family or two or fewer unrelated adults and their children and/or grandchildren. Family is defined as parents, children, grandparents, grandchildren, brothers and sisters.

The head of an organization representing Latino politicians statewide said Cobb created an atmosphere of distrust with its housing law as well as initiatives to deport illegal immigrants from the county jail and verify the legal status of workers on county projects.

Jerry Gonzalez of the Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials quit the Cobb County Hispanic/Latino Initiative — a monthly group of business and community leaders — saying the county has shown a "consistent lack of open, honest and transparent dialogue" on issues affecting the Hispanic community.

Cobb commissioners denied the charge.

Gonzalez said Nasuti's interest in changing Gwinnett's law won't solve problems with immigration.

"The only thing a local government can do is put a Band-Aid on a gushing wound," he said. "It doesn't really address the core issue."








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