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Clermont residents consider filing suit against Hall County
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The Hall County Board of Commissioners may have come to a decision on the North Hall library, but Clermont residents say their fight is far from over.

On Thursday, the Hall County Board of Commissioners voted 4-1 to build the North Hall library at Nopone Road.

The commissioners say building the library on the same property as the future North Hall park and community center will allow families to meet their quality of life needs in one centralized location. Combining the facilities is also expected to save costs during construction.

Clermont residents, who have worked for the last month to try to convince the commission to keep the library in Clermont, may take their fight to court.

"Right now it’s still on track to file suit against them. They were put on notice about it," Clermont Mayor James Nix said.

Clermont attorney David Syfan said he will meet with the city council in an executive session following a regularly scheduled city council meeting March 2.

"The council and I will discuss where we want to go," Syfan said. "Unfortunately, litigation is not cheap."

If council members decide to move forward with litigation, Syfan said they will spend about two weeks gathering documents and evidence to submit to court.

If strong enough evidence is found, an injunction may be issued to halt progress on the Nopone Road project until the case can be heard.

"You’ve got to show a good reason under the law for the grant of it," Syfan said.

However, county officials maintain no promises were ever made. Until Thursday, no vote had ever been taken to finalize the location of the library and the SPLOST ballot called for a North Hall library, not a Clermont library.

Syfan believes there is enough evidence to show that Hall County misrepresented its intentions before the Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax vote by telling people the North Hall library would replace the aging Clermont library. The county also purchased a 44-acre tract of land in the town.

"I feel like we have a good chance that the court will recognize that," Syfan said.