Ellijay City Council, We Would Have to Close the Fire Station

The City of Ellijay will start the Local Option Sales Tax (L.O.S.T) negotiations by asking for 20% of the split with the County and East Ellijay.Yesterday Ellijay City Council passed a motion to allow Mayor Al Hoyle to enter negotiations with the County and East Ellijay for the split of L.O.S.T. This is required to be done every ten years. The split currently has Ellijay – 17%, East Ellijay -10%, and the county receives the balance.

Last week Commission Chairman J.C. Sanford hand delivered to the two Mayors the county’s offer to start negotiations. The County offered Ellijay 6.753% and East Ellijay 3.014% which would give the County 90.233%.

This offer was not received very well by the Ellijay City Council. This would be a 23% cut that equals to $350,000 the city would lose. The change in percentage would add only 2% revenue to the county. The council felt the county was trying to take from the cities to bail them out.

And if they agreed to these percentages the City of Ellijay would have to cut services. The results could be closing the fire station and cutting the police department. Mayor Hoyle said the current property tax millage rate is 3% and if they accepted the county’s offer they would have to raise property tax to 7.5% to make up the difference.

The city council believes they have a good argument to ask for more than the county offered. They referred to being the county seat with the courthouse and also how many schools were in the city limits. The City of Ellijay also explained that a lot more property has been annexed into the city in the last 10 years thus requiring an increase in services by the city. The city believes that needs to be taken into consideration.

Gilmer County residents have already seen a reduction in services in the last couple of years. If both Cities do not retain enough to operate the services they currently provide then it only stands to reason that the amount the County will gain will not be sufficient to replace those services and have any added benefit. So we have to wonder what this would really accomplish.

The City of East Ellijay did not have a council meeting but Mr. Wood told FYN that Mayor West had responded to the county in a letter and expressed that they look forward to starting negotiations with the county.

The county and cities must officially notify the state that negotiations have started by July 1, 2012 and the proposed split must be sent to the state by December 31, 2012.
It seems early to start this discussion over the L.O.S.T. But the time may be needed to negotiate this considerable gap between the way the county sees it and the way the City of Ellijay and the City of East Ellijay see it.

There are 8 criteria used to set the split – see below where you can visit the 2 websites to read the L.O.S.T. guidelines.

ACCG

GMA