An update: Roswell City Council approves Mimosa Hall renovation plans

By Maria Saporta

Roswell’s Mimosa Hall on Monday night got the green light to go green.

“The Roswell City Council has just unanimously passed a resolution to approve the installation of solar panels in the replacement roof for Mimosa Hall,” wrote an excited Steve Gibson in an email.

Gibson is the president of Friends of Mimosa Hall & Gardens, which helped put together a proposal to make the historic home into the oldest “net zero” house in the country.

This was an important next step in making a “Net Zero Mimosa Hall” a reality. A recent Maria’s Metro column described the project’s potential.

“We couldn’t be more thrilled for Mimosa Hall, Roswell’s Historic District and the citizens of Georgia,” Gibson said. ”This project will further the City of Roswell’s initiative as an ARC (Atlanta Regional Commission) Certified Gold ‘Green Community.’ By becoming the oldest Net Zero house in the country, Mimosa Hall will sustainably integrate the future and the past to benefit everyone for generations to come.”

The Friends group did work hard to drum up support for the plan, which will include flat solar panels flushed on the roof and combined with a battery system to store excess solar power to be used on cloudy days and at night.

Kelly Callen, one of the members of the Friends board, sent out an email before the meeting to get citizens to urge their councilmembers to “vote yes.”

The suggested subject line for the email campaign was: “Encouraging You to Vote Yes for Net Zero Mimosa!”

Obviously the campaign worked.

Roswell Mayor Lori Henry already has expressed her support for the project.

Now the Friends group will need to complete fundraising to implement the “Net Zero” plans. The project will cost about $135,000, and it still needs to raise about $70,000.