Ellijay Cracks Down on Drugs and Alcohol with New Fine

The city of Ellijay will now have higher fines for three different drug and alcohol related charges.During a workshop before the regular meeting on Monday, Ellijay Police Chief Larry Callahan recommended to the council that the city increase its base fines for three drug and alcohol related offenses.

The reason, Callahan said, is to help the city correspond to a recent change in legislation by House Bill 1176 that affects surcharge fees on drug and alcohol arrests. In return, Callahan says that the state plans to use the surcharge fees for the County Drug Abuse Treatment and Education Fund.

“House Bill 1176, says that basically the state is requiring us to give them 50 percent of our base fine amounts on these set violations,”

said Callahan in the workshop.

The violations that Callahan said the bill will affect are DUI, Alcohol violation by person under 21, homicide by vehicle, and serious injury by vehicle that involves a DUI. However, Callahan said the city does not hear homicide by vehicle in city court cases, so only fines pertaining to the three other offenses will increase.

“My suggestion is we increase our fine amount to cover what the state is going to take,”

said Callahan.
When asked by Ellijay Mayor Al Hoyle exactly what the fines would increase to, Callahan said he didn’t how all three offenses are to increase, but gave an example of an increase on one charge.

“I can tell you that right now our first offense DUI is right around $1100. It’s going to increase close to $2,000 for a first offense DUI.”

After hearing Callahan’s recommendation in the workshop, the council after deciding it was necessary to increase the fines later voted to approve the changes in fines.

Also, in the city council workshop meeting on Monday, the council listened to a request from the city of Ellijay’s Downtown Development Authority Chairman Larry Robinson.

Robinson asked council to consider putting an item on a future agenda that would amend its Beer and Wine ordinance to include the sale of alcohol by the downtown development authority. He said this could allow for the authority to use the sale of alcohol as a fundraising source. Robinson then shared a model from an existing Beer and Wire ordinance from the city of Carrolton with the council to use as a model.

Downtown Development Authority Member and Marketing and Promotions Chair Jim Stover also suggested that members of the authority and council have a meeting to discuss the change.

“There is just so many facades to an ordinance like that and so many opinions. When we do this we would like to make sure that everything has been thought of,”

said Stover.

The Downtown Development Authority and members of the city council are scheduling a meeting on the ordinance for next week.