The leaders of Cobb County government’s public safety agencies said Tuesday that police and fire services for the proposed City of East Cobb are lacking many financial and service details.
During a special called work session of the Cobb Board of Commissioners, the heads of the county’s police, fire and 911 services showed slides highlighting what they’re providing, but said a financial feasibility study for East Cobb raises more questions than answers about what a new city may be able to deliver.
“We’re not here to advocate, but to educate,” Cobb public safety director Randy Crider said during the virtual work session, which included no discussion among commissioners. “But I’ve been asked a lot of questions I don’t have answers for.”
Legislation calling for a May 24 referendum to determine East Cobb Cityhood is awaiting Gov. Brian Kemp’s signature into law. Three other cityhood bills—for Lost Mountain, Mableton and Vinings—also are expected to receive passage, with referendums also in May.
Cobb Commission Chairwoman Lisa Cupid told legislators in January that cityhood votes in all four proposed areas were being rushed, and that the county hadn’t had time to examine the financial and service impacts.
Those presentations were made Tuesday at the work session by Cobb public safety, parks and community development officials.
(You can watch a replay of the video by clicking here; and view the presentation slides by clicking here.)
The county has created a cityhood page that claims an estimated $45 million will be lost annually of all four new Cobb cities are created.
Nearly half of that—around $23 million—would come out of East Cobb, and most of the work session was devoted to East Cobb services, specifically police and fire. The other three cities are proposing “city light” services centered on controlling growth and development.
That was also the centerpiece of the original East Cobb legislation filed in March 2021 by former State Rep. Matt Dollar. Public safety was added last fall, as researchers from Georgia State University were conducting a financial feasibility study.
That study, released in November, concluded a City of East Cobb of around 60,000 people was financially feasible, even with public safety services estimated at costing $14 million a year.
The East Cobb bill also calls for planning and zoning, code enforcement and parks and recreation services.
More than half of the proposed city’s estimated $27 million in annual revenues would come from the 2.86 mills transferred from the Cobb Fire Fund.
At Tuesday’s work session, Crider repeated concerns he expressed to legislators that the East Cobb study is “just general” about public safety issues, including staffing, equipment, response time and training.
“We need to know what’s expected of us,” he said, referring to what may be included in intergovernmental and mutual aid agreements, similar to what the county provides in backup roles with Cobb’s six existing cities.
Crider said there aren’t enough details in the East Cobb study about exactly what specialty units a new city’s police department may have, such as SWAT units.
The East Cobb study also calls for a city fire department to consist of two stations—21 on Lower Roswell Road, at the East Cobb Government Service Center, and 15 on Oak Lane.
In showing commissioners a map of the proposed city, Cobb Fire Chief Bill Johnson said he has concerns about response time.
That’s because some parts of the proposed city (in red on the map) are served by stations that would remain in unincorporated Cobb. An area that would be located just outside of the city (in yellow) is now serviced by Station 15, which would be in the new city.
He also said he didn’t know how the East Cobb fire department would be staffed. The City of Roswell, for example, has many firefighters who work part-time shifts when off-duty from full-time jobs in other fire departments.
Stuart VanHoozer, the interim Cobb Fire Chief, and Cobb 911 Director Melissa Altiero also said they were unclear how their departments may be asked to provide support to a proposed City of East Cobb.
But Cindy Cooperman, a spokeswoman for the Committee for East Cobb Cityhood, called the county’s response “disappointing,” saying the county “has not properly briefed their staff on the well-established process in Georgia to form a city.”
Should a City of East Cobb referendum be approved, elections for a mayor and six city council members would take place in November, with a two-year transition period starting in January 2023.
She said the newly elected officials would work with a transition committee appointed by the governor to formalize processes and details for transferring services to be provided by the new city.
“This is not something new,” she said, referring to similar processes that have taken place in recent years in Milton, Johns Creek and Peachtree Corners. “These cities are thriving and have happy residents as a result.”
Cooperman also said that the “internal analysis of county staff is not credible when it suggests that the cost offset to $45M in revenue will only be approximately $450K.
“The county’s rushed attempt at an analysis was not thorough enough because many vital details on actual costs still need to be disclosed by the county.
“They had a year to analyze this properly and failed to do so,” Cooperman said.
The only direct meeting between East Cobb Cityhood forces and the county was in April of 2021 between Dollar and Cupid.
Cooperman said the cityhood group reached out to Cupid for a meeting in November with the addition of police and fire services, but has not yet heard back.
Cobb government spokesman Ross Cavitt referred East Cobb News to a statement Cupid made in a video early this week “that she is open to meet with anyone.”
He provided a statement from Cupid referencing the Dollar meeting and saying that “I met other proponents about the effort approximately 2-3 weeks ago during a legislative meeting. They said they wanted to meet again and we will work on making that happen.”
Cooperman said the cityhood group is planning an in-person town hall after the Cobb County School District winter break next week, but a specific date has not been set.
Related:
- East Cobb Cityhood bill gets final passage in Ga. legislature
- Cobb government, Cityhood advocates ramp up talking points
- East Cobb Cityhood bill passes Senate; returns to House
- Editor’s Note: Why the rush with Cobb Cityhood bills?
- Democrat announces campaign for Ga. House special election
- East Cobb Cityhood bill passes Senate committee
- Cupid speaks out on cityhood, redistricting issues
- Cobb Republicans file bill to redistrict county commission seats
- East Cobb Cityhood bill sponsor resigns from legislature
- Cobb Republicans file school board redistricting bill
- East Cobb Cityhood bill passes Georgia House
- East Cobb News Cityhood page
- East Cobb News Politics & Elections guide
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Now that Matt Dollar has resigned, who is representing (especially since we can’t vote) the rights of the tens of thousands in the map yellow area (CC1) unincorporated Cobb not included within the proposed city? According to very senior county officers, our emergency services will be greatly reduced.
There will be a special election to succeed Dollar on April 5, after the legislative session ends.
http://eastcobbnews.com/4-candidates-qualify-in-east-cobb-ga-house-special-election/
Lots of dates are mentioned for these District 45 Rep. Looks like a runoff is likely. Nevertheless, if a Rep is finally elected, they won’t have much time to do any negotiating on our behalf (assuming they’re not in support of the new city plan which would preclude their interest in helping anyway) prior to the referendum.
Yes, Matt Dollar was quite successful in scre*ing over his constituents…and the rest of the East Cobb delegation applauded him for it.
I’m talking Sharon Cooper, John Carson & John Albers.
Well, this comment by Cooperman is crass and not germane:
“They had a year to analyze this properly and failed to do so,” Cooperman said.
The March 2021 version of the bill did NOT have Police and Fire in it as proposed services. So, for nearly a year, the County had assumed Fire and Police were not part of the City plans because it wasn’t in the original legislation.
It was only when Matt Dollar CHANGED the legislation on January 13, 2022 via a House Committee meeting on Governmental Affairs (a mere 3 days into the 2022 Session…see this link to the date changes: https://www.legis.ga.gov/legislation/60811) that anyone, much less the County, knew that Police and Fire had been added to the legislation.
I suspect that Dollar had it planned from the beginning to have Fire and Police, and he enjoyed playing “bait-and-switch” on people.
So, even if the County had done any analysis in the past year, it would have been A WASTE OF TIME AND MONEY.
It’s like when Matt Dollar was asked, in committee a month ago, “What changed in your legislation from last year to now?”…and Dollar stated “I don’t remember.”
Right. He didn’t remember adding Police and Fire. He didn’t remember changing the Election Date from November of 2022 to be May 24 Primary Date.
I wonder how much Sharon Cooper knew about the bait-and-switch…?
They are going to have a meeting but don’t know where or when. And they call the county unprepared!
It’s telling when county officials say things like “We’re here to advocate, not educate”. Nobody needs a bureaucrat telling them what to think.
@Gary — Except your “quote” is exactly the opposite of what was actually said. The real quote was ““We’re not here to advocate, but to educate”.
Anyone in favor of this fiasco is either expecting to benefit financially (like the real estate developers behind it) or is simply a fool.
My quote was copied and pasted from the article. Wendy must have edited the article later without mentioning the error.
Why is Cindy Cooperman so concerned with the County’s presentation of facts?
And, I’m interested in seeing this “well established process” for forming a city that she describes.
Where is a copy of this “well established process” and where is the County violating that process?
I’m guessing Mrs. Cooperman is going to personally benefit from this either politically or financially.