COBB COUNTY - Things may be looking up for the North Georgia Chapter of the House Rabbit Society and its furry friends.

After the Cobb County Planning and Zoning Commission recommended denial earlier this month of the chapter's request for a land use permit to operate a rabbit rescue shelter out of a home zoned residential in east Cobb, the Cobb Board of Commissioners decided Tuesday to hold the request until the board's Sept. 21 hearing.

Although county code requires animal boarding businesses to be in commercial or industrial areas, petitioners Edie and Mark Sayeg said they have made major improvements to the previously dilapidated home and, with it being across from a strip mall on heavily traveled Shallowford Road, they want commissioners to make an exception for them.

Community support for the shelter was overwhelming, as 100 residents - many from the chapter's 450 members, but others being neighbors of the property in question - banded together in yellow attire to show their support of the shelter and its request for a permit during the commissioners' zoning hearing.

"We intend to be good neighbors, and we have spent thousands of volunteer hours and dollars renovating and cleaning up a house that was once overgrown, molding, vacant and a nuisance to the neighborhood," chapter member Darren Friberg said. "We heard some concerns about having parking for our meetings, so we now host them at the Atlanta Humane Society. Prior to having the home, there was no shelter and we were all volunteers and keeping the rabbits in our homes. Edie and Mark Sayeg withdrew money from their IRA to pay for the home, and the renovation costs have depleted donors. The Garden Ladies of Cobb County has offered its assistance to help landscape the land. This home is across the street from a strip mall, and is right on Shallowford Road, which sees 19,000 cars a day, so it is not well-suited to a family residence."

Friberg said the chapter sought legal advice before the purchase of the home, and that they were "misled" when an attorney assured them the shelter would be an approved use for the property.

Friberg said the group has a petition with 1,600 signatures from those who want to see north Georgia's only rabbit rescue group remain in the home at 2280 Shallowford Road. Among those include residential neighbor David Hunt, who wrote a letter to the board, which Friberg read aloud.

"For 17 years, that property has been an eyesore," Hunt's letter stated. "It has been derelict, there have been constant vehicles, keg parties, the fence fell over, and this was always the first impression of our neighborhood. For the first time in 17 years, I'm not embarrassed when friends come over."

But Jill Flamm, president of the East Cobb Civic Association, said granting a land use permit for 24 months to an organization that "plans to expand" and holds an "intense use" would set an unwanted precedence for the area.

Commissioner Thea Powell, whose district includes the rabbit rescue, said her biggest concern with the group being located out of a home is the retail component it includes, as the chapter sells food and other rabbit supplies from the shelter.

Friberg said selling the supplies is important for funding the rescue group, as co-chapter representative and the home's owner, Edie Sayeg, said the rabbits are sold at sometimes more than half of what it costs to even spay or neuter them.

Friberg and Sayeg said they were "extremely pleased and happy" that the board voted 5-0 to hold any decision on the property until next month - to give the group time to come up with some alternatives for the location's retail sales. Friberg and Sayeg said they felt certain a compromise could be found.

"We feel a continuance means they want to work with us," Sayeg said. "One of the neighbors told us the house was constantly drug-infested and she was even stranded in her home once when the SWAT team had to come out. We completely re-Sheetrocked the entire house and sprayed for rats and rodents. Everyone's just come together and all we want to do is provide a loving place for these rabbits. And I don't have the energy to go through all of this again. It's been heart-breaking, and we can only take in so many, so we constantly have to turn people away, so if this shelter isn't there, period, there will be nowhere for them to go."