MARIETTA - Mayor Steve Tumlin used his veto power Thursday to kill last week's vote by the City Council approving Marietta's first local historic district along Kennesaw Avenue.

The veto, Tumlin's first as mayor, was made on the recommendation of Gregg Litchfield, an attorney with Haynie, Litchfield and Crane, the Marietta firm that represents the city.

Before approving a local historic district, a certain number of public hearings must be conducted. Litchfield said one of those hearings was not conducted or properly advertised, rendering the ordinance unenforceable.

"If we can't enforce it, it's not valid," Councilman Van Pearlberg said during the special called Judicial Legislative Committee meeting Thursday.

"It's the notice to the public that's the problem," Litchfield said. "... It was overlooked."

Two other flaws in the process, Councilman Philip Goldstein said, were that while most property owners received notice of some of the hearings, a few property owners did not. Moreover, the ordinance requires that the "occupants" of the homes impacted receive notices, which doesn't just cover the property owners, but anyone who lives there, such as renters. And only property owners were sent notices, Goldstein said.

The City Council approved the district on Jan. 13 in a vote of 4-3 with Goldstein, the Rev. Anthony Coleman and Annette Lewis voting against. Goldstein said Thursday he didn't closely examine the checklist of required steps for approving the historic district until after the night of the vote, when two Kennesaw Avenue residents spoke out against the district. Goldstein then alerted Tumlin to the errors, prompting the mayor to ask city attorney Doug Haynie for advice. Tumlin said Haynie advised him that the ordinance was indeed unenforceable.

Tumlin's veto restarts the process of creating a historic district along Kennesaw Avenue, Goldstein said, estimating the soonest it could now be approved would be sometime in March. Tumlin pledged that he would bring the district back after the ordinance was properly revised.

"It had to be vetoed at this time, not for it to disappear, but to come back in a much better form," Tumlin said.

The Historic Preservation Commission has worked to establish the Kennesaw Avenue area as its first local historic district since the historic preservation ordinance was adopted in 2005. It was to encompass 29 properties, including 25 houses, along Kennesaw Avenue beginning at its intersection with Maple Avenue and ending just before Atwood Drive.

Councilman Jim King said neither the city's staff nor the members of the HPC should be blamed for the procedural errors that killed the historic district.

"Ultimately, it's our fault," King said.

HPC member Becky Paden voiced her frustration after the meeting.

"It's a very great disappointment that the mayor is vetoing the legislation from last week, and we understand we pretty much have to start over in the process of obtaining the agreement of owners and sending notifications and other various aspects in steps toward preservation of the district," she said.

Before approval of a historic district, the city had to approve design guidelines, subject to approval of 60 percent of eligible voters who live or own property in the proposed district. The guidelines provide a framework for approvals of material changes to properties in the proposed district, such as adding porches, said Brian Binzer, the city's development services director. The purpose of the guidelines is to assist property owners in making appropriate changes to properties, keeping them in line with the historical nature of the district. The HPC then reviews requests from property owners who wish to make changes to their properties within the district. For the Kennesaw Avenue local historic district, the HPC obtained 67 percent approval from eligible voters, with 18 consenting, five opposed and no response from four, Binzer said.