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September 2, 2010
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Officials hard at work on service agreement
Published June 19, 2009
LOGANVILLE — Officials in Loganville announced last week there would be a 60-day extension before the adoption of the service agreement with Walton County. However, officials said they expect it to go much smoother than the one currently under dispute with Gwinnett County.
“The extension is just to get the details worked out,” said Loganville Mayor Ray Nunley. “It was very different to discussions between Gwinnett County and the cities on its service agreement. The one with Walton County was simple — we have sewer and they don’t. They have water and we don’t.”
In the meantime, it is once again up to a judge to decide how to settle the dispute between Gwinnett County and its 15 cities, something officials are concerned could cost the cities and the county state funding.
City Manager Bill Jones said he believes the judge did lift sanctions to provide protections for state funding but is concerned if the dispute carries on much longer without any resolution that could fall away.
“If it does what we stand to lose is the $250,000 Transportation Enhancement grant for sidewalks and benches,” Jones said. “Hopefully it won’t come to that.”
The matter was sent back to a judge last week when the county and cities still couldn’t agree after more than two months of mediation. What is still in dispute is about $50 million in taxes Gwinnett County wants to collect from city residents. But the cities believe city residents are being double charged for some services, such as police and fire, since these services in many instances are provided by the cities and billed through city taxes. Loganville and Snellville have their own police and fire departments and Grayson hires a private security company to supplement its police services from the county.
Gwinnett County had said it would be providing more police and fire services to the cities but it is unclear whether it will have the resources for that now since the public outcry over the proposed millage rate increase has forced budget cuts instead. The county voted June 2 not to raise the millage rate at the present time, going on to announce the first round of budget cuts this week, eliminating county spending to the tune of $81 million for 2009 to balance the budget. Included in that first round of budget cuts was more than $4 million for additional public safety staffing.
In a press release Tuesday, officials said the county is still looking at a budget deficit of $60 million in 2010, $45 million in 2011 and $44 million in 2012.
“Immediately following the vote on June 2, I directed county staff to find ways to close the gap-looking at the current fiscal year first, followed by future years’ budgets,” said Gwinnett County Board of Commission Chairman Charles Bannister. “The only way to narrow the deficit is to make severe cuts that equate to substantial changes in service levels. Our goal is to preserve the core services we provide to residents; however, every department in the organization will experience a budget reduction that will impact the level of services we can deliver.”
Officials said the first round of cuts included the elimination of all 2009 BOC initiatives, more than 100 vacant positions and several program modifications. Another set of recommendations will be up for consideration July 21.
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