Cobb commissioners approve $1.3 billion FY 2026 budget

Along partisan lines, the Cobb Board of Commissioners on Tuesday approved a $1.3 billion fiscal year 2026 budget that holds the line on the general fund property tax rate and provides modest raises for some county employees.

The budget, which goes into effect on Oct. 1, adds only four new positions—two in the Cobb Water Department and two in the Cobb Fire Department—and reduces the amount of money transferred to the general fund from water revenues.

While that latter reduction—from 5 percent of water revenues to 4 percent—made Commissioner JoAnn Birrell of East Cobb happy, she didn’t like a cut in the fire fund millage rate.

She and fellow Republican Commissioner Keli Gambrill voted against the budget proposal that drew criticisms for increased funding. The FY 2026 budget is $48 million more that FY 2025 across all funding categories, with much of the increase tied to employee pay raises and increases in the cost of benefits.

County employees will get a two percent cost-of-living raise, and some are eligible for another a three percent based on performance, primarily those in public safety.

Although the general fund millage rate is holding at 84.6 mills, that part of the budget is increasing by $13 million, to around $643 million, due to rising assessments.

The fire fund millage rate is falling from 2.99 mills to 2.97 mills, resulting in a $1 million decrease in revenues to $161 million.

That cut was among several from a projection in March by county budget officials that the government was facing a $7 million budget shortfall.

(For more budget information visit the Cobb government’s budget page.)

While Cobb property owners get a floating homestead exemption for the general fund portion of their tax bill, that exemption does not exist for the fire fund, which could be subject to higher taxes.

But Birrell opposed the fire fund cuts, pointing out that commissioners did the same thing in 2018, only to raise the rate again.

“We’ve been down this road before, and just got back to what it was,” she said. “Everything in the fire fund pays for what the fire department does.”

Cobb Commission Chairwoman Lisa Cupid, one of the three Democrats who voted to approve the budget, said the employee raises are needed, defending the additional spending for recruitment and retention purposes.

While most public speakers at Tuesday’s meeting urged commissioners to rein in spending, Cupid said that county employees “don’t come for public hearings. They speak with their feet.”

The budget also cuts out $1.2 million in discretionary spending for each of the five commissioners that they had had in recent years.

But the Cobb tax digest growth is smaller this year, less than 3 percent, compared to more than 7 percent in recent years.

That produced a budget crunch long before the FY 2026 spending plan was laid out. Cobb government department heads asked for nearly 300 new positions, most of them with the Sheriff’s Office and police department.

But even with what amounts to a hiring freeze and targeted cuts to balance the budget, Birrell complained that the trend in recent years to significantly increase spending is troubling.

“Cobb used to be the county that people looked up to,” she said.

“Our slogan used to be ‘we do more with less.’ That’s not how I see it now.”

Cupid, who took office in 2021, when party control of the board flipped from Republican to Democrat, said Cobb is doing “more with less” better than most local governments in metro Atlanta.

“Find me one,” she said. “Let’s go on a road trip.”