Form a New City of South Fulton??? Fast Facts Documents

Background The Vote for a new City of South Fulton is September 18, 2007... Shaky housing market dashes any wishful thinking that a SF City could stay afloat City of South Fulton feasibility study debunked by county officials... Division over whether to create South Fulton, GA continues New Fulton City of Milton having a meltdown Winners and Losers with a new City of South Fulton Cityhood is no magic bullet   Building a city is not cheap Being able to buy fire stations for $5,000 is great but they mean nothing without fire trucks. Vehicle extraction equipment (Jaws of life) can cost $50,000, and a new fire truck can cost between $300,000 to $600,000.  That $900,000 surplus the so called feasibility projects won't buy 2 fire trucks for entire new city.  Local Option Sales Tax (LOST) dollars for cities will not be available until September 2008, the city won’t be able to get tax anticipation notes because it has not established a credit rating.  Milton and Johns Creek are having that struggle now regarding credit.  Transition services while a new city creates its own operational management team from Fulton County are not free.  The county bills new cities monthly at actual cost. Whatever the new city does not outsource in multi-million dollar agreements with CH2M Hill, it will have to pay Fulton County back on a monthly basis even though those LOST tax dollars will not be available until some nine months after the city might be formed. The new city must buy or provide itself the following services that Fulton County presently performs: Municipal Court service, Parks, Parks Maintenance, Recreation Programs, City Jail (FC Jail-Arrest Warrants only), Police, Fire, 911 Service, 800MHz Radio System 800MHz Radio Maintenance, Ambulance/EMS,  Economic Development, Animal Control, Environmental, Water Distribution Erosion & Sediment Control, Sewage Collection Stormwater Management, Street Maintenance/Construction, Building Maintenance/Construction, Community Development, Planning and Zoning, Permitting, Inspections, Code Enforcement and GIS. What happens when a cities do not have enough money to cover their expenses? They raise property taxes or They lower the level of services they provide or They turn in their city charter and dissolve the city like Lithia Springs.  The problem is if we incorporate, Fulton will dismantle its municipal services delivery organization and they will not be able to service the former City of South Fulton.       The latest tweak to the City of South Fulton referendum means all annexations in South Fulton into existing South Fulton Cities finalized by April 2, 2007 are affirmed by state law and are beyond any legal challenge. it now correctly reflects for the vote new boundaries of a smaller proposed City of South Fulton without the 15,000+ acres of the land represented by petitions of voters and landowners to annex into existing South Fulton Cities instead. Why the “Rush to Incorporate”? What is the motivation behind the hurry?  Do we want the higher taxes as in other new Fulton Cities which the proponents of those cities did not disclose to voters? Did you know there are higher franchise fees for cities which unincorporated counties do not have to pay?  This will cause increases in your utility bills. The new cities still have zoning problems – big zoning problems.  Did you hear about the Sandy Springs Councilmember who thinks the city is “falling into an abyss” when she talks about new, local zoning? Even elected officials in the new cities say that there are problems they did not anticipate. Looks like the new North Fulton City of Johns Creek can't afford to start a fire department yet Because of errors in the incorporation bill a City of South Fulton will only get one year of transition services from Fulton County like Police Fire 911 - new North Fulton Cities got 2 years. Can we build Police and Fire departments in a year?  Will we have enough money to buy the assets we already paid for as taxpayers? It could cost up to $15 million for Johns Creek to take over the three county fire stations, buy equipment and add two temporary stations. It could cost another $12 million to operate for a year, according to the task force. See New Map The ever-shrinking proposed City of South Fulton suffered another setback with passage of Bill SF City supporter: "This is a huge problem. It's taken a substantial portion of the new city away." More than 15,000 acres that would have been part of the planned city have been taken by cities Bill sanctions all annexations of land and tax base planned for the new city up until April 2, 2007. Much of the commercial tax base is gone, the tax burden will fall on homeowner's property taxes. Bill reflects the substantially smaller boundaries of the smaller city. Why would pro-city folks want to buy police, fire and parks assets we already own from Fulton County? State to decides to fund study to see if  South Fulton would even be viable after the huge annexations. Supporters have yet to demonstrate new city can stand on residential tax income after annexations. SB301 allows a vote to tax Fulton Industrial and prohibitions against its annexation. Fulton Industrial will not automatically be included in the new City of South Fulton.  There is a second vote to approve including Fulton Industrial in the new City that only takes place is the city is approved.  All Fulton County voters including north Fulton voters must approve giving Fulton Industrial to a City of South Fulton. Pro-city folks plan to outsource city services.  Sandy Springs residents now regret privatizing services. AJC Article: Proposed city of South Fulton "taken to cleaners"   Background There has been considerable information shared about the so-called benefits and viability of creating a new city called South Fulton, GA.   Many residents have taken the initiative to annex into existing cities instead of awaiting the threat of a new city. You may recall initially we were led to believe by our elected officials over a year ago that our only choice was to form a new city or not - hold that thought. Many were and still are unaware of the decisions we will make either consciously or by doing nothing.  Deep inside they hope that by not consciously making a choice somehow things will remain the same or status quo.  The reality is they will not.  A series of circumstances were set in motion beginning with the legislation to allow a vote for the incorporation of Sandy Springs that led to incorporation fever, which could ultimately end up with North Fulton seceding to form its own county.  These changes have impacted the financials of South Fulton and created all sorts of scrambling at the county to maintain service delivery.  They have resulted in layoffs, longer waits for county services, reductions or the near elimination of some services like parks, and the exodus of many county employees over uncertainty. Some in SW Fulton are so focused on the near term battle, they don't see we may be getting played in the war by adversaries near and afar. On September 18, 2007 registered voters in unincorporated South Fulton County will have the opportunity to vote to either form a new city of South Fulton, GA or remain unincorporated.  Many have bought into the anti-annexation campaign so much they don't know what they are for or what they want instead of annexation.  It is important to realize that while you might not be totally convinced about choosing to join an established city, the choice to form a new city of South Fulton, GA would be disastrous. Pro-city folks plan to outsource city services.  Sandy Springs residents now regret privatizing services. Many stayed at home during the Sandy Springs cityhood vote  and a very small minority of the residents voted it into fruition.  Remember all of South Fulton is voting on this new city. If you in SW Fulton and you do not commit to registering to vote if you're not registered, and vote against a new city, you may very well be changing your mailing address very soon. Some think from what they've heard in some pro-city meetings that they know the pros and cons of building a new city. Others unfortunately are deciding solely based on what proponents have told them, emotions or gut feelings. The key to the continued success and prosperity of our community is for residents to make these crucial informed decisions based on facts and truth. Because of mistakes in the legislation for a new City of South Fulton, we are already nearly eight months into its transition period for emergency services to be provided to the city by Fulton County. Transition refers to the limited period of time Fulton County must legally provide a new city police, fire, EMS/Ambulance/911 to allow new cities time to build their own systems or contract to outsource their emergency services infrastructure. Well before the vote in September for a new city takes place, the countdown started last year toward when transitional emergency services to South Fulton, GA go away. Confirm it yourself - incredibly according Fulton County’s Transitional Documents the transition period for a city of South Fulton started last year in November 2006! That means if we vote for a new city, Fulton County will only be required to provide transitional emergency services for less than a year from its inception (11 months - December 1, 2007 to October 31, 2008). Thus we would only have eleven (11) months to build our own police, fire and EMS/911 departments and systems.  (Buy/build Police and Fire Stations, buy Fire Trucks, Police Cars, guns, bullets, hire/ train police officers, firemen 911 dispatchers....you get the idea?) During these eleven months taxes must be collected by the new city to fund this massive effort or huge amounts of money must be borrowed.  If you think in light of this there won't be a huge tax increase with a new city, well beyond what you'd pay if annexed into an existing one - think again. By comparison the North Fulton cities of Milton and Johns Creek are given a full 24 months for an orderly transition of emergency services.  We've got the deck stacked against us before we even vote! Will we free our minds and demand from elected officials what we want, or remain captive to have them continue to tell us what they think we need? Confirm your decision to be free at the polls on September 18th. Fast Facts Proponents including some of our elected officials have and continue to conduct informational "Pep Rallies" extolling the so-called virtues of forming a new city and would have you believe a host of so called benefits and facts.   One elected official who was an early supporter of a new city now is against it and wants to remain unincorporated. We examine here some of those statements by proponents and we expand on the "whole truth" and challenge you to not just believe us, but do the research and confirm the facts for yourself: Statement Truth The city will be getting Fulton Industrial Boulevard district revenue. False - Currently all cities are prohibited from annexing or including in their borders the Fulton Industrial Tax District area.  The September 18 vote to form a new city WOULD NOT include the Fulton Industrial Commercial Tax District in the city's borders. Senate Bill 301 was passed to repeal the amendment to the Georgia Constitution that prohibited the Fulton County Industrial District (the Fulton Industrial Blvd. area) from being taxed by the Fulton County governing authority. But the vote for FIB is in November 2007.  Residents must decide on a new city in September 2007 without knowing whether FIB will contribute to it. Pro-city advocates initially said we did not need FIB to be financially viable now supporters characterize this FIB revenue as "extremely crucial to the financial viability of the new City of South Fulton". All of Fulton County must vote for the FIB referendum. Dr. Eger's study proves the City of South Fulton is financially viable. False - The revised study has unrealistically low assumptions about salaries in major metropolitan areas. The It does not reflect the recently lowered millage rate that means the projected tax revenue is too high.  It actually concludes that based on statistics our police and fire costs are too high and we should consider reducing the number of police and firemen. With the huge increase in crime do you really have faith in the numbers from someone who says we have too many police? The report is filled with disclaimers and various statements that warn the reader about the reliability of its predictions, stating, “the task of predicting … is not an exact science”.  The annexations will not materially impact the financial viability city of South Fulton. False -Large commercial areas have been annexed into other cities, the remaining tax burden will fall on residential taxpayers.  Why do you think that cityhood advocates spent much of their time and money putting out signs opposing annexations and filing lawsuits? Because they threaten the financial viability of a new city.  The impact continues to grow as communities continue to join existing municipalities and can do so until the vote on September 18, 2007 If you look at the unincorporated South Fulton Special Services District (SSD) budget revenues exceed expenses, so a new city would experience similar favorable financials. False -A city has many responsibilities above and beyond what the South Fulton Special Services District (SSD) has if South Fulton were to remain unincorporated. In addition to police, fire and parks a city also has to pay for judicial (municipal court and jails), ambulance/EMS 911 services, animal control, public works (water distribution, sewage collection and treatment, street maintenance/construction, city building maintenance/construction, erosion/storm water control), planning and zoning, code enforcement, permitting and inspections, and economic development (Source FC checklist for new city services).  These general fund items are not included in the SSD budget.  Pro-city folks will talk about how a city has access to local option sales tax (LOST) dollars, but the city does not get them until September 2008. That's almost 10 months after a city might be formed. We'll be bankrupt by then because the new city won't have any credit to get a Tax anticipation Note (TAN) The newly available LOST funds will not cover all of the municipal services a new city must now provide which means services will have to be cut or taxes will have to be raised. With a new city of South Fulton you will remain in Fulton Schools. True - You will continue to face the same problems in Fulton Schools particularly School Board inaction on creating programs to address the educational performance gap between North and South Fulton Schools. I can continue to send my child to a good school in North Fulton Maybe - That won't be an option anymore if North Fulton splits off to form a new county and its own school system with all of the new schools that South Fulton helped pay for.  Now that they have all of their new schools, we're stuck with what little new construction has started to date in a system with much less money to work with. We think its a good idea to outsource city services like Sandy Springs and other new North Fulton cities. Maybe - This is not necessarily a good idea to farm out services to a for profit business.  Just because others did it doesn't mean it works.  Look in the newspaper and you will find there are a lot of problems with this arrangement. There will be more local control with a new city. True - Except local control is only a good thing only if the leadership has integrity and puts constituent's needs before their own personal gain. If it means granting power to those who do not wish to sincerely serve the community - no thanks! Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. - Do you really know why leaders are adopting the positions they do?  - The adage follow the money is so true.  Have you examined their campaign disclosure records and finances to see why they do what they do?  - Ask yourself who in our community are you ready to trust in a leadership role with ours the taxpayer's checkbook?  - Who do you trust to be your mayor and councilperson? - Are you ready to just coronate the self appointed pushing for a new city? We will have our own City - South Fulton, GA True - This is true you will get to change your mailing address from Atlanta, GA to South Fulton, GA and order new checks, stationary and send out a host of change of address notices. This is a win-win situation for unincorporated South Fulton. False - Yes it is a win for future elected officials and their relatives with jobs or contracts with the new city; banks and other financial institutions who loaned the new city money to resolve cash flow problems; members of the “organizing committee” who will become elected city officials or whose companies will do business with the city, but the taxpayers and residents lose! New and existing commercial development will fund the new city. False - South Fulton has not been very successful in attracting commercial development to provide tax revenue. Our time will come, but not soon enough to fund the ramp up required by a new city - particularly without the credit North Fulton cities were able to secure. We have lost much of the existing commercial revenue due to the annexations by Union City and the Fulton Industrial revenue will continue to be shared countywide with North Fulton.  Sure we have plenty of new homes that will necessitate additional tax funding for new schools, but in the absence of commercial development like in North Fulton, who pays the taxes?  YOU the homeowner. Sandy Springs voted overwhelmingly for cityhood. True - Yes 90% of those that actually voted did so for cityhood.  Except that was a very small percentage of the residents of Sandy Springs. So a small minority of folks decided to more forward.  Will you remain unregistered to vote or stay at home hoping by inaction for status quo OR will you turn out on September 18 to vote against the ill advised choice of a new city of South Fulton, GA ? We should form a new city because the window to  form new cities will go away soon, so we should too. False - There is no evidence that the legislature intends to reinstate the 3-mile rule that prevented Sandy Springs from becoming a city for 30 years. Doing something just because someone else does it reminds me of a childhood adage monkey see, monkey do....  Just because some in North Fulton did it does not mean it was a good idea.  One size does not fit all. All of the new cities of Milton, Johns Creek, and Sandy Springs already have big issues and they have the commercial tax base we do not.  Here's just a sampling of the issues that they face:   New Fulton City is struggling financially AJC: South Fulton new city drive 'seems to be coming apart' The newly incorporated city is strapped for cash Local Control in New Fulton City Dysfunctional Information and Links: Senate Bill 552 Checklist of New City's Services County Transition Plans for proposed new cities Incorporations Provisions Comparison Incorporation Impact on Local Option Sales Tax (LOST) Analysis of the old "Dr. Eger Report" on the financial feasibility of new SF Fair and Balanced? Incorporation - Winners and Losers Why Atlanta back to top Get Viewer to read Adobe PDF Documents                                                                                                       back to top