Cobb 2018 budget adoption, 2040 comprehensive plan on Friday agenda

A postponed meeting from last week that was to include the Cobb 2018 budget adoption and the Cobb 2040 Comprehensive Plan will take place Friday.

Bob Ott, Cobb 2018 budget adoption
District 2 commissioner Bob Ott.

The Cobb Board of Commissioners will meet starting at 10 a.m. in the 2nd floor room of the Cobb BOC building, 100 Cherokee St., in downtown Marietta.

The meeting was rescheduled because county government was shut down due to Tropical Storm Irma. Before commissioners vote on the fiscal year 2018 budget, a final public hearing on the budget will take place.

Cobb commission chairman Mike Boyce has proposed an $890 million budget (PDF here), with $405 million for the general fund, and without a millage rate increase. After losing a battle in July to boost the millage rate to fully fund the 2008 Cobb parks bond referendum, Boyce is proposing to use $21.5 million in contingency funding to balance the budget.

East Cobb commissioner Bob Ott has gone on the record stating he does not support a millage rate increase and called for a budget review to find cost savings (East Cobb News post here).

East Cobb Library
The East Cobb Library opened at Parkaire Landing Shopping Center in 2010.

He’s also been feuding with his fellow East Cobb commissioner, JoAnn Birrell, who has proposed closing the East Cobb Library to help balance the budget. At an August town hall meeting at that same library branch—the second-busiest in the Cobb public library system—Ott said he would propose closing an “underperforming” branch elsewhere in his district but has not publicly elaborated since then (East Cobb News post here).

East Cobb residents spoke out loudly at a previous public hearing before Birrell defended her proposal to close the East Cobb Library. More than 5,000 people have signed an online petition to keep it open.

Addoption of the Cobb 2040 Comprehensive Plan is on Friday’s agenda, which reflects “Cobb’s vision, policies and goals based on the existing plan and community involvement,” according to documents explaining the plan update process.

Hearings, revisions and other work going into the 2040 plan have been ongoing since 2015. The final draft was completed on Sept. 5, with final revisions explained here.

Several East Cobb citizen activists have been critical of the proposed Cobb 2040 report, concerned about the influx of high-density development in the East Cobb area.

The county is required by the state to adopt a plan and submit it for review by the Atlanta Regional Commission.

Also on Friday’s agenda are the following East Cobb-related items:

  • A change order to approve $194,700 in funding to resurface Dickerson Road, located off Lower Roswell Road, where a new subdivision, Crossvine, is being built by Lynwood Development;
  • An appeal by the owner of a proposed bar in northeast Cobb whose application for a liquor license was denied. Naseeb Rana of Kasbah Corp. wants to open an establishment in the Sandy Plains Village shopping center called Paprik’a which would have outdoor seating close to residential homes. Citizens from the Chatsworth and other subdivisions have strongly protested the application, saying the noise and late hours are incompatible with the community. They also said other establishments in the area serving alcohol are all-indoors and that Rana has not been responsive to community concerns;
  • East Cobb resident Ross Cavitt is expected to be appointed Cobb communications director, after more than 20 years as a reporter at WSB-TV (East Cobb News post here.)

BREAKING NEWS: Cobb commissioners hold line on 2017 property tax millage rate

The Cobb Board of Commissioners voted late Tuesday evening to keep the 2017 county government millage rate the same as 2016, instead of raising it, as Chairman Mike Boyce had proposed.

By a 3-2 vote, the commission approved a substitute motion by East Cobb commissioner Bob Ott to keep the overall millage rate at 9.85 mills, instead of going up to 9.98 mills.

East Cobb commissioner JoAnn Birrell and Bob Weatherford voted for Ott’s motion. Boyce and commissioner Lisa Cupid of South Cobb were opposed.

Boyce had wanted a 0.13 mills increase to pay for the fulfillment of the $40 million parks bond referendum approved by Cobb voters in 2008.

Ott’s proposal included diverting budgeted economic development contingency funding the next two years to make up for the difference.

He has been adamantly against a tax increase, and Birrell objected to a hike for several reasons, including the impact on senior citizens.

Boyce, an East Cobb resident in his first year as chairman, and Cupid said the reduction amounts to “kicking the can down the road” for next year’s budget and in the county’s ability to provide a rising level of services he said Cobb citizens have come to expect.