Johnny Crist, Mayor, City of Lilburn

As a key city in Gwinnett County, Lilburn is hard at work evolving and aiming to become a bigger destination in the Atlanta metro area. Smart planning, strong collaboration, and operating with minimum debt has been the foundation of the city’s success. In an interview with Focus:,, Mayor Johnny Crist highlights the work that goes into making Lilburn an ideal place for families and businesses, and the value of cultivating strong relationships within the city and county.

What changes have had the biggest impact on the city over the past year?

When thinking about growth, I want our team to grow together and for there to be unity. I believe that if your team is not walking together, you will not go anywhere. The highest value in my leadership is to pull the team together in such a way that there is mutual love, trust, respect, and honor for each other.

The first year of my leadership has been devoted to building a team. Out of a strong team comes vision and other people that want to join. I want a team that is unified and aligned. In terms of growth for the city, we in the city of Lilburn have prided ourselves on running an organization that has no debt, and we take no loans — we work on a cash basis. We have enough revenue that we move through everything by utilizing the funds available. I do not want to be the leader that drives the city into huge debt only for someone else to pay it off. I prefer to treat it like my own personal finances. As a dad, it will not help my family if I live in debt and run on credit cards. Likewise, I do not want the city to do that. In terms of real estate, there is good debt, and with the economy at large we have not felt any negative impacts.

We just completed our 2040 plan and are looking 15 years into the future to plan all the different aspects of the city, so we can help guide the future development in that time span.

How would you characterize the growth and current development activity happening in the city?

In a city with long-range forecasting, there is always a sense of looking towards tomorrow. I want to build a city where I know what is going to happen and I can see it before it even gets here. Through long-range vision and strategy, we as leaders have to see what we want and what we do not want. It is people without a plan that end up where they do not want to go. Planning is crucial for any organization that wants to thrive on a mission. My mission is for Lilburn to be a destination where people from all over the metro area want to come and join in what we are doing.

The city is so lovable and walkable; it is a place where you want to be and an environment where people are enjoying themselves. Our downtown looks like a parade, with a constant stream of people strolling around — that was all intentional. We wanted a place where people are interested in the architecture and the local environment, along with its own unique identity.

What are the main economic drivers in the city?

From its beginnings in the lottery of 1820, through setbacks like the fire of 1920 that destroyed most of the business district and a boll weevil infestation that destroyed Lilburn’s economic base, cotton, in the 1920’s, Lilburn has continually reinvented itself while preserving a strong sense of community.

Lilburn’s population has grown by over 35% since 2010, and the city continues to grow with Gwinnett County. Its real estate is over 56% commercial with 4.1 million square feet of retail space, 860,000 square feet of office space, and 1.5 million square feet of industrial inventory. Top industries in Lilburn include government and other services followed by retail trade, construction, and healthcare.

The city’s primary revenue sources are taxes, licenses and permits, and charges for services. Moving forward, we intend to continue redevelopment of our central business district called Old Town while transforming Lawrenceville Highway into a highly walkable destination for new businesses and residents alike.

How is the city collaborating with other cities, counties, or the state to address shared challenges?

I believe that relationships are everything. I want to be completely connected to our county as it is the lynchpin. I want to have strong relationships with county leaders, which includes all 17 cities. I want to collaborate because that is how business is done, and it allows us to share processes and ideas that we can learn from each other.

What are your top priorities in the next two to three years?

We have county and state highways as well as city streets where we’d like to put walking trails on either side. We are having those conversations now as other cities have already done it. For the last 10 years, we have been laser focused on improving our downtown. We are not expanding our work to get rid of blighted properties — we want to bring developers in and also improve the infrastructure along Highway 29.