Pine Lake is the smallest city in DeKalb County, Georgia, United States. The population was 752 at the 2020 census.

History

Pine Lake was established as a city in December 1937, after a short life as a summer retreat run by the Pine Woods Corporation. The corporation sold lots around a small fishing lake to Atlantans who lived in (then) faraway areas like Buckhead for use as a weekend retreat. The 20' x 100' lots sold for $69, and the advertisement for lots directed people "from Decatur down the [unpaved] Rockbridge Road East." Many homeowners continued to use their property as a weekend getaway long after the city incorporated. Prior to development, Pine Lake was a portion of a farm. The lake was formerly a widened region of Snapfinger Creek, and the valley that encompasses much of the town was where corn was grown. The lake was dammed by the Army Corps of Engineers as erosion and flood control, prior to the official FDR lake projects.

Geography

Pine Lake is located at 33.79139°N, -84.20639°W (33.791505, -84.206428). According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 0.2 sqmi, of which 0.2 sqmi is land and 5.00% is water.

Demographics

As of the 2020 United States census, there were 752 people, 386 households, and 199 families residing in the city.

Education

Residents are zoned to schools in the DeKalb County School District. All of the schools are located outside of the Pine Lake city limits in unincorporated sections of DeKalb County.

In Media

Welcome to Pine Lake, is a documentary feature film released in 2020 by ViacomCBS. The largely observational film looks at the all-women leadership in the predominantly white city of Pine Lake. The documentary claims that the primary funding source of the City’s police force is from traffic tickets issued predominately to people of color from the surrounding communities. According to National Public Radio member station KCRW, the filmmaker “found that this progressive town was participating in an unfair and ultimately racist criminal justice system.” In February, 2022, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution wrote, " 'Welcome to Pine Lake' is a scathing indictment of the privilege of obliviousness when it comes to class and race."