Cobb Commission
Chairman Tim Lee plans to ask voters in the 2016 presidential primary to approve a property tax increase that would
help fund a $500 million bus system down
Cobb Parkway, according to an email from the county’
s transportation
director to a federal transportation official obtained by The
Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
The county has to come up with $250 million to qualify for a
federal grant that would pay for the other half of the bus rapid transit
system, which would operate like a train
on a dedicated lane to be built along much of the Cobb Parkway thoroughfare. It would cut a path through
some of the most
congested areas in
metro Atlanta, from Kennesaw State, past the Big Chicken, down through
the Cumberland area and past the new
Atlanta Braves stadium.
Cobb transportation director Faye DiMassimo wrote to Keith
Melton, community planner in the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Atlanta office, on July 9
to assure him that the county would be
moving ahead with BRT planning
in 2015. The email was sent just weeks after it became clear
that a majority of county commissioners would not support
Lee’s plan to use $72.5 million in individual projects that
would be funded by the Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (SPLOST) renewal
as part of the county’s grant match. “Cobb will continue station development
and operating plan development through 2015,” the email says. “Previously, Cobb had planned to secure local
funding through its SPLOST.
“Alternatively, Cobb County intends to seek necessary local
match funding sources through a bond referendum
in the March 2016 (primary) … with a (grant) application submission for
2016 funding consideration.”
In an interview, Lee said he is considering the referendum
in 2016 because it is the next election after Tuesday. But when asked if the
ballot initiative would happen, Lee responded:
“It’s way too early to even talk about it.” DiMassimo said that Lee was
aware of her email before she sent it. The email also says that the BRT project
would be “submitted” for federal grant consideration by Sen. Johnny Isakson in
October. Isakson said in an interview that he is not sponsoring the project,
and that his role was to set up a meeting between Lee, DiMassimo and U.S.
Secretary of Transportation Anthony Fox. Isakson said Lee and DiMassimo flew to
Washington for that meeting.
“First of all, we don’t do earmarks anymore, so we can’t
make submissions,” Isakson said. “I think the county is looking to do BRT with
matching funds from the federal government in 2016 or 2017. Obviously, I’m
supportive
of matching funds coming to Georgia anytime I can.”
But “there’s any number of steps that have to happen” first,
he said. The biggest step is identifying a way to pay the county’s share.
A continued push In preparing the list of projects to be
funded by the SPLOST this summer, Lee pushed for $100 million in matching funds
for the grant. When it became clear that the four district commissioners would
not support that plan, the chairman removed it and lobbied for adding $72.5
million worth of individual projects on the SPLOST list that would count toward
the county’s match. Critics derided that move as an attempt to sneak BRT past voters,
who stiff-armed the project as part of a 2012 regional sales tax
initiative.
On July 22, as commissioners
considered approving the list of projects to be funded by the SPLOST
renewal, Lee sought to assure them that BRT was not part of this year’s vote.
“I just want to be clear about something: the bus rapid
transit project … is not going to be part of the SPLOST for consideration in
November,” Lee said at the meeting. “The project, in its entirety, has been
removed.”
Not entirely. References to the BRT were removed from the
list of projects the county has to publish for the referendum, but a $60 million project bridging Windy Hill
Road over Cobb Parkway is on the SPLOST
project list and would reduce
the overall cost of BRT by 12 percent. That, in turn, would
reduce the amount of cash the county has to borrow to
proceed with BRT. DiMassimo said in an interview this week
that the bridge is needed regardless of BRT, but acknowledged that it could
impact the county’s effort to
build it. “It has been identified as a necessary stand-alone
project for nearly 10 years,” she said of the Windy Hill Road bridge.
Commissioner Lisa Cupid, who pushed in that July meeting to
make sure BRT was not a part of the SPLOST vote, said she is frustrated that the transit line
is again being linked to the SPLOST vote. She argued at the July meeting for
BRT’s removal because the county “has not been as transparent as we could and
should be” regarding whether transit was on or off the SPLOST ballot. “I was
under the impression that, at the end of the day, BRT-related projects had been
removed,” Cupid said in an interview this week. “I thought we took those
projects out … to reduce the level of concern from the public that BRT was
being hidden. So this is new information to me.”
The county has been repeatedly criticized over transparency
issues during the past year — from Lee hiring an off-the-books attorney to
negotiate with the Braves without the county attorney’s knowledge, to the
county claiming that the public investment in the stadium would be limited to
$300 million when it will borrow nearly $400 million for the project.
Commissioner Bob Ott said Friday that one of the reasons he
voted against placing SPLOST on ballots is because he thinks some will be used
to accomplish BRT.
“I had my doubts during the entire discussion that night as
to what was really going on,” Ott said. “There were just too many ways to get
to where the BRT proponents want to go. There seems to be a continued push to
bring BRT into Cobb County.”
If approved by voters, the
SPLOST renewal would raise a minimum of $750 million over six years,
with the biggest beneficiary being the
county’s transportation department, which depends on the sales tax revenue for 98 percent
of its budget. The penny tax renewal would keep the county’s
sales tax at six percent — four percent for the state; one percent for the
schools; and one percent for municipal governments.
2016 SPLOST funding:
$287.4 million for transportation projects
$184.9 million combined for projects identified by six cities
$77.5 million for Parks and Recreation
$38.8 million for county-wide projects
$37.1 million for police
$30 million for information services
$23.3 million for new police training center
$23.2 million for libraries
$17.8 million for facilities
$14 million for county radio system
$13.5 million for fire department
$2.2 million for senior services
Source: Cobb County. For a full project list, go to the 2016
SPLOST page at cobbcounty.org
30 years of close Cobb County SPLOST votes
1981: Failed. Yes 48 percent; No 52 percent
1985: Passed. Yes 63 percent; No 37 percent
1989: Failed. Yes 49.6 percent; No 49.9 percent
1990: Passed. Yes 52 percent; No 42 percent
1994: Passed. Yes 56 percent; No 44 percent
1998: Failed. Yes 41 percent; No 59 percent
2000: Failed. Yes 47 percent; No 53 percent
2005: Passed. Yes 49.7 percent; No 49.5 percent
2011: Passed. Yes 49.9 percent; No 49.7 percent
Source: Cobb Board of Election
Source: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution by Dan Klepal_
(http://www.myajc.com/staff/dan-klepal/)
Comments
Vote NO on the Cobb SPLOST to slow down this
government spending spree. Cobb needs an
independent poll of Cobb voters to see how many citizens support BRT or any
expansion of tax subsidized public transit. Public transit can be replaced by
private transit to get it off the books and end the corruption. All current public transit should be
self-supporting, not tax subsidized.
Norb Leahy, Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader
No comments:
Post a Comment