Saporta Report reported Monday that DeKalb County officials are planning on asking the Georgia General Assembly in early 2013 to approve a local option sales tax to be spent on various transportation projects.  From CEO Burrell Ellis’ budget recommendation to DeKalb County Commissioners, he writes…

“In 2013, we will seek the Georgia Legislature’s approval for a local option sales tax for Transportation purposes, in order to address this growing backlog of street resurfacing, sidewalks, intersection safety and congestion relief and related projects.”

The county has nearly spent all the 2006 transportation bond funds, and now wants to allocate $5 million from the HOST program to continue to pay for needed transportation repairs and upgrades.  But HOST isn’t enough to leverage all available matching funds, according to Saporta.  That’s why the commissioners and the CEO are pursuing this option.

Al points out that a list of 12 amendments to the Transportation Investment Act draft list now posted on the Atlanta Regional Commission’s website.   Among them is CEO Burrell Ellis’ request to take $297 million from GA 400 projects and give it to the I-20 East corridor mass transit project, which is seconded by Decatur Mayor Bill Floyd.  Here’s the wording of the amendment…

The purpose of this amendment is allocate an additional $297 million in regional sales tax funds to the mass transit extension along I-20 East corridor (TIA-M-023), by reducing that amount of sales tax funding from the projects proposed on State Route 400 at I-285 (TIA-AR-030), and the S.R. 400 Collector-Distributor lanes (TIA-FN-014), and asking the State of Georgia to pledge that these important roadway projects for the Region and the State will still be completed over the next 10 years through multiple alternative sources of funding such as public-private partnerships, toll revenues, bonds, and other state-generated funds that can leverage the federal funds that are also being programmed for this corridor, in order to create a true win-win both for economic competitiveness and congestion relief through our enhanced regional transit network as well as the roadway network. The remaining $45.5 million in TIA funding is proposed to be split equally between TIA-AR-030 and TIA-FN-014 to advance the projects.

And here’s the stated “reason for the request”…

On September 27, 2011, the DeKalb County Board of Commissioners voted to request an additional $297 million to fund this priority mass transit project. The completion of a mass transit extension along the I-20 East Corridor has been a top priority in the Regional transportation plans of the Atlanta Regional Commission, the MARTA Board, the DeKalb County CEO and Board of Commissioners for many years. The projected ridership for this line would be among the highest for the transit extensions being considered by the Regional Roundtable for the Transportation Investment Act. Alternative funding sources are available for the SR 400 projects.

The amendment is slated to be considered at a roundtable meeting tomorrow.

Last night as the storms started, my land line rang from a number that identified as “GA ST GOVT.” Curious, I answered it, and I was greeted by a recorded message from Decatur mayor Bill Floyd, inviting me to participate in a “Telephone Town Hall” on the “Transportation Investment Act,” the July 2012 referendum to consider a 10-year penny sales tax to fund transportation improvements in 10 Metro regional counties. The discussion was taking place right that very minute. All I had to do was stay on the line.

I’ve been invited to participate in all sorts of “roundtables” and “town halls” and “webinars” and such, but never have I gotten a phone call like this one. On the one hand, it might have been nice to get a little bit of advance notice that this call was coming, but on the other hand, advance notice may not have changed the likelihood of my participation. As it was, it came at a good moment; I had unplugged the computer during the thunderbumper and was unloading the dishwasher and listening to that blessed rain fall. So I crooked the phone between my ear and shoulder while I cleaned the kitchen and paid attention.

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Sewers!  Jobs!  Sewers!  Jobs!

So, what’s the silver-lining of over $1 billion in EPA-mandated sewer repairs?  Over 1,300 regional jobs!

So says DeKalb County CEO Burrell Ellis in his annual State of the County speech this morning, according to the AJC’s Megan Matteucci.

Ellis will give his speech again tonight at 6pm at the Maloof Auditorium in downtown Decatur.

1920’s Albuquerque, NM sewer photo courtesy of SewerHistory.org

Well this is just great.  From the AJC…

Decatur police are investigating allegations that DeKalb County officials illegally detained former DeKalb Chief Terrell Bolton and stole his diabetes testing kit.

According to a police report obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Bolton asked officers to issue arrest warrants for CEO Burrell Ellis, Sheriff Thomas Brown and county chief operating officer Keith Barker on charges of false imprisonment, theft by taking and criminal trespass.

Decatur Police Chief Mike Booker said Tuesday that the investigation is in the preliminary stages.

This Sunday’s AJC gets their investigative mitts on a recent GSU study commissioned by the DeKalb County Commission, which states that DeKalb County has “too many managers and and almost double the number of employees as Cobb and Gwinnett counties.”

For instance…

DeKalb CEO Burrell Ellis has a staff of 24, according to county records. An additional five positions in the CEO’s staff are vacant. And the county has 30 people working in its Board of Commissioners office, including DeKalb’s seven elected commissioners.

In contrast, Cobb County Manager David Hankerson has five other people working in his office…

The GSU report recommends eliminating over 900 DeKalb County positions, and the CEO’s office doesn’t necessarily disagree, noting in a release to the AJC that downsizing is a part of the recent reorg caused by a stunted economy.  DeKalb Commissioners are also

Now of course, there’s always this caveat…

Beyond comparing DeKalb to similar governments, it is difficult to measure the effectiveness of county staffing, said GSU professor Greg Streib, one of the study’s authors. Officials from several national county government associations said there are no standards for government staffing because of their vast differences across the nation.

But that’s more of the caveat you throw out there when your county has, say, 10%-15% more employees with a similar population size.  But twice as many?