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Monday, July 21, 2008
Cityhood movements send strong message to counties
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The folks over in Dunwoody voted last week to become a city, following our lead. Those in favor tallied around 80 percent of the vote, meaning they didn’t vote “yes” they voted “Hell yes!”
It was three years ago June that we Sandy Springsteens overwhelmingly voted to incorporate as a city, and we were followed by Milton, Johns Creek and Chattahoochee Hill Country. And more will follow, I’m sure.
There is no doubt in my mind that becoming a city was a good thing. We had been ill-served by Fulton County for decades. I have since wondered whether we would be a city today if 10 years ago the Fulton County Commission realized the discontent they were creating and started making moves to clean up their act.
And I’m more amazed that other county governments, like DeKalb, haven’t seen the number of cities that have escaped from under the thumb of county rule in the last three years and tried to make an effort to make life better for the communities in their borders.
This is not advanced government we’re talking here. It doesn’t take a genius to see that metro Atlanta counties have suddenly become vulnerable to losing millions is tax revenue by seeing communities incorporate. Some have estimated that cityhood for Dunwoody will cost DeKalb $15 million. That’s going to be a very bitter pill to choke down.
I once posed the question in this space, is there anyone out there willing to offer an argument that we were better off under Fulton County. I had no takers then and I doubt I’m going to find one this time out.
There is no measurement by which I can see that becoming a city was a bad idea. Has it cured all the ills here in our little town? Of course not. But problems that have been years in the making are not cleaned up in two or three years.
But, by becoming our own city we at last had our own mayor and city council representatives to attack those problems, instead of the absentee landlord that was the Fulton County Commission.
Which begs the question - are county governments learning a lesson here or are they on their way to becoming irrelevant?
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