Cobb County budget

EDITOR’S NOTE: Series on Cobb County growth issues misses the mark

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Ebenezer Road park preview, Cobb growth issues
Cobb commissioners spent $1.7 million this year to buy Ebenezer Road property for a future passive park. (East Cobb News photos by Wendy Parker)

Last week a national organization that examines municipal and local governance concerns published a series of posts about Cobb County growth issues, especially in the years since the recession.

The organization is called Strong Towns, which I have not heard of before. It describes itself as a non-profit media organization that’s based in Brainerd, Minn., a small town with a population of 13,000 or so, not close to a metropolitan area.

On Tuesdays I like to focus on local government, since that’s when many Cobb Board of Commissioners meetings take place. Today’s meeting has been cancelled, and I thought I’d delve a little into this interesting, but flawed examination.

The five-part Strong Towns report, which has gotten some chatter on Cobb citizens social media groups, refers to Cobb as “a suburban region that epitomizes the folly of going into debt to build more and more infrastructure with no ability to pay for it.”

Cobb growth issues
Condominiums along Powers Ferry Road are part of a high-density community spreading out from SunTrust Park.

While that’s certainly how many locals around here feel about what’s happening in the county, I think the premise is faulty, and I’m skeptical of some of the claims made in this report.

Strong Towns misses one of the biggest points of all: Cobb remains a very attractive magnet for jobs because of its diversified economy and a well-educated workforce, the partial byproduct of another major attraction here, excellent public schools.

Cobb isn’t as “addicted to growth,” as the initial post is titled, as much as new residents and employers are continuously drawn by quality services and low taxes. A heavy pipeline of development bottled up during the lean years of the recession is taking shape.

These realities were not examined by Strong Towns, but I will link to all the posts in this series so you can read for yourself:

In an evergreen post elsewhere on its site, Strong Towns claims that many cities and counties in America are falling for a “Growth Ponzi Scheme,” which it further asserts as “the dominant model of suburban growth since the mid-20th century.”

The final post about Cobb started off with a reference to Bernie Madoff, who’s serving prison time for defrauding investors.

Really? To try to make a link between criminal behavior and the development and financial issues of a bustling suburban county, albeit one with major budget problems, borders on being irresponsible, as well as willfully misunderstanding.

Cobb growth issues
Cobb commissioners this spring adopted the long-delayed Johnson Ferry Urban Design Guidelines to guide future growth in the busy commercial corridor.

I will always detest the Atlanta Braves stadium deal because the process was a total sham. But that doesn’t explain the county’s budget, tax and spending issues, which go back many years.

The county wasn’t chasing growth as much as it wasn’t sufficiently funding the growth that was already here or on the way, or was having trouble keeping up with the pace of the growth.

(Here’s a good example: When our family moved to East Cobb in the early 1970s, our home was still on septic tank, with the Sope Creek sewer line still under construction.)

There is an anti-suburban sentiment behind this report, and this is the biggest problem with it:

“Much of Cobb County . . . feels like nowhere. It has no center of gravity. It has no thriving urban core to serve as a tax-revenue cash cow.”

Cobb growth issues
A citizen living near a proposed townhome community near Olde Town Athletic Club demonstrated to county commissioners this spring the building heights that were part of the initial plan.

Ironically, the area around SunTrust may prove to be just such a place. Cobb does have many misplaced priorities, symbolized by the Braves deal, and which I wrote not long ago stripped away the illusion of supposedly fiscally conservative government.

Instead of really trying to understand the unique challenges facing a Sunbelt community that has gone from mostly rural to suburban and now urban in many spots, and in about a half-century or so, Strong Towns wants Cobb to be more like Brainerd, I guess (a place where I’ve never been).

From what I’ve read about this organization, it wants every place to be like small-town America, with bucolic downtown cores, pedestrian-friendly shops and restaurants and adaptable to a  “traditional development pattern.”

While that sentiment does have some conservative support, and it’s appealing to me as I continue on in middle age, it has never really come about in Cobb, for better or for worse.

It’s a nice ideal, but it doesn’t offer any practical solutions. Strong Towns produced a lot of words about Cobb County but with little real local knowledge on the ground about its subject.

That matters.

 

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Revised Cobb budget proposal seeks tax hike, keeps libraries and parks open

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revised Cobb budget
Cobb Commission Chairman Mike Boyce holds his first budget town hall meeting Monday at the East Cobb Senior Center. (East Cobb News file photo)

A revised Cobb budget for fiscal year 2019 would keep open libraries and parks that had been put on draft lifts as options for closures because of the county’s projected $30 million deficit.

The revised budget, which Boyce explained in his weekly video (see bottom of this post), comes to $453 million for the general fund. The current budget for the general fund is $405 million.

In addition, the proposed budget would would add police officer positions and purchase body cameras for law enforcement and have Sunday opening hours at regional libraries (including the Mountain View branch in East Cobb).

It also would keep open the UGA Cobb Extension Service and the county animal services department. Those agencies also have been mentioned for possible elimination.

The millage rate increase he is seeking is 1.7 mills, above the 1.1-mill hike he had initially sought. While the 1.1 mills could cover the $30 million gap, Boyce said additional funds are necessary to restore county services to what they were before the recession.

He said based on feedback from Cobb citizens, especially in regards to libraries and parks facilities, the message is clear.

“We’re not closing anything,” Boyce said. “From what I’ve heard and seen, people like these amenities and want us to keep them. But I have to find a way to pay for them.”

Boyce, who begins a series of budget town hall meetings on Monday at the East Cobb Senior Center, also laid out how much a 1.7-mill increase would cost property owners (see chart below), with annual jumps ranging from $170 to $1,700, based the the taxable value of their homes.

Revised Cobb budget, millage chart

After a testy Cobb budget retreat this week, Boyce got no “clear direction” from other commissioners about what proposal to take to the public. East Cobb commissioner Bob Ott has maintained that he wants to see more spending cuts before he would support any kind of increase.

Northeast Cobb commissioner JoAnn Birrell has said “everything is on the table” but that she didn’t favor shutting down parks facilities.

East Cobb facilities that have appeared on draft lists prepared by department heads and made public include the East Cobb Library, Fullers Park and Fullers Recreation Center, the Mountain View Aquatic Center, Mountain View Community Center and The Art Place.

Other budget details include restoring eliminated Cobb DOT maintenance positions and increasing right-of-way mowing contracts. Proposed cuts include $2 million in local grant matches and information services contracts.

Boyce said he’s gotten many e-mails from citizens complaining about unmowed grass along county roads and potholes.

On Wednesday, Cobb government asked in a social media posting for the public’s patience in handling a long backlog of transportation maintenance calls. It said Cobb DOT received 300 requests for service in a seven-day period and that the backlog includes 1,800 work orders.

“At current staffing levels, DOT is completing about 20 work orders per day,” according to the message.

“Do we want to have a county with a high quality of life serviced by the best staff in Georgia?” Boyce said in his video. “Or do we want to live in a mediocre county staffed and funded by a sub-par budget?”

He also said that “these town halls make a difference.”

Monday’s town hall meeting at the East Cobb Senior Center (3332 Sandy Plains Road) starts at 7 p.m. The town halls continue through July 9 at the Sewell Mill Library, followed by three public budget hearings that are required by law.

Budget adoption is scheduled for July 25.

Related stories

 

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EDITOR’S NOTE: The scapegoats of the Cobb budget crisis

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East Cobb Library, Cobb budget crisis
The East Cobb Library has been in operation only since 2010 at Parkaire Landing Shopping Center. (East Cobb News photos by Wendy Parker)

The Cobb budget crisis will soon be addressed in serious detail by the Cobb Board of Commissioners, which is holding a budget retreat on Tuesday.

The week after that, next Monday, June 18 to be exact, at the East Cobb Senior Center, budget town halls will start around the county. There will be another one in our community, on July 9, at the Sewell Mill Library and Cultural Center.

UPDATE: Cobb chairman proposes revised budget, keeping parks and libraries open

Cobb County government is facing a $30 million budget deficit for fiscal year 2019. We have known this and been told this for months.

That’s as big a deficit as the county faced during the worst of the recession.

Yet only a small handful of “options” for addressing this gap, submitted by a few department heads, have been made public.

They’re the departments that tend to get people’s emotions riled up: senior services, libraries and, this past week, parks, pools and recreation centers.

Here we go again.

Like the proposed library cuts, the cuts on parks and rec “draft list,” if enacted, would absolutely crush the provision of popular services.

Like the proposed library cuts, closing all of the parks and rec facilities on that list wouldn’t do much to close the deficit.

In East Cobb, the “draft list” includes Fullers Park and the Fullers Recreation Center, the Mountain View Aquatic Center, The Art Place and the Mountain View Community Center.

A little more than $3 million, to be exact, is what the parks and rec savings would add up to countywide. The library cuts would amount to less than that, roughly $2.9 million.

Along with new membership fees and increases for classes and rentals at senior centers, the possible elimination of the UGA Cobb Extension Service and shutting down Keep Cobb Beautiful (also on the parks and rec list), that still doesn’t equal what the county spends every year to pay off its obligations for SunTrust Park and other costs for Atlanta Braves games and events there.

Sewell Mill Library and Cultural Center
The work of local artists on display at the $10.3 million Sewell Mill Library and Cultural Center, which opened last December.

As I wrote back in February: SunTrust is untouchable, having been placed on the “must” list of budget items that are required to be appropriated by commissioners every year.

Parks, libraries and senior services are not. They’re merely on the “desired” list.

Yet the cost of delivering services has grown the most in public safety, transportation, courts, community development and water and sewer.

Library hours have not been added back to their pre-Recession totals. Cobb’s unwillingness to have Sunday library hours anywhere except the Switzer branch, but only during the school year, is ridiculous.

The library system’s budget details were laid out in painful detail months ago. Employees in these endangered departments know their jobs may be eliminated.

Related stories

Why are these low-cost, high-impact services, which add exponentially to our qualify of life, vulnerable to being gutted with a record tax digest predicted for 2018?

Citizens skeptical of paying higher property taxes think it’s a ploy by Cobb Commission Chairman Mike Boyce to get a millage rate increase. He wants to add 1.1 mills to your property tax bill, which would just about cover the $30 million.

Getting you stoked up over the possibility of losing your library, or park, is an old tactic. His predecessor, Tim Lee, did the same thing. It worked during the Recession, when tax rates went up.

The county released a “Cobb budget journey” explainer this past week with information to bolster the argument that our current general fund millage rate is just about tapped out.

We’re paying a lower millage rate now than in 1990, despite the Cobb population having grown from 450,000 then to around 750,000 now. The tax hike imposed during the Recession was brought down a couple years ago, foolishly, by Lee, with a millage rate reduction right before losing his runoff with Boyce, and just as SunTrust became fully operational.

That vote only added to the budget jam that exists now.

I’m not wild about a tax increase either, and many homeowners are already paying higher tax bills because their assessments have gone up, some dramatically.

Instead of grazing around the edges, threatening to close parks and libraries and the Cobb Safety Village and whatnot, it’s time to tackle the truly big-ticket items. There’s got to be an honest conversation about what it really costs to properly serve a fast-growing county with basic, local government services.

Cobb is no longer the sleepy bedroom community it was when our family moved here in the mid-1960s. Many who simply wanted a quiet refuge in a ranch house on a wooded lot (some built by my father, a now-retired home contractor) are finding the density, traffic, noise and increasingly urban feel to Cobb, and even East Cobb, alarming.

So do I. That’s why a visit to a park, or a library has become something much more than a treat. For me, it’s almost essential to do this, at least once a week, or when I can.

But the truth is we require more public safety services, more court services, more transportation services, more zoning services, more water and sewer services. The current millage rate, even what Boyce has proposed, likely will not cover all of what’s required in a few years. Even if he gets his wish, it may not be enough.

Ebenezer Road park
Cobb commissioners recently spent $1.7 million to purchase land on Ebenezer Road for a future passive park.

Some question the wisdom of spending millions on future park land and opening new facilities built with SPLOST money, but that operate with county budget funds.

Those are valid issues, as is the subject of SPLOST reform. These topics are likely to be hashed out during the hot summer budget months ahead. They have to be part of an eventual effort to get ahead of budget issues.

In order for that to happen, Cobb leaders have to offer something of a vision for the county that hasn’t been forthcoming for years, even before the recession.

I’m admittedly a bleeding heart for parks and libraries, but scapegoating the services that Cobb has nickeled-and-dimed for decades, and playing a game of emotional blackmail with the public, isn’t the way to do that.

 

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Cobb budget deficit reveals ‘the painful truth,’ Boyce tells East Cobb business group

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Cobb budget
Cobb Commission Chairman Mike Boyce speaking to the East Cobb Business Association Tuesday. (East Cobb News photo by Wendy Parker)

In appearing before various constituent groups months ahead of time, Mike Boyce has been increasingly blunt about the Cobb budget deficit, which is expected to be at least $30 million for fiscal year 2019.

UPDATE: Cobb chairman proposes revised budget, keeping parks and libraries open

Earlier this month, the Cobb commission chairman told a few hundred (mostly) upset seniors at the East Cobb Senior Center about the need for rising fees for county services to the elderly, “because we’re all in this together.”

Earlier this week, Boyce met with members of the East Cobb Business Association and delivered a similar message. In what’s becoming something of a stump speech early in the budget season (the FY 2019 budget doesn’t go into effect until October), Boyce continued to sharpen his tone and implore citizens to be vocal and get engaged with the process.

“We have finally shown the reality of what the shortfall is,” Boyce said in remarks at the ECBA’s monthly luncheon at the Olde Towne Athletic Club.

Related story

Bringing pie charts and listings of wants and needs, Boyce reiterated his belief that the current general fund millage rate of 6.76—which yielded revenues of $405 million for the current fiscal year 2018—is not sufficient if Cobb is to remain what he calls “a five-star county.”

After Cobb commissioners used contingency money to close a $20 million gap for FY 2018, there aren’t many more sources to tap. Additional needs call for hiring more police officers, among other increases in spending.

Starting his second year in office, Boyce, an East Cobb resident, has said he “wants to get ahead of the story” in shaping the budget picture as clearly as possible.

“Now is the time we have to pay the bills,” he said.

Last year, he tried to get commissioners to approve a 0.13 mill increase to fund the 2008 Cobb parks bond referendum, but was rejected.

FY 18 Cobb Mandated Essential List
(Information and charts provided by Cobb County government.)

FY 18 Cobb Desired

Getting approval for a property tax increase to address the widening budget gap might seem unlikely, but on Monday East Cobb commissioner Bob Ott—who uniformly opposes tax increases—opened the door, at least slightly, to such a possibility.

In an article published for the InsiderAdvantage political newsletter, Ott said he opposed a millage rate increase “without cuts in services that are not mandated or essential to county operations.”

Those include senior programs, parks and libraries, which are on a long list of “desired” services that could face significant reductions for FY 2019.

During last year’s budget deliberations, Northeast Cobb commissioner JoAnn Birrell suggested closing the East Cobb Library, the second-busiest branch in the Cobb system. That never came to fruition, but East Cobb residents who spoke out against that proposal remain concerned.

One of those East Cobb Library supporters, Rachel Slomovitz, has started an online petition in support of a millage increase with the libraries in mind, and thus far has more than 600 signatures.

She estimates her proposal would cost taxpayers an additional $25 a year to avoid the possibility of up to $3 million in cuts (roughly a quarter of the library system’s entire budget) and closing multiple branches.

Ott further explained in the InsiderAdvantage piece that at a commissioners budget retreat last fall, he and a colleague worked up a budget solution with a $55 million deficit baseline and balanced that with non-essential program cuts, fee increases and a 0.5 millage rate increase.

That 0.5 mills would yield $14 million, by Ott’s calculation. He concluded by writing that after “desired” cuts were made and required spending was approved, and “if the essential list is not completely funded” with the present millage rate, “only then would I consider a tax increase.”

Boyce said he read Ott’s article and found it constructive and useful.

“How we’re going to get [to a resolution] is the next part of the problem,” Boyce told the ECBA attendees. “It’s a painful truth, but we’ve got to start telling the truth.”

Boyce will deliver his State of the County address to the Cobb Chamber of Commerce Monday morning.

 

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Cobb commissioners go on retreat to tackle budget issues, facing $20M gap

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Mike Boyce, Cobb commissioners
Chairman Mike Boyce’s proposed millage rate increase was shot down by his fellow commissioners in August. (East Cobb News file photo)

After a contentious year of haggling over the property tax millage rate and the fiscal year 2018 budget, Cobb commissioners are spending Monday and Tuesday on a retreat to figure out future plans for handling spending concerns.

Chairman Mike Boyce and the four district commissioners will be meeting at the Threadmill Complex in Austell for a day-and-a-half of meetings and discussions. Last month the board adopted a $403.4 million FY 2018 spending plan that included the use of $20 million in contingency spending.

The county is facing another $20 million deficit for fiscal year 2019.

“If you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll get there,” Boyce said in a statement issued Friday. “What I’m trying to do is bring in a process where we as a Board collectively knows what the issues are then the Board gives me some guidance on how to build this budget.”

The budget battles also sparked conflicts between East Cobb’s two commissioners. JoAnn Birrell suggested closing the East Cobb Library. Bob Ott, whose district includes the library, proposed closing another library in his district and making organizational changes to the East Cobb Government Service Center.

Ultimately, the commissioners voted to close no libraries but delayed funding additional staff for the new Sewell Mill Library and Cultural Center until after the budget was adopted.

East Cobb commissioner Bob Ott voted against a millage rate increase, and vowed not to do so to balance the FY 2018 budget. (East Cobb News file photo)

For similar reasons this week, commissioners also delayed a vote to approve a construction contract for Mabry Park.

The Sewell Mill Library and Mabry Park cases center around one of the main items on the retreat agenda: Funding recurring operational and maintenance costs for facilities approved through the SPLOST (Special Local Option Sales Tax).

Northeast Cobb residents have waited for a decade for a passive park in their community, and Boyce and Ott in particular pledged that Mabry Park would be built. They also were adamant that new policies for funding continuing expenses have to be ironed out.

It’s a seemingly perplexing position for Cobb commissioners to be in, given that Cobb reported a record tax digest this year of $33 billion.

In the first big test of his administration, Boyce didn’t get enough support from commissioners to raise the property tax millage rate. His proposal to boost the rate 0.13 to fully fund the 2008 Cobb Parks Bond Referendum was voted down 3-2, with only South Cobb commissioner Lisa Cupid in support.

Boyce, who defeated incumbent chairman Tim Lee last year, pledged to support parks funding. But the Cobb Parks Coalition issued a statement before the millage rate vote saying fulfilling the referendum didn’t require a tax increase.

At a heated town hall meeting in July at the East Cobb Senior Center, many residents spoke out against a tax hike, which Ott and Birrell also opposed.

Boyce, who is a first-time elected official, issued a comment at that meeting that has been a common refrain at times during his first year in office.

“I have to pay for what your commissioners passed last year,” Boyce said. “It’s a bill that’s come due.”

Vote on Cobb County budget, other commission meetings delayed due to weather

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A final public hearing and vote on the fiscal year 2018 Cobb County government budget was scheduled to take place on Tuesday but is being put on hold because of Tropical Storm Irma.

Cobb government offices are closed Monday and Tuesday (East Cobb News coverage here) due to severe weather.

Shortly after 12 p.m. on Monday, Cobb government announced that Tuesday’s regularly scheduled Cobb Board of Commissioners meeting was being rescheduled for Friday, Sept. 22, at 10 a.m.

Cobb commission chairman Mike Boyce
Cobb commission chairman Mike Boyce.

At that meeting, commissioners will conduct a final public hearing on the budget and vote on final approval. Chairman Mike Boyce is recommending an $890 million spending package, with $405 million coming from the general fund, and no millage rate increases (East Cobb News coverage here and here).

The Sept. 22 meeting also will include a vote on the Cobb 2040 Comprehensive Plan, a road map for suggested future land use and other long-term community growth and development strategies to be submitted to the Atlanta Regional Commission.

The commission’s agenda work session that was to have taken place Monday morning has been rescheduled for Tuesday, Sept. 19, at 3 p.m., following the commission’s monthly zoning hearing (which starts at 9 a.m.)

The commission’s work session also slated for today will take place instead on Monday, Sept. 25, at 1:30 p.m., and will feature additional budget presentations.

All of the board’s meetings will take place in the second floor boardroom of the Cobb BOC Building, 100 Cherokee St., in downtown Marietta.

Ott opposes raising millage rate to close $21M Cobb budget gap

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This shouldn’t come as a surprise: Cobb Commissioner Bob Ott is opposed to raising the millage rate to balance the fiscal year 2018 Cobb County budget.

Bob Ott
Commissioner Bob Ott at his East Cobb Library town hall meeting in August. (East Cobb News photo by Wendy Parker)

With commissioners scheduled to adopt a budget next Thursday, Ott sent out a lengthy message right before the Labor Day holiday weekend explaining why he would not support a rise in the property tax millage rate to cover an estimated $21 million shortfall.

Commission chairman Mike Boyce has proposed an $890 million spending package (PDF here) that includes using contingency funding to close the entire deficit gap.

In July, Ott helped foil Boyce’s plan to raise the millage rate to fully fund the $40 million 2008 Cobb Parks referendum (East Cobb News coverage here).

The proposed FY 2018 budget would be balanced by using reserve funding from the following sources:

  • $10.4 million from the reserve for a county employees pay and classification implementation study;
  • $5.7 million from the county Title Ad Valorem Tax Reserve;
  • $5.3 million from the county economic development contingency.

Ott, who’s been vigorously opposed to property tax increases in general, said he can’t support raising the millage rate now, for a full fiscal-year budget, with contingency money available. In his weekly e-mail newsletter that came out on Friday, he said:

“I believe it is wrong to raise the millage rate before the BOC uses the money from these funds to pay-down the deficit. Together, at their height, these funds totaled approximately $22 million being held in reserve on top of the county’s ‘normal’ reserve funds.”

He also hinted at this position at an Aug. 17 town hall meeting at the East Cobb Library, just days after the budget was revealed, telling constituents “it’s your money.”

In his Friday e-mail, Ott urged finding ways to reduce expenses in some county services, including two familiar targets of his, the annual transfer of Cobb water system revenues to the general fund, and transit subsidies:

“I don’t believe the answer to addressing this $21 million deficit is simply an increase in the millage rate. A complete review of the budget and expenses should be done to identify and eliminate wasteful spending. Two areas that I believe illustrate inefficiencies in the budget are the need to transfer $20 million per year from the Water System to the general fund and the roughly $17 million a year subsidy of the county transit system. CobbLinc provides invaluable service to many county residents. However, many buses travel the routes virtually, if not completely, empty.”

Ott’s also been in a budget fight on another front, with fellow East Cobb commissioner JoAnn Birrell, who is proposing to close the East Cobb Library, citing duplication of services.

After hearing from upset East Cobb residents opposed to shuttering the second-busiest branch in the Cobb library system, Birrell defended her proposal at an Aug. 22 public hearing on the budget. She cited a recent report calling for more police officer hires in Cobb (Birrell has long wanted to create a new police precinct in Northeast Cobb) and said she wants to be good steward of taxpayer money.

At his town hall, Ott said he is considering moving some services at the East Cobb Government Service Center to the East Cobb Library and possibly closing an “underperforming” library elsewhere in his district, but he hasn’t elaborated.

Here’s his full statement from Friday; he said he’ll be detailing more suggestions on budget cuts.

EAST COBB TOWN HALL MEETING: Commissioner Bob Ott talks budget, libraries, pipeline and more

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Cobb commissioner Bob Ott

Just a few days after seeing the proposed fiscal year 2018 Cobb County budget for the first time, commissioner Bob Ott briefed East Cobb constituents on the numbers Thursday night and offered some suggestions that could punctuate budget discussions over the next few weeks.

At a packed town hall meeting in the community room of the East Cobb Library, Ott outlined the $890 million spending plan proposed by commission chairman Mike Boyce, including using $21.5 million in one-time reserve funding.

The Cobb Board of Commissioners will hold the first of two public hearings on the budget on Tuesday before approval on Sept. 12. That’s not much time to absorb a proposed spending package that’s 3.79 percent higher than the FY 2017 budget, and only weeks after a heated battle over the property tax millage rate.

Cobb County Government proposed FY 2018 budget
Click the graphic to view and download the budget proposal. 

The budget document also was released this week [there’s a downloadable PDF here] as Cobb homeowners were mailed their property tax bills for 2017. As Ott reminded them, “the tax bill you just got is to pay for [the last fiscal] year.”

The proposed budget is based on the current millage rate established by commissioners last month. Ott and fellow East Cobb commissioner JoAnn Birrell prevailed in their refusal to raise the millage rate by 0.13, as Boyce had wanted.

The inclusion of the proposed reserve funding to help balance the budget is a dramatic one. A total of $10.4 million would come from the reserve for a county employees pay and classification implementation study; $5.7 million would come from the Title Ad Valorem Tax Reserve; and the $5.3 million would come from the county economic development contingency.

“The board has to decide what are the critical needs,” Ott said. “The bottom line is, it’s your money.”

Specifically regarding the reserve money, Ott, an ardent opponent of tax increases, repeated himself: “It is my belief that it’s your money,” and that there’s “no reason” for it to remain unspent and raise taxes instead.

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